AUTHOR - SANDRA MONTANINO ARC PROOF ONLY - DO NOT PRINT - THE WEIGHT OF SALT SANDRA MONTANINO ARC PROOF EDWARDS PUBLISHING The Weight of Salt Sandra Montanino THE WEIGHT OF SALT VOLUME ONE A GRIPPING STORY OF LOVE AND COURAGE Published by: Edwards Publishing Provo, UT Copyright © 2021 Sandra Montanino All rights reserved, including the right to reproduce this book, or portions thereof, in any form. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission from the publisher, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews. The views expressed herein are the responsibility of the author and do not necessarily represent the position of the publisher. For information or permission about this publication, please email [email protected] or contact the author via the authors website. www.SandraMontanino.comwww.SandraMontanino.com This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, places, events, locales, and incidents are either the products of the author’s imagination or used in a fictitious manner. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or actual events is purely coincidental. Some names and identifying details have been changed to protect the privacy of individuals. Cover design by: Bryan Heim Photography and Design - Bryan Heim Interior print design and layout by: Erika Kuta Marler ISBN: 978-1-7345090-0-7 (ebook) ISBN: 978-1-7345090-1-4 (paperback) ISBN: 978-1-7345090-2-1 (hardback) Subjects: FICTION / Romance. | FICTION / Historical. | FICTION / Coming of Age. ARCAuthor Sandra PROOF Montanino -Sandra Montanino [email protected] IN SUPPORT OF THE AUTHOR In support of the author of The Weight of Salt, it would be greatly appreciated if you took a moment to leave your honest review.review. -Sandra Montanino AuthorSandraM@[email protected] ARC PROOF ARC PROOF Dedication It's with a warm heart, I dedicate this book to all my family—those that are here, and those in the hereafter—especially my grandmother, Angelina who left us with a rich treasure chest of Sicilian stories. These tales, both real and imagined, captivated and inspired me to write this book and those that follow. I hope you will enjoy them as much as I havehave. ARC PROOF ARC PROOF CHAPTER 1 YBOR CITY, FLORIDA, 1906 he pendulum clock on the bureau bartered its T minutes for hours. Still, the baby had not come. Fifteen-year-old Angelina Pirrello clutched her rosary and recited an impassioned Hail Mary as her mother’s cries in labor pierced the air and robbed their home of its bloom. Carolina appeared fragile and angelic amid a cloud of white sheets. She lay saturated in perspiration on the same iron bed where she’d given birth six times before. Her breathing grew more ragged as Angelina kept an anxious watch on her. Domenico glanced at the clock and then at his wife. He feverishly passed his hand through his hair. “Angelina, when ARCyou left a message forPROOF the doctor, did you say to come quickly?” “Yes, Papa, I said to hurry.” Her father persisted in asking the same question again and again. 2 | THE WEIGHT OF SALT Moans swelled into screams, and in Carolina’s pale-green eyes, Angelina saw the depths of her mother’s pain. She sensed it all around her—in the air and on the floor beneath her feet. Sicilian women believed in the compassion of the Virgin Mary, who’d experienced the agony of childbirth. Angelina didn’t question the belief as she summoned the Virgin for help with fierce prayer, a slight tremor tainting her voice. The tranquility was fleeting as it stretched across the room, and Carolina’s pain momentarily subsided. Domenico sat on the edge of the bed, raised his wife’s fingers to his lips, and then closed his hand around hers.hers. “Ti amo,” he said. The tender moment did not dispel Angelina’s uneasiness. Her mother’s long brown hair lay outstretched and tangled beneath her head while the agony of labor blemished her face. Angelina had no memory of her mother suffering so intensely during the births of her younger siblings. The lines penetrating Domenico’s forehead vanished when a rapid knocking shook the front door. He hurried toward the sound and, with long strides, passed through the parlor and pulled open the door. “Dottor Martino!” The doctor wasn’t there.there “All this screaming every time I pass your house. Did you suppose I was deaf?” said their neighbor Signora Bertelli. She held a flower-filled vase, a cloth bag, and an oblong object wrapped in a dishtowel. “You insult me by not calling for my help. Only the saints can forgive such a sin.” “I sent for the doctor long