Elizabeth Street - Laurie Fabiano [13]
With every item that Giovanna packed, Nunzio assured her this was a brief chapter in their lives. He would soon return to Scilla with the money they needed to move north and have Giovanna start her studies. Giovanna never laughed at his plan again, but she felt like she was playing along with a child’s fantasy. All she wished for was that Nunzio would return to her and the child she hoped she was carrying. She wondered why Nunzio’s dream had to be bigger than her own and reminded herself that was how it had always been. He was the idealist and she the pragmatist. Yet, like everything in their lives, there were contradictions. He was the idealist with little faith, and she was the pragmatist who believed in miracles. Nunzio dreamt and Giovanna prayed.
Giovanna insisted on going with Nunzio and her father to Naples. On the night before they were to leave, they both had trouble sleeping. Nunzio awoke at one point to find Giovanna carefully unraveling the Christmas tablecloth and winding the yarn into a ball. He did not question her and instead helped her undo the stitches. When the last of the string was wound on the ball, he simply took her hand and led her back to bed. They found it difficult to speak to each other and spent what little time they had in an entangled embrace.
It took them a day to walk to Reggio. They avoided the roads, knowing they might be stopped and forced to pay a tax, or jumped by brigands who would assume that if they were traveling on a road they were wealthy. Instead, they took to the hills, and when they did encounter brigands in the mountains, they were given a hot meal and advice for safely navigating the streets of Naples. Sitting by the fire, a man with many slashes on his face, some scarred and others fresh, warned, “If the ship is not ready, go back into the mountains. The port is filled with thieves and hucksters.”
From Reggio they took a boat to Naples. Emotionally and physically drained, they slept for most of the trip. Giovanna had never been to Naples, or to any city so large, and she was at once repulsed and awed. The smells and voices assaulted her, and the buildings made her jaw gape. With the brigands’ words ringing in their ears, they avoided the peddlers selling “Americani clothes,” the “dentists” who offered to extract troublesome teeth before the voyage, the “monks” who sold blessings for safe passage, and the cures for trachoma, the dreaded eye disease that would prevent an immigrant access to l’America.
Giovanna was relieved that the Spartan Prince was leaving the next day. She couldn’t imagine being able to act so strong for much longer. Nunzio bought a ticket for steerage and was examined by the ship’s doctor. The shipping companies did not want to run the risk of transporting back a rejected immigrant at their expense. After Nunzio passed the physical, they coached him. The shipping agent asked in Neapolitan dialect, “Do you have a job in America?”
“Yes,” answered Nunzio, thinking of Lorenzo’s promise to find him a job.
“No, the answer is no,” reprimanded the agent. “If you say yes, you will be rejected. A yes means that you are contracted labor, and that’s illegal.”
“No, I have no job,” Nunzio repeated.
They slept in a pensione near the port and woke to the sounds of a ship’s departure—the vendors’ cries, the clopping of heavy hooves hauling luggage, and men shouting orders. Nearing the ship, they also heard the wails and sobs of the many women who had come to bid their husbands and sons good-bye. Peddlers circled in and out of embracing families in a last-ditch effort to sell their wares. They knew their prey was vulnerable, and a distraught mother might pull out her last coin for a blessing or extra food.
Domenico cut the awkward silence between Giovanna and Nunzio with