
31 Mar Broken Marble Cherry Bowl
āBroken Marble Cherry Bowlā
Written by Dan A. Cardoza Edited by Craig Groshek Thumbnail Art by Craig Groshek Narrated by N/ACopyright Statement: Unless explicitly stated, all stories published on CreepypastaStories.com are the property of (and under copyright to) their respective authors, and may not be narrated or performed, adapted to film, television or audio mediums, republished in a print or electronic book, reposted on any other website, blog, or online platform, or otherwise monetized without the express written consent of its author(s).
š§ Available Audio Adaptations: None Available
ā° ESTIMATED READING TIME ā 13 minutes
Grande Nonno died making a living, like Papa. He was born with his blue denim sleeves rolled up.
He and Grande Nonna are buried just a few miles south of the Apuan Mountains on the Alpsā Italian side. Theyāve been rotting away in a small village cemetery near the town of Caravaggio. Caravaggio, Italy, is in the province of Bergamo, in Lombardy, Italy, 40 kilometers northeast of Milanās municipality.
Carrara is in central Italy. Carrara is in the provinces of Massa and Carrara. The region is famous for the white and blue-grey marble quarried there. The brilliant, almost translucent blue and grey exist as arteries and veins, frozen in memoriam. The Carrione River gushes in the winter through the canyons of the region. Flash floods in the spring have been known to cleanse citizens clear out into the Ligurian Sea.
At first glance, the Apuan Alps of northwest Tuscanyās Carrara region are pure white. You can imagine snow being born in the high castle crags.
Early train travelers through the regional mountains had been cautioned of the risk of blindness due to marble dust and glare from all the whiteness. The talc of powder is said to be under the control of no other than the wind, a stiff wind that wants nothing to do with humankind.
Most travel guides, even today, will tell you the Carrara region is famous for three things: marble, anarchy, and pig fat. This unlikely trio is intertwined as deeply as the mineral veins striating the marbled mountains.
Since ancient Roman times, Carraraās Apuan Alps have supplied marble for some of the worldās most prized sculptures. Carrara is the marble of Michelangeloās PietĆ , Jean-Antoin Houdinās George Washington, and New Delhiās vast Akshardham Temple. The stone is blessed with luminosity, its networks of blue arteries and veins, natureās psychological Rorschach test ranges from grayish to purple. In monolithic form, it can support the sky, like Half-Dome in Yosemite, California. It has been winnowed down into the translucence of light itself in thin slabs, a fitting lid on an iridescent coffin.
My name is David. Iām a little softer than marble but much colder. Itās taken a while to get here, but thatās what you get when you grow up in the middle of a nightmare.
This story isnāt so much about me. Itās mostly about us. Yes, dear reader, you and me, us humans, with all our ugliness, beauty, and pain. Itās about the idiosyncrasies and occasional flaws of raising children, children whose only intent is to live, once born. Thereās not one baby book available online or in a storefront about how to raise a monster. I can assure you, the parents that no how-to, donāt need any damned instructions.
Donāt get me wrong, I enjoy a wonderful life, especially now that Iāve lived alone for just over a decade. Papa and Mamma are back in Northern Italy, going on eleven years now. They will be back, not to worry. In most ways, theyāve never really left. They are like shadows that remain hidden, but for midnight.
When I say that they are not really being gone, by that, I mean there are very few places in this run-down house where they donāt exist. And, outside, they are out there too.
Papa is in the drippy faucet, the one he couldnāt fix. And so I put up with it, and wait. Itās just off their bedroom, on the second floor. Now that theyāre gone, I sleep in their queen. Papa is in the crazy garden. Jesus, itās insanely productive. Most of us Italianās are birthed with green thumbs. Heās no exception. Hell, heās placed enough bullshit in the dirt to turn the backyard into a greenhouse. The soil canāt help itself. Itās rich and loamy.
