It all started on a summer day in Trani, a town on the coast of Southern Italy. The sea drew waves along the shore of the sandy beach I've known since childhood. Fires burnt, women screamed, and children cried while the men held them tight against their chests. When I was eighteen my mother was murdered, taken from my life forever. Today, I sit in silence on golden sand, wishing I could sail my boat across the Mediterranean and into the Atlantic.
Five in the morning. It's always the best time to be awake in the summer. The sun is preparing to rise, offering the hope of a new day, yet not the promise. The wind is cool, brushing my hair from my shoulder onto my back, letting it rest and graze on my face, untamed.
I hear voices shouting at my left, far away but approaching quickly. Muffled and laughing like hyenas, I stay where I am, I'm safe, which is not to say that I don't feel threatened. Because my father pays his taxes to the Locals I know I am safe. But because there are Locals to whom he must pay taxes, I know I will never be safe.
"La principessa di ghiaccio, signore e signori" their faces become clear as they draw near, breaking through the silence with laughs and smiles, all of which is a facade. They call me 'the ice princess', what a beautiful title to have gained over the years. What a horrible name for a nineteen year old girl. Three boys: Marco, Tommaso and Alessio, pace forward with a somber expression. They've known pain and witnessed murder. Youth is short and precious here in the south.
"Six o'clock, it's good to see you Ana" Tommaso says as they all sit next to me on the beach.
"Good to see you too" I reply, as I do everyday. I go running at five and meet here at six. Always. For ten minutes we all sit in silence. Marco likes to rock backwards and forwards, Tommaso just looks at his feet, Alessio closes his eyes and sometimes I think I hear him sob. I like to look up at the sky.
My mother along with theirs was killed five months ago. The four wives of ordinary men were taken at night and forced on a motor boat. The sons were also taken, the fathers gunned when they dared to rise, and in the worst cases, the daughters raped. I can't decide what's worse, having seen it or not. Five months ago there had been a revolt against the Locals, the tax for businesses was higher than expected and no one wanted to pay it. These things are always about money. Marco, Tommaso and Alessio's parents had been involved in that revolt. Mine hadn't. The Locals had taken the night to make an example of the rebellious, and brought my mother for good measure, an additional threat to anyone who might have decided to join in on the rebellion. A member told Tommaso to drive twenty kilometers off the coast if he wanted to live. Tommaso did as instructed. And here we all are
"Do you think my mom knew she was going to die?" Marco's voice breaks.
"Yeah, she knew. I knew" Tomaso answers. The mothers had been told to stand on a plastic sheet upon which they were then shot. How could they not know?
"I wish I'd said goodbye"
"Shut up already." Alessio sighs, annoyed. Alessio never speaks of what happened, he wants to show the word he is strong when really he is the weakest of them all. Tell everyone what you saw here tonight so there be no doubt about whose boss the Locals had said to him, after which they drove back to the hole they came crawling out of, and let the boys free.
Free to live in anger and sorrow. There had been no last words. No last cigarettes or dances or kisses or smiles. Just four bullets to the heads of each woman before they were sunk to the bottom of the ocean.
"Fuck you, Alessio. I'm not going to pretend my mom isn't fifty feet underwater just because the truth hurts" Marco snaps. Our stories were so true they often seemed fiction. How many times had the police dismissed us with a laugh? Some truly didn't believe us, the rest were mafia.
"He's right, you know." Tommaso says to no one in particular.
"Whatever" Alessio snaps.
There is nothing left to say, our memories are as present as our futures, always shifting, sometimes blurry, but never too blurry to be forgotten. Together we slowly rise from the pain of our memories and our emotions and walk our way back to normality.
The roads smell like fresh bread, sea salt and gasoline from the ports. The houses are yellow, but so dirty with dust and time they seem grey at times, with broken windows and colorful curtains. My house is in one of the three apartment buildings that makes a small square.
"Ana! Come up here a second!" Melina's voice echoes from the balcony of the red building, she is one of the ten people I know are living in that building, but there must be at least seventy. In shorts and a tank top I rush into Melina's building. She isn't our neighbor but had been close with my mother. A lot of people had known my mother. I take the stairs two at a time to the second floor, where she lives.
"Here, here" She flashes me her delightful smile from where she stands at the end of the narrow hall, motioning with her hand for me to follow her. Melina sows while her husband repairs shoes. Her son and my friend Veste bakes at the local panetteria.
"Ciao Melina" I hug her before greeting Giovanni, her husband
"It's been so long, you're so beautiful Ana" Giovanni says, pulling back from the hug to asses me at arm's length.
"It's only been a week Giovanni" He shakes his head and hugs me again. There is never pity in his eyes, or in his touch. We share our sorrow, our story, without feeling sorry for ourselves. Pity was for the poor, not the survivors.
