ORZO turns ORZA: a brand new Organization of Respectful Loving Aunties

So maybe all that darkness of those preceding chapters never happened at all! Maybe instead of the pain and agony of having to give her baby away, maybe Filomena instead is immersed in immeasurable love, because she is able to remain, for all intents and purposes, Pasquale's mother! Thanks to a little-known organization called

ORZA:

in Italiano

Organizzazione di Rispettose Zie Amorevoli

or in English, the ORGANIZATION OF RESPECTFUL LOVING AUNTIES.

an organization founded by Filomena herself, with the help of her lifelong friend, Annunziata (Nunzi) Sesta. And several others, including the midwife, Clementina Rizolli, and Adelina Trieste and the rest of the women who don't need names as yet.

Consider this, this scene that follows, to be the true telling, hollowing out all darkness, because this is really how it happened:

Filomena is standing here beside a weathered grey fence, in the milky sunlight of a clear November day. Filomena is holding a basket in one hand, and bracing the other hand beneath her bulging belly, cradling herself. She is curtained in a lime green dress that is shaped like a tent, a dress she made herself.

Soon. That's what Clementina, the midwife, said after she examined Filomena two afternoons ago. Filomena was lying on the kitchen table, her lower half bare, the table hardly big enough for her expanded body, her bare feet braced on each edge of the table.

"My dear girl, your baby's head is low, oh so low, and lined up and ready to go!" Clementina, leaning over to face Filomena, whispered to her. "Your baby is coming soon. Maybe this week!"

That's all Nunzi had to hear! Nunzi who was right there in the kitchen, naturally, as she has been right at Filomena's side all along. Without Nunzi, how would Filomena possibly manage?

No matter.

"Let's get you packed," Nunzi said, helping Filomena off the table.

It took them no time at all to pack, as Filomena has only the green dress and a brown skirt and one other that is the dark blue color of the ocean. And a yellow blouse, ironically, that's almost exactly the shape of a priest's surplice.

Full and blousy. Every time the priest passed her in the street, Filomena, wearing the yellow blouse, would bow her head. Father Crudele would stop and stare at her as she walked by, that evil wrinkle in his brow. Filo would hurry along, keeping her head low and her walk steady.

Nunzi and Filo left Paola about 1:00, and rode in the cart led by the bony brown mare. In an hour and a half they were at the farm owned by the lifelong friend of Nunzi's cousin, Giovanna Trieste. Giovanna who has seven children, including a brand new one, a sweet little peanut of an infant girl, named Pia, who is barely two weeks old.

Now, Filomena is standing by the fence. Nunzi, who Clementina has taught the art of midwifery, is inside drinking her espresso with Adelina, whose baby is making slurping noises at her breast. Filomena was inside too, until Adelina sent her outside after she tried unsuccessfully to nap.

Filo slowly approaches the chicken coop to collect the eggs. But she stops here, and is staring into the pen: in one muddy corner is a gigantic sow, lying on her side. A litter of seven pink and muddy piggies are nursing, making noises not unlike those of baby Pia. Filomena smiles, and without thinking, she lifts her hand to her oversized breasts, which have swelled into ripe melons.

On the other side of the pen stand two ancient donkeys and a cow.

Now Adelina's second youngest child, a curly-headed boy they call Rico, joins Filomena.

Dozens of chickens strut through the yard beside the fence.

Filomena lays her hand on Rico's head. "Do you want to show me how to collect the eggs sweetheart?" ("Vuoi mostrarmi come raccogliere le uova, tesoro?")

As the little boy takes her hand and leads her into the chicken coop, Filomena considers the word "uova," eggs, how it feels in her lips to say it. But then the smell of chicken shit takes Filo's attention, giving her stomach a twist.

She has to bend over slightly to get inside the coop. Her stomach presses tightly against her chest.

Rico already has his hand in the stiff straw, pulling out an egg and laying it gently in Filo's basket. Filo does the same. They take turns. The warm eggs feel good in her hand. They move along, transferring eggs into the basket.

"Are there always this many?" Filo asks the boy. He smiles. Two teeth are missing up top.

"Yes, sometimes even more," he says. "We can stop now because the basket is over half full. May I carry it?" She smiles and hands it over.

He pulls open the door of the coop and hurries back to the house. Filo, meanwhile, is walking slowly, and noticing suddenly that her belly is tightening. Not like times before, when the pull was gentle.

But this time it's a dagger slicing across her insides. She catches her breath at the squeeze of pain -- una stretta di dolore. It feels like someone is tightening a burning rope across her gut. She holds her hand beneath her swollen womb, she feels a foot, a heel or an elbow poking into her tented dress.

The next pain takes her breath completely, she tries to massage her belly, she shoves her hand into the fiercely tight wall of agony and she cries out. Now the rope is steel on fire, burning rope, just getting tighter and tighter.

Filo stops, and takes another breath. The pain is tighter still. "Oh my," she thinks, "I must tell..." Before she can say "Nunzi" the pain once again pulls her so tight she can't walk. She wonders: will I be able to get back to the house? She takes a tiny step and leans onto the fence. Holds on with both hands. Her breath is shallow. The pain isn't going away.

"NUNZI!" she cries. But will her voice carry inside? Filo is starting to panic, she cannot bear the scizzor, it feels like nothing she has experienced before, like a hot slice going back and forth, she is being torn below her belly. She cries out again for Nunzi but her voice is weaker.

She decides. "I must...get...back...to..." She lets go of the fence and takes a step, wobbling. But then her body decides. She collapses into the soft grass. On both hands, then her side, fetal position with her fetus. She cries: "Nunzi, Nunzi, Nunzi..."

She lies there, thinking she might die, all alone out here, where is Nunzi, why is she...and then the pain subsides. Filo inhales slowly. She pushes up to her hands and knees and now she is crying, "Someone please, dear Mary, please help me up!" She stays that way, on hands and knees, and then lifts herself so she is kneeling. She clasps her hands in prayer and says the Hail Mary three times.

Slowly, she stands. And takes a step. And another. She is four or five steps from the door, so close, I've got to make it I can I can I can, and she is at the door.

But before she can open it, the hot knife is back, slicing again and when she is collapsing this time, she hits the door with a thump.

With her last bit of energy, she raises her voice to scream "HELLLLLLLP ME PLEASE HELP ME HELP ME PLEASE!" (Aituami, per fravore, aiutami, aiutami, per favore!"

The door opens, and Filo falls, half inside and half outside. Nunzi and Adelina each lift a shoulder, and pull her across the floor, where Filomena is in more pain than she ever knew possible, and now her legs spread, water tinged with blood is oozing from her.

And in no more time than it takes for Adelina to boil a kettle of water, Filo, still in the same place on the floor, her face wet and writhing in pain, her legs spread. Nunzi is kneeling, and reaching and catching the dark hairy head, and soon one red shoulder, and then the other, and finally the whole skinny body is wiggling and slipping onto the green tent of a dress that looks like grass to greet Filo's baby.