Page 12 of The Butcher's Wife

When I step inside, I’m struck by how old my parents look. Everyone’s aged so much since I’ve been gone. Mom’s hair is tucked inside a pink satin bonnet, and she’s wearing a matching pink nightgown. She has a face full of makeup—in case of an emergency, she always says, but Serafina and I are pretty sure it’s because Dad’s never seen her without it. Dad’s shirtless. His hairy belly juts out over his lap, his hands clasped on top. His CPAP mask lies next to his thigh.

“What is it?” Mom asks.

The ridiculous thought of asking to sleep in their room crosses my mind, and I cast it aside just as quickly.

“Are you okay?” I ask Dad.

“Anne—Serafina!” Mom scolds.

We never talk aloud about Dad’s stuff. He’s whole. There’s no blood or broken bones. If I have concerns, I keep them to myself.

Dad grunts. “What do you want?”

“Rafa told me what happened,” I say. “Who am I going to marry now?”

Mom gives an exhausted sigh. “It is three in the morning. Let’s save this for breakfast. Your father had a long day, and he needs to sleep.”

“I want...” I say, and for a moment, I fight against the wild thrashing of indecision, until—this is how I keep my family safe. It’s the same way I’ve always kept my family safe, with my beauty and my body. “I want to marry Dom.”

Mom sputters, choking on her shock like a fish on a riverbank. “Annetta!”

“Serafina,” I correct, and she snaps her mouth shut. I turn to Dad. “Can you do it? Make Dom marry me?”

“That man is twenty years your senior,” Mom says.

Aldo had forty years on Serafina. Dad has eight on Mom. Since when do they care about what’s appropriate?

“He could protect me,” I say simply.

He could protect all of us.If anyone can do the impossible, it’s Dom.

Dad blows out a long stream of air. Mom looks over at him sharply.

He’ll think about it. It’s as good an answer as I’ll get tonight.

“Thanks,” I say, feeling like I’ve left a slip of paper in the prayer box. “I’m glad you’re okay, Dad. I love you both.”

4

ANNETTA

My first weddinghad fallen straight out of a fairytale. The joining of the Barbaras and the Chiarellis could be nothing short of perfection.

I’d ridden on a horse-drawn carriage through arches of pink roses and lavender wisteria, dusted with tiny, delicate baby’s breath. When I stepped out in my hand-embroidered gown, which had been flown in from London and cost more than a house, everyone turned to admire me. I’d spent weeks starving myself to squeeze into the dress, but the corset top still made me a bit breathless as I walked down the aisle. If you looked very closely, my skin was visible beneath the faintly sheer white of the fabric.

The men I’d grown up around, my uncles, cousins, and family friends, leered as I walked past, but I didn’t cringe. I didn’t hide. I held my head high, like a good daughter. I was there to show power, and the way a woman in our family shows power is by being skinny, beautiful, and pure.

The sight of Frederico at the end of the aisle, watching me with adoration and looking like a prince with his perfectly coiffed hair and his tailored tuxedo, made guilt tugat me. The Chiarellis had asked for Serafina—the accomplished, pretty, elegant twin—to be his bride. When Serafina cried herself sick each night for weeks, I asked to meet Frederico privately and gave him a clumsy, enthusiastic blowjob so he’d pick me instead.

It hadn’t felt like such a hardship. Frederico was charming and young. He was a better choice than any other match I would have had.

Maybe I would learn to love him.

Serafina was grateful I’d given her a few more years of freedom, so much so that I had to make her stop bringing me tea and bouquets. As I walked down an aisle strewn with softly wilting rose petals to a handsome, kind-faced husband, I thought,maybe I should’ve let her do this. Frederico would be a good husband. He would make his future wife happy.

I was wrong.

Now, at Saint Roch Catholic Church, where dust bunnies and wafer crumbs collect along the edges of the pews, and the faint smell of mold permeates the air, I make myself a different bet. This won’t be the husband who makes me happy, but maybe he can keep me safe.