Heās in the tomatoes stakes, the ones he used his machete to ax into six-foot lengths. The stakes are round and made out of two-inch dried bamboo. He uses four to stand up the cages, cages meant to confine the beautiful green and red of the plants. Papa makes the wire cages too. It seems he makes everything except the water. In July, once the plants have taken hold, he uses the iron enclosures to jail all the tomatoes with cheap labor until they are forced to ripen.
The rake, heās damned well in it. Papaās in the sweaty oil on the tacky handle. Heās also in the missing hickory slivers that have ended up in his calloused palms. I can even feel him in the shovel, the square, and the round one. Papaās strong hands are there, the ones that heād forced around my throat.
The rounded shovel has a grave diggerās blade, having killed a rat or two. It acts as guillotines and can be used to take out Napoleonās armies of screaming tomato worms, as well as any meandering garden snake.
Father is in the pantry, more stubborn than any simile. I swear to it. Heās in the ugly green wooden cabinet, the cabinet built onto one of the garage walls. He had inherited from the previous homeowners. Papa was there when he smashed the planked wooden door on my curious fingers after heād carelessly left it unlocked. He was as quiet as a panther in the single-car parking space.
Heād reinforced the shelves, āextra support never hurt nuthinā, heād said. If I catch you climbing up them again, Iāll crack your eardrums open like a walnut shell.ā
Brandied cherries, thorny blackberries, and drunken raisins, a container of bay leaves, dried leaves broad enough to cover your crotch, theyāre all in there, his damned pantry, canned jars of minestrones soups, pickled venison with bone broth, broth heād used to boil meat off a cats ribs.
I love Papa. I canāt get enough of him, even though heād never taught me a damned thing or showed an ounce of affection. Heād beaten me so hard once. He used a messy summer fly-swatter. The kids at school teased me for more than a week. Theyād called me porch-face because of the clumsy screen door in the back of the house. I wouldnāt dare tell them the truth. Donāt get me wrong, I truly love him, Papa, way over in Italy, but if not for the distance, Iād kill him.
Itās like when ivory Dominoās fall, Italy.
One after the other, first cousin Adrianna broke her back. Sheād been living taking care of Nonno and Nonna in their two bedrooms inherited cottage. Winter had been a bastarda that year. Those cloudy Cumuli scoundrels just wouldnāt let up or leave.
The storms had come over the ice-box Apuan Mountains like some uninvited frost-bitten, frost-bitten diesel train. They huffed and puffed their swollen blue faces, clean out of Switzerland and Austria. The back stoop and steps had frozen.
In the last atmospheric disturbance, Adrianna had forgotten all their scratchy linens sheād hung out on the clothesline in the AM. When sheād clipped on the wooden clothespins, there had been sunshine, clawing itself over the horizon. The landscape was frozen, but the fragile sunrays had been as dry as a church mouse fart.
Sheād seen them as flags, all the sheets, and towels. Theyād flapped parallel in the same direction of the sleet. If the sky hadnāt been so windy, they might have frozen all their stiffness in place.
Both feet had come out from underneath her hefty girth. She attempted to scoot across the stoop and down a short run of stairs. Adriannaās heard the crunch before, the time sheād chopped fresh kindling for the cottageās cast iron stove. Sheād cracked her cervical spine in three places.
The mĆ©dico had ordered rest and that she lay as stiff as a corpse for at least two months. I donāt know what in the hell they call them in Italy, but the doctor had also thrown a shitload of Benzodiazepines at her to āuplift her mood,ā heād said.
Adrianna had sounded as if she was a happy zombie. Sheād begun to slur her words. So, she used the neighbor on the other end of the phone. This neighbor lady, Arelia, was one of a few in the village who knew broken English. Adrianna had stirred up the whole neighborhood with her high maintenance and melodramatics, most likely from her being high.
In short order, Arelia, the helpful neighbor, quit. Sheād had enough of nursing Arianna, as well as for cooking and feeding Nonno and Nonna. Sheād shouted in Italian when sheād left the cottage for the last time, āIām not going to be used as some kind of crazy finger puppet.ā Thatās when mother and fatherās trip was a done deal.
