This Is It: A Novel in Stories by Matthew Fox

Author:Matthew Fox [Fox, Matthew]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Gay, Fiction & Literature, LGBT, Humorous, Fiction
ISBN: 9781773371214
Google: BI1i0AEACAAJ
Publisher: Great Plains Publications
Published: 2024-10-14T23:00:00+00:00

6

The Last Son

From the cellar, Bonifacia followed her parents’ footsteps on the map in her head. They were in the kitchen, creaking their way to the master bedroom. Mama was quick for a pregnant lady. Bonifacia could make out her mix of shuffling and hurrying, like she was running a race in slippers. Papa clomped behind her, barking in Italian. Mama barked back. Bonifacia understood more of their dialect than they suspected. She made out “cold” and “crazy” from Papa, “shame” and “money” from Mama.

There were daddy-long-legs in the cellar. They creeped out to judge Bonifacia in her musky, dirt-floored crucible. Papa had sent her down here as a punishment because she’d told off Roberto—she can’t remember why—and now she had to clean all the wine jugs with a pair of her father’s retired underwear, dipped into a tin bucket that contained water and a drop of bleach. The jugs stank of mould and sour booze. This was her fourth hour with that toxic mix. She wrung the underwear over the last jug and watched soapy tears roll down the glass surface, cutting paths in the grime. She hated the work, but at least she didn’t get the belt this time. And she liked being isolated from the scandal—from the house’s hot core of anger.

School, too, was a refuge. Bonifacia was allowed to walk the two miles on her own now that Lia had graduated to the high school, which was in the opposite direction. Each day at 3:30 p.m. she pushed open the school’s doors and considered turning right instead of left. But then she’d imagine her mother an hour later, staring down Laurier Street between a crack in the lace curtains, rubbing her pregnant belly, worried face floating above the MILK EGGS BREAD signs in the window. Once this image was in her mind, Bonifacia knew she had no choice. She’d turn left and climb the hill home.

Her parents were moving apart now. Papa was still yelling in the bedroom; Mama in the washroom. She was in the washroom a lot lately—for refuge, Bonifacia thought—but Papa couldn’t even give her peace on the toilet. He said something about deserving better. She said something about deserving more for the $15 they sent back to his family in Italy every month.

Bonifacia imagined what $15 could have bought them, if it hadn’t gone to Italy all these years. Better mattresses, a stronger lock on the bedroom door, insect poison. She let a daddy-long-legs come up her forearm to the elbow, then flicked it off. It somersaulted through the air and landed in the pail of water, appendages up and kicking. She wondered what it might be thinking—I wish I could scream, perhaps? She wondered if it knew it was dying. If I were a spider, I would scream, she thought.

“Oh, go to bed!” her mother screeched, above. Mama moved to the living room, Papa sat on the bed. The mattress squeaked under him. This signalled a detente, but nothing was resolved. It would all pick up at a later provocation.

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