For Fi, at last, It's Time

Filomena is standing beside a weathered grey fence, in the milky sunlight of a clear November day. She is holding a basket in one hand, and bracing the other hand beneath her bulging belly, cradling herself. She is curtained in her dark 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 all 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 Filomena left Paola about 1:00, and rode in the cart led by the bony brown mare. In the end, Mama stayed behind with a bad chest cold. "I want so much to be going with you, Filomena," she says, but her voice is hoarse and the congestion is heavy, making her feel weak. "Oh Mama, you will be with me, I promise you that!" Fi would embrace her mother, but fears that she too will get sick. After a long morning of riding, Fi and Nunzi were at Lina's farm in Amantea again. Lina 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, to whom Clementina has taught the basics of the art of midwifery, is inside drinking her espresso with Lina, whose baby is making slurping noises at her breast. Filomena was inside too, until Lina sent her outside after Fi tried unsuccessfully to nap.

Filo slowly approaches the chicken coop to collect the eggs. But she stops here, beside the fence, and she is staring into the pen: in one muddy corner is the gigantic sow known as Concetta, 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 Lina's second youngest child, that curly-headed boy we call Rico, joins Filomena.

"Lina, can I collect the eggs with you?"

"Of course!" Filomena smiles at the enchanting little boy, and sets her hand on the warm curls of his head. She can't look at Rico without thinking the same thought over and over again: someday my son will grow this big and so much bigger. And Lina will let me see him as he grows! She knows that she ought not to think so far into the future, but somehow it helps her. It is a comfort to remind herself that life goes on beyond the climactic event she faces.

Dozens of chickens strut through the yard beside the fence.

"Do you want to show me how to collect the eggs again, 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. The top of her stomach presses up 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. A ray of light filters through the coop and lands on one of the chickens.

"Are there always this many eggs?" 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, waddles slowly, 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, twisting scorch of 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 scizzoring, it feels like nothing she has experienced before, like she is being slice in two, the saw going back and forth, back and forth, faster and faster, she is completely 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 straw. 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. After several moments, 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, slashing and 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 Lina each lift a shoulder, and pull her across the floor, where Filomena is in more pain than she ever knew possible, the bottom half of her feels like it will explode, and now her legs spread, water tinged with blood is oozing.

Lina sets out to boil a kettle of water, but there isn't time. Filo, now lying right inside the door, her face wet and writhing in pain, has her legs spread. Nunzi is kneeling, and reaching and catching a 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.