Hearing all this, mother and father had jumped on the first international flight out of San Francisco to Milan. Apparently, Caravaggio, Italy is another Hotel California, like the Eaglesā hit song, once you arrive, you can never leave.
By god, nothing was going to happen to Nonno and Nonna. My parents had too much invested, not the least the thirty-odd dollars theyād sent to Italy every month.
Iām sure their leaving had nothing to do with any future inheritance.
Back at the House
Although Mamma is in Italy, sheās never really left the house.
Sheās in the pasta sauce she taught me to make: Butt loads of fresh garlic, a pinch of brown sugar, a teaspoon of vinegar, fresh basil, Papaās rusty tomatoes, and her secret weapon, Italian ground sausage with fennel. There are enough jars of Mammaās pasta sauce in the green pantry to fill up a Venetian Gondola. I almost forgot, add about ½ cup of tawny port wine, not the cooking kind. In Northern Italy, thatās how we roll.
Sheād used her intoxicating pasta sauce and pasta to keep papa fat and uncomfortable, too uncomfortable for kinky sex.
Mamma had been the Comet shine in the scratched porcelain sink. Iām messy. She cleaned the kitchen floor good enough to eat off, vacuumed the rug in front of the big screen TV, left wheel marks resembling perfectly furrowed OCD rows of corn, truer than any in Kansas. I have stacks of dirty dishes on the coffee table. The washer broke, and now Iām using the dishwasher to clean all my clothes.
I almost forgot, Mamma is down the drain in the bathtub and out the sewer pipes, swimming toward the mainline. Everything she ever did is out there. I hope the witch stays in Italy, never comes home.
Mammaās into saving. Sheās a penny-pincher.
Sheād hoarded change, mainly the spare dimes she could fit into Papaās discarded whiskey and cognac, Toro Gordo see-through tubes. The nasty cigars never left his mouth. Each tube was gifted at storing their designated dimes, each dime held snugly in its place. Dimes were tight, seemingly pinching themselves into place, each dime a fool, should they even think of leaving the nested affection.
Iāve spent every one of those Mercury-headed sons-a-bitches, those President Franklin D. Roosevelt, In God We Trust counterfeit dimes. Money is evil. It needed to be punished. I gave them all away at the Thunder Valley Casino, just north of Sacramento. It had taken a lot of liquor, anger, and time to spend the forty-eight tubes of stolen dimes. Losing had never felt so good. Returning at 3:00 AM Saturday morning, Iād slept most of the weekend away, having gorged on an all-you-can-eat buffet.
Canning
With COVID and all, and since Mammaās cooking is in Italy, Iāve taken up canning.
Canning has become extremely popular with my generation. I am a millennial. Itās a safe, effective, and simple process, and itās crazy inexpensive. Mother made me inexpensive, cheap enough to toss away if she could have gotten away with it. She gave me to Papa, expecting heād use me up. I hate her as much as sin, with all her paternal conspiracies.
People can take advantage of canning to preserve just about anything: fruits, peaches, plums, thorny and bloody blackberries picked in the boiling sun, along the Yuba River, vegetables, soups, sauces, and meats, damned right, all kinds of proteins.
In the late 1700s, that crazy war genius, Napoleon Bonaparte, commissioned a regional search for a better method to preserve food. He believed that āAn army travels on its stomach.ā
He was looking for a less expensive and more efficient way to feed his armies. He intended to make food last longer and give his armies nutritional food, meat to build up their strength. Their heritage of strength is what allowed the troops to perform more of their carnage in all the battles. And so Napoleon proposed a hefty bounty to anyone who could come up with a better method of preserving food in quantity, with a long shelf life, even though most of Napoleonās soldiers had a limited expiration date.
A genius named Nicholas Appert had claimed the prize, though it took until 1810 for him to perfect his discovery. But like most time-proven inventions used for the military, it would take about fifty years before the methodology and know-how would trickle down to the average family. Think of Ronald Reaganās Star Wars.
By 1858, this brilliant, cylindrically shaped man, John Mason, had invented the iconic, reusable āMason Jar.ā The Mason jar is the gold standard of canning, even today.