ago.” Domenico’s tone offered noARC apology. PROOF Angelina understood her father’s reluctance to call a midwife. The world had left the past behind and arrived at the dawn of the twentieth century. Domenico wanted his wife to have the best of modern care. CHAPTER 1 | 3 Though middle-aged and with graying hair, Signora Bertelli had something ageless about her—not in appearance but in her enthusiasm for life. With a look of scorn, she waved her finger at Domenico. “Who do you think is more useful, a midwife standing right in front of you or a doctor who’s nowhere to be found?” She narrowed her eyes. “This is the reason why God, with His divine wisdom, never trusted a man to have a child.” Signora Bertelli raised her chin, brushed past Domenico, and went straight to the bedroom. Certain her father would counter the remark, Angelina watched, but he remained silent as her mother pulled herself up in bed and managed a thread of a smile. “Thank you for coming, my friend.” Carolina’s voice held the hoarse residue of her screams, yet a light glistened in her eyes. “You under! stand, signora. Like me, you believed in our Sicilian ways— the ways of our mothers and grandmothers before us.” Angelina glanced at her father. Between his skepticism of all things superstitious and her mother’s belief in them, Angelina grew uncertain about what she should believe. In previous births, her father had remained outside the bedroom until after a child was born. This time, he stayed by her mother’s side through this longest of labors, the absence of the doctor, and a midwife’s presence. It all added to the strange imbalance of the day. Signora Bertelli, not the kind of person willing to suppress her opinion, shook her head in apparent disgust. “I want you to know that I delivered many babies back in Santo Stefano Quisquina.” ARCWhen did she last usePROOF her skills? The thought lingered in Angelina’s mind as she approached their neighbor. “What can I do to help you, signora?” “Right now, we have to wait for nature. With my help, the seventh baby will arrive before your doctor.” Their neighbor 4 | THE WEIGHT OF SALT set her vase and its floral offering on the night table before retrieving scissors and a string from her apron pocket. Domenico wrung his hands. “She has suffered enough.” The remark, directed at no one in particular, could only be a desperate petition for God’s ears. He shook his head and rushed from the room. Compelled by his look of distress, Angelina followed. Her father dashed across the parlor, then burst through the adjoining door connecting their home to their small grocery store. He passed the deli counter displaying cheeses, meats, and shelves stacked with cans, bottles, boxes, and bins—reminders of their old country across the sea. Domenico gathered his five remaining children around him. He frowned, and his jaw tightened. “Salvatore,” Domenico addressed the eldest of his sons. “Take your brothers and your little sister over to the Ferlita’s house and stay with them until I send for you.” Vincenzo, next in line among the siblings, spoke up. “We want to be here when the baby comes.” His puzzled look did nothing to change his father’s mind.mind “I’ll call for you when it’s time.” Domenico turned to Angelina. “I may need you to help your mother, but see if the doctor’s coming.” Angelina rushed to the window. Her eyes darted from the carriages to the wagons to the individuals moving about along the walkways. “I don’t see him.” Domenico shook his head. “Can he have that many patients to detain him?” ARCA wooden crucifix—long agoPROOF sanctified by a priest—hung over the doorway, spilling blessings on those who passed beneath it. Her father reached up, touched the feet of Christ, and lingered as he made the sign of the cross. The gesture surprised Angelina. She’d come to believe her father only CHAPTER 1 | 5 associated with God to please her mother. He’d never been religious. Domenico hurried back to the bedroom, Angelina trailing behind. “The baby is not down far enough, but babies come in their own time,” said Signora Bertelli. Carolina’s eyes moistened. “It’s too much. I can’t take it. I’m so tired.” Angelina’s heart lurched. “How can I help you, Mama? Please tell me what to do.” Carolina reached for her daughter’s hand. “Bring me a little water, bella mia. My mouth is so dry.” Angelina hurried from the room and quickly reappeared with a glass filled to the brim. She held it to her mother’s lips, but in her eagerness, tipped the glass too far and spilled water on her mother’s nightdress.