"Look" Melina comes back into the living room, smiling with pride. I hadn't even noticed her leaving I was so distraught by Giovanni's hug. In arms she holds a dress, light blue with red flowers. It has a V neckline and a cotton belt that wraps around the waist.
"I love it" I tell her admiring the dress, which she places in my arms. "Grazie" She smiles, petting my cheek before giving it an affectionate slap
"Your mother would have killed me had she known I was letting you wear those baggy jeans of yours all around town, or these tiny shorts." Melina's smile fades quickly at the memory of her friend, "She was such a lady, that woman. Sweet, gentle, smart, a real catch" My mother was a lot of other things she had failed to mention; fierce being one of them. She was smart enough not to have participated in an active, open revolt destined for tragedy, but brave enough never to have bowed, never to have gone to the Locals' dinners, never to have been intimidated by the truth.
"Now come on Melina, no need for that kind of talk" Giovanni's stiff laugh hushes his loved one's mournful thoughts. Melina snaps out of her sadness, putting on a forces smile.
"Try it on, I want to see you in something with color for once. And take a shower while you're at it, you smell worse than Giovanni's cooking!" With a sniffle of a tear and little chuckle, she pushes me towards the bathroom next to the kitchen. It was a small house with only one bedroom, a kitchen, a bathroom and a living room. Whenever I slept over at their place, I slept in the living room with Veste; we'd known each other since I was born. There was little space, but enough light for Veste to scare the living crap out of me whenever he felt like it.
In the bathroom I remove my black tank top and shorts, then my underwear and bra. In the shower I am relieved by the cold water rushing over me. Hot water around here is a privilege. It's expensive too, so we only turned it on during the winter and autumn for one hot shower a week. I don't mind it, my mother hadn't either. The only people who think they are too good for it are the Locals. They have hot water all year round.
Out of the shower, I step into the dress and find myself staring thoughtfully at my reflection. Black hair, black eyes, taller than every girl in school and lacking in boobs was the way one would best describe me. My height is a curse. It makes me odd, sometimes envied, sometimes forced to stand out. The dress is beautiful, pushing my breasts upwards for view, and finishing at my upper thigh instead of lower like it was meant to.
"I really love it Melina" I tell her, stepping out of the bathroom. She looks at me wearily, insecure and shifting from one foot to the other. Melina is in her late forties, with short brown hair and a curvy figure. She doesn't look at me with jealousy or pity or hatred, but a motherly love.
"Well, it is quite short, a bit showing... oh what the hell! If you've got it, flaunt it." She sighs, satisfied with my look at last.
"If you'd like, my father is making dinner tonight, spinach ravioli" when my mother had lived there had been no need for an invitation, Melina would have invited herself. But now it's different, too much has changed. My father has closed himself off to company. I was lucky if he even looked at me.
"No no, I wouldn't want to intrude. You can pay me back by giving this to Vaste, he says he won't be home until late" She hands me a bag of food and sends me on my way, my sports clothes under my arm. I stop by my apartment to set down the clothes and get my bathing suit, goggles and the book for Latin class which is due on the first day back to school, tomorrow. I leave the dress on, putting the bathing suit underneath and switched my running shoes for flip flops. The sea had been my second home all summer. After changing, I head to the panetteria only a kilometer down the road. It's small and usually packed because it makes the best fruit tarts in the area.
"Adelaide, Adelaideeeee!" The owner of the panetteria starts to sing my name at a random tune behind the counter as he serves the boy in front of me. No one calls me Adelaide except for my father. Most people in Italy refer to each other by a shortened versions of their last name. My last name is Ancona so over time people just started calling me Ana.
"Lucio, vedo che nonostante la tua vecchiaia, non sai ancora cantare" I insult his singing skills as usual, to which he laughs.
"I'll get lover boy, bella" Lucio rarely makes sense, but believes himself to be a legendary poet, a delusional old man of a golden heart. "Veste!" He shouts unnecessarily loud with a deep cough as he storms into the kitchen behind the counter.
"What Lucio? What now? Did the cigarettes disappear again? Did the fairy steal all of our imaginary birthday cakes? What is it this time?" Veste's voice is heard miles away. I can almost see him rolling his eyes at Lucio who replies in a snide comment before my best friend comes rushing out of the kitchen
"Ana!" Removing his white cooking hat, he jumps over the counter and embraces me before I even have time to say hello.
"Veste" He holds me tight, his head resting just lightly below mine. Everything about him screams home. I haven't seen Veste since he came back from Sardinia. He stayed on the island, in Olbia, with his grandmother for a while. He appears more tan and muscular than the last time I saw him. His hair is also lighter but despite it all his childish grin the same.
"How are you? It's been so long, I'd forgotten how tall you were" I eye him with a smile, pulling back from the embrace.
"Me? Look at you, you're stunning" Veste's hands rest on my waste after I removed mine from his hips. His smile is replaced by a flash of shock but he quickly cleared his throat, covering the surprise.