The best thing momma taught me before she left was how to can. I do thank her for that if nothing else, and I will be grateful to her for the rest of my life.
The Supplies:
- Boiling water bath canner or a large, deep saucepot with a lid and a rack
- Glass preserving jars, lids, and bands (always start with new lids)
- Common kitchen utensils, such as a wooden spoon, ladle, and paring knife
- Quality ingredients (fresh fruits and vegetables)
- Jar lifter
- Home canning funnel
- Bubble freer and headspace tool
I admit itās become an obsession, canning. Itās been more than a hot minute, well, over ten years now, since Papa and Mamma left for Italy. I might have to whisper, but I think Iām a better canner than my missing Mamma. You heard me right. Mamma went missing while in Italy. Sheās still missing.
If I sound a little matter of fact, well, for Christ-sakes, I am. I donāt miss her a bit. Hell, sheās everywhere I turn in this two-story falling apart clapboard house.
Letās get back to canning. I donāt have time for terribly long stories.
Bitches, I am the RuPaul Andre Charles of canning. Iāve got canning game. Over the years, I have mastered the art. Yes, you heard me correct. Itās an art: Squatty Stainless steel jar lids, lids that stack in gorgeous, shiny rows in Papaās garage pantry. Tall, long Mason jars, the glass of stars, full of peaches, their skin sloughing off. Donāt you just love the word slough? I eat the juicy peaches, skin first. Iāve preserved Kidney beans and canned eggplant, the kind that resembles the Emoji penis. Iāve canned olives, as dark as jackal eyes, red pimentoās for pupils. Green-fingered asparagus, some as thick as longshoremenās thumbs, the rest, as long as your middle finger, Iāve stored them all.
I figure all the canned goods in Papaās green cupboard should last at least five freaking years. Think about it, not having to shop for food, all the plague masks, all the germs, the disguising people?
I Quit my Job
I worked for the State of California in IT. My employer was the Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation. It was a nice fit for the longest time, the past twenty years. But, with all the write-ups, suspensions, and disciplinary action, I told the governor of the golden state of California to shove his state job up his Department of Controllerās ass. Iād had it.
The talking behind my back and taunting had gone on for months. I was accused of sexual harassment, gender insensitivity, and for keeping less than standard hygienic practices.
It was never written up formally, but my immediate supervisor had also accused me of excessive flatulence. Heād said, āIāll save you all the embarrassment by not having it on the record.ā
They assumed father had simply disappeared in the woods. Heād been hiking a lot after Mammaās disappearance. Well, heād disappeared too. It was in early February. Ah, em, it had been snowing a lot. The Apaun forests were deep and dark, all that bullshit.
Think of me as the red stapler man in the hit movie Office Space. Iād been placed in a corner, next to a dingy wall, at the end of a long row of cubicles. Iād been made fun of for the longest time. There had been food on my shirt that Iād made sure to wash at least once a month, the broken clip on my suspenders, my olive oiled hair, a litany of complaints.
Theyād said, āHeās a pig, eats most of his food out of jars, he farts like a bull in a software China shop. He scrambles and breaks every damned software application and Microsoft Excel spreadsheet account that he touches. His math is sloppy. He doesnāt add up.ā
āFuck you,ā I shouted when Kevin won the yearly IT award. I wouldnāt have been so bad, but I used the third floors intercom.
This girl named Nancy had turned me in for wearing real pigās ears for Halloween. I thought It was appropriate. I used elastic and Velcro and had dried them out. āFuck you,ā Iād shouted when theyād told me who it was that complained. āFuck all of you, Nancy,ā Iād said. āYou bitches are going to end up in a Massonās canning jar.ā I was fired the very next day. They walked me clear down the block to the bus stop.
Ok, I get this feeling that you are making fun of me too. This is so personal, and I have been sharing so much of myself. I know you think Iām crazy, reader. You canāt fool me. Donāt flatter yourself, smarty-pants. You think I killed my mother and father and jarred them. No, and No, and hell no!
Iām in Papaās garage. He wonāt mind. Iām using his workbench vice. Grande Nonno had a workbench, too, over there in Italy. Heād used it to sharpen all his slaughtering tools and wheat scythe. Grande Nonno and I had always gotten along. I loved him. Heās the one that taught me why the sheep in the foothills of the Alps have two downhill legs shorter than the other, walking the hills and all, in one direction.
Papa did everything big, including installing a commercial-sized workbench vice. His vice is industrial red and shiny as glass. I tighten it, tighter and tighter. Nothing ever escaped father. He held me down, two knees on my back, both hands in my long pissy hair, Iād wet the bed again.
As I grew older, heād do this, but for other reasons.
I turn the handle. I have the vices dog fixed in place. I watch as the moving jaw moves in the direction of the stationary jaw. The main screws seem to elongate as the vice grips tighter, one of lifeās paradoxes. I crank and crank until Papaās double-barreled shotgun is fixed in place.
I saw and saw, using the hacksaw.
As the storm shakes the rafters, I play Papaās favorite CD using his cheap flea-market vintage player. How he loved him some Brahm, especially the classic-haunted lullabies, steeped in all the Mephistophelian memories they evoked. He loved the anxious melody, all the nervous piano keys, the white noise that kept myāhis demons at bay.
Piano Concerto Number Two was his favorite, with its assemblage of Stradivarius violins fluttering their hyaline wings off. How it reminds me of the times, Iād torn the wings off the butterflies whenever the pain ferreted itself into the light, sniffing for vengeance.
Most of the cold steel barrel falls to the floor. I sand and sand whatās left of the barrel until itās smooth to the touch. It never heats up. It remains cold.
I snap on the TV in the family room. It takes a while to find the channel with only white noise. Next to me, on the make-shift end table is a mason jar. Itās filled to the brim with pickled pigās feet broth, mostly bitter vinegar. I grasp the jar in my sweaty palm. I swish the dogās eyes in a clockwise direction. I place the vacuum-packed jar back on the card table next to the couch.
The age-darkened sheepās eyes spin and whirl in a circular motion of sight, no longer tethered to their brains by any pesky optic nerves or even semblance of reality.
I pick up the jar again. I stare back and spin the wolfās eyes in a counter-clockwise direction. I smile. I place the cyclone of deception and conspiracy back on the table.
Now I can use my index finger on the trigger. The shotgun barrel is so much shorter now. Using my toes was unrealistic since Iāve gained so much weight after being terminated. Terminated, what a harsh word, isnāt it? Because of all the nutritious canned protein, Iāve become a little cherub. Thereās no way my chubby two toes were going to blast me over the moon.
Dear reader, if youāve gotten this far, Iām truly sorry. You will have to sit on the couch now, directly across from me, and watch.
Youāll have company. They are watching me too. The feral eyes are strobe lights, a horrific merry-go-round of sight, the sonās-a-bitch, around and around they go. The room fades to black, the TV splatters.
You know most of the rooms in the house by now. After you puke your guts out, you run toward the leaky shower in the master bath. The blistering hot water canāt rub your bloody skin off fast enough, āFuck the crime scene,ā you shout at the top of your lungs, into the ceiling. You contemplate how your pretty world has just shit its pants.
You exit the shower. The room has turned into a psych ward spa. Everything is a vapor. You splash ice water on your face over the sink in front of the massive mirror. You rub and rub at the steam on the glass.
Directly behind you, in the mirror, is your new reality. You can see it clearly now. It stands bleeding, broad-shouldered. Somehow the brawny shoulders are holding up a broken marble bowl of cherries. The bloody cherries are globing over the rim of the bowl.
After youāve determined the broken bowl is whatās left of my skull, I make you feel the icy barrel against your flesh, directly behind your pounding heart.
Now, Sonās-a-bitch, the lights really do go out.
š§ Available Audio Adaptations: None Available
š More stories from author: Dan A. Cardoza
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Copyright Statement: Unless explicitly stated, all stories published on CreepypastaStories.com are the property of (and under copyright to) their respective authors, and may not be narrated or performed, adapted to film, television or audio mