Carmine had been born exactly nine months after Josephine arrived in America. She had been met at the docks in New York by Vincenzo’s cousin from Jersey City. All of the people in Vincenzo’s family had that same pushed-in face, and she remembered thinking that if they never had children, it would be better than having ones that looked like that. (As it turned out, the two youngest girls had that unfortunate face. The others were all beautiful, with large, aquiline noses and full, pouty mouths). The cousin—she never learned his name—escorted her to the train station, handed her a ticket, helped her with her trunk, and walked away before the train even left the station. Josephine sat, clutching her ticket, her heart doing strange flips and flops as a swirl of people speaking English surrounded her. The language sounded harsh. Unwelcoming. But soon she relaxed, watching the lights of cities and seaside towns pass before her. America was a shiny place, Josephine learned. It glittered. She believed she could be happy there, even with Vincenzo.
That night, even though she was tired and achy and hungry from so many weeks of travel, Vincenzo climbed on top of her and moved around inside her five or six times, then collapsed beside her. In the nine years since he had married her right before going off to America, she had forgotten what he looked like exactly, until she saw the cousin from Jersey City. She had forgotten this part too. Or rather, she had remembered that he required a minute or two of her time, that it felt like nothing but an itch she wanted to scratch, and then it was over. Since she had last seen her husband, he had grown fat, so although it was as quick as before, his weight on top of her made it hard to breathe. Still, she could hold her breath until he was done. Then Josephine would sit up, take long deep breaths, and go and wash herself. By the time she got back into bed, Vincenzo was snoring.
During her first couple of weeks in America, they didn’t talk very much. He went off to work in the mill that sat on the river at the bottom of the hill, and she did the same types of chores she had done back home. She baked bread and made pasta and tended the garden; she darned his clothes and crocheted a blanket for their bed; she stewed and bottled and canned fruits and vegetables; she walked to the church and helped the nuns clean the altar and dress the saints. Life in America, Josephine thought those first weeks, was very much like life in the Old Country. All of her neighbors spoke Italian and they had all come from villages right near her own. Vincenzo didn’t have the same desire he’d had when they got married. Every few nights, he forced her legs apart and heaved his fat body on top of hers. Push, push, push, push. Done. Holding her breath, Josephine began to count how many thrusts it took him to finish. It was never more than six.
After her first week in America, Josephine fell asleep smiling. Here, there was always someone to gossip with while picking the ripe tomatoes. There was always someone with news of the war, or someone who knew details of Father Leone’s life. It was said he was from Florence, an artist himself, perhaps of noble birth. He was so holy, Josephine was told, that the pope wrote him letters of admiration and respect. In America, things grew with more abandon. Melons were juicier, tomatoes redder, eggplants larger. She had many rooms to wander, windows to make curtains for, a stove with six burners. For the few thrusts and grunts Vincenzo required, it was worth it to be in America.
But on the fourteenth morning of her arrival, Josephine woke up with the room spinning like it did when she had too much wine. Vincenzo was already moving about the kitchen, and she called for him to come, something was wrong. By the time he came, she was throwing up in the chamber pot.
“I’m sick,” she told him. “I think I’m dying.”
She thought she would never stop puking. But by the afternoon, weak and exhausted, it stopped. Josephine threw away the eggs she’d collected from her neighbor the day before. Fresh eggs make you talk too much. Old eggs make you sick; she knew that. But when this continued every morning for several days, Vincenzo grinned at her and said, “You’re pregnant. Finally.” With her head in the chamber pot, and the room upside down, she couldn’t tell him what she was thinking: Finally? I hardly know you. For her, this pregnancy had happened too fast.
JOSEPHINE NEVER UNDERSTOOD why she had been so blessed after her wedding that she did not get pregnant. Because once she came to America, all she did was have babies. It was as if this country was so abundant, so full of plenty, that babies grew in her with the same ease that vegetables filled her garden. First she had Carmine, then Concetta, Giulia, Elisabetta. Vincenzo strutted like a rooster, showing off his virility. “All I have to do is look at my wife,” he liked to say, “and poof! She has a baby.” But it wasn’t poof! to Josephine. Each baby was bigger and harder to deliver, and she became more swollen and lethargic with each pregnancy. Her breasts grew big, and leaked milk even when there wasn’t a baby or two latched onto them. Often, she had a baby at each breast and a third one waiting her turn.
Once she delivered a baby, the only relief was that Vincenzo would leave her alone for a few months. But soon, those months would pass, and one night, he would push aside the babies flopped around the bed, shove Josephine’s legs open, and heave his ever fatter body onto hers. Even worse, either because he had grown so fat, or because he was getting older, it took him longer. Sometimes Josephine counted all the way to thirteen before he grunted and rolled off her. All the while he was pushing into her, babies cried and tugged at her and her breasts leaked out milk.