Page 7 of Revenge on the Mafia

Her gaze shifted to Mamá. My heart weighed as heavy as bricks. She folded little triangles of the napkin in her hand until it was scrunched in her palm. Then, she unfolded and restarted. Her actions were more familiar to me than her helping Mara or me with homework. I had only known her as loving, but her mental health was always so fragile.

“She’s improving.” There was a slight hesitation in her voice.

Mamá’s schizophrenia had turned into a complete psychotic breakdown when Papá died. At eighteen, I had to be the one to get her hospitalized. I made decisions to medicate my mother in those cold, white, sterile hallways while my sister, Mara played with her Barbie dolls on the steel bench a few feet away. Those days still gave me nightmares. The type you had even when your eyes were open.

“Maybe I should take her home.” I’d done that once before, after a year had passed of her being in the hospital, when the weight of guilt had become too heavy to carry. Not to our home, because that house with all the beautiful and tragic memories had to be sold in the weeks after Papá’s death.

Sonia touched my shoulder gently. “I say this with the best intentions, Anna. You can’t take care of her by yourself.” Anymore. I bit the inside of my cheek to control my emotions. I had tried so hard. For two years, I kept her home in the tiny tinbox apartment we lived in. She took the medication, and she was almost our mamá again. Then she had a relapse. Started forgetting her meds, and I couldn’t be home twenty-four-seven to look after her. “You made the right decision,” she urged.

I nodded, but didn’t agree. All the decisions I had made were wrong.

“We’re here to make sure she’s taking her medication consistently. You have to trust in that.”

“I do.” I just wish I didn’t have to keep her away from home.

I had to choose. Sacrifice Mara’s education and keep her at home to look after Mamá, or send Mamá away. Neither was right. Neither was an easy choice to make.

“I’ll let you visit.”

“Thank you.”

With a squeeze on my shoulder, she walked away. I made my way to Mamá.

“Hola, Mamá.”

She mumbled to an invisible person as she watched me approach her. I sat down next to her. “How’re you doing?”

A frown creased her forehead. “You’re upset.”

I shook my head. “I’m not.” Liar.

“Your voice breaks when you’re upset,” she said softly.

I swallowed thickly, holding back from clearing my throat.

“Did you go back?”

“Where?”

“To the house.”

I couldn’t even if I wanted to. “No, it’s not ours anymore, Mamá.”

“Good.”

We sat in silence for a few minutes. The sound of outside traffic hummed between us.

“Why’re you asking about the house?”

She bent down and picked up paper-like bracts. A magenta-colored bougainvillea. The wind must have carried it from the pergola. “We had a lot of them, there.” She touched it as if the leaves were made of velvet. An ache built in my chest.

“We did. We had them all around our balconies.” They had wrapped around the house, looking towards the front garden and the beach at the back like a bright pink wreath. I’d wondered far too many times if the new owners had kept them. Still, I couldn’t make myself go and see.

“Your papá built it for me when we got married.”

“I know.” They loved each other so deeply. My Italian mother came to Spain to study but married my father instead and never went back. “I know you miss him.” She was too young to carry this burden. Some women married at forty-two. Mamá became a widow.

“Don’t go there,” she insisted.