"Oh, your mom told me to bring you dinner" I hand him the paper bag as we walk out of the panetteria, towards the beach near the main port. "Are you busy? I can come back" I assure him.
"Nah, business was slow anyways. My mom never stopped calling, I swear! When I didn't answer the phone she called my grandma and then Lucio. You'd think I was five...almost nineteen" He laughs. Melina could definitely be a bit much.
"She's just being a mom, curious to the point of murder. She made me this dress" His eyes travel down my body, assessing me once more. Too quickly he looks away.
"It's a little opened" He scratches the back of his neck unsure. I push him into the street, playfully and a bit insulted.
"Hey!"
"It's summer and the dress is summery, nothing wrong with the dress" frustrated I cross the street, onto the beach. Veste follows quickly.
"Sorry, jeez, I was just saying"
"You were just saying nothing." I've never gotten so winded about a dress before. My mother would have thought the dress was also inappropriate, but she wasn't here to tell me that.
"Let's go swimming" I decide once we get to the beach. I begin stripping, having my bathing suit underneath.
"Wow, wait up" Veste's hand stops me, resting on my elbow
"What?"
"You... are you okay? You seem off Ana" His words irritate me.
"Well, yeah I might be a bit off" I snap "In fact, Tarni is a bit off" I snatch my elbow out of his grasp and take off my dress, carefully folding it and putting it in my bag revealing my white bikini. Veste remains silent, also undressing and going into the water.
"Have I done something to upset you?"
"No, nothing, it's just that recently everything feels fake. Everyone is tip toeing on shells, no one talks about what happened anymore; everyone's too scared" Veste stops walking and turns to me, stern and no longer concerned but willing for me to listen.
"And so should you" His sincere expression reminds me of the rest. There isn't going to be another revolt against the locals for a long, long time.
"I'll race you to the Tourist Beach" The Tourist Beach is barely visible from where we are standing. Fifteen kilometers out isn't easy.
"I'm in" It's two o'clock, it will take us about an hour and a half to get to the next beach which means we'd be starving by the time we got there. I put on my goggles and hand Veste the extra pair I snagged from the lost and found. The water is cold but as we swim it becomes no colder than the summer air. On the last kilometer we both sprint to the finish line, but its clear that he won.
"You've been practicing" I laugh, walking onto the sand.
"So have you, kept up all the way." I have a feeling he'd swam slower just so that he wouldn't leave me behind. It kind of irritates me.
"Oh please, you slowed down"
"Did not!" I roll my eyes and fall on the beach exhausted and starving as I predicted. My bikini is touching only my hip bones as I lay down. I am not just hungry I now realize, I am starving.
"When was the last time you had a meal, Ana, you're skin and bone" Yesterday...
"This morning" My father hadn't bothered to stock the fridge for a month now. He was always working, unconcerned with anything but his barber shop. I was also so caught up in my own world since my mom died that I didn't pay attention to myself.
"I'll get us some food, wait here" I nod, closing my eyes and drifting off. Some time passes before I am awakened by a sharp scream. The beach is empty except for a couple lights in the distance, being September second the tourist had returned to their homes wherever these may be. I look around but there is nothing to see. Did I imagine the scream? I look at my watch, it's four thirty, Veste has been gone for forty minutes. I get up and walk towards the white building in the distance. It's a restaurant/bar.
The closer I get, the louder the music becomes. I hate not having anything to cover myself with but I feel too dizzy to truly do anything about it. The bar is filled, everyone is standing and dancing, I could have sworn that if there was a hell this was it.
"I'm sorry!" I try to call for the attention of a woman eating a sandwich, but she doesn't pay me any attention. I look around but Veste is nowhere to be seen.
"Hey, that's Angelina Ancona's daughter!' I feel a man's hand on my lower back but when I turn around he is gone. "Did you come to play?" A group of men laugh, one louder than the others. "Pretty girl come over!" A voice shouts soon joined by others, "Let me teach you who's boss, Ana". One of them I recognize. He went to my school. He is laughing along with the others but doesn't make a move towards me as the others do.
A hand grazed my ass from behind, I jump and notice the crosses on their necks, the blue jeans, the oversized t-shirts. Oh God, these are Locals, and this is their bar. What have I gotten myself into? I turn to find a man smiling down at me, his breath smells like cheap corona. Angrily, I swing my fist, hitting him in the face. Then all hell breaks loose. Someone fists my hair, another bites my neck, my bathing suit comes undone and I am being dragged outside. I kick, scream and scratch but the arms around my waist are so tight I can barely breathe. A man with blond hair pryes my mouth opened and pours a hot liquid down my throat. I vomit in my mouth, but the liquor doesn't stop. I try to scream but I can't. Wildly, I look around for help, but the large figures are completely surrounding me. Seconds before everything goes dark, I realize; I am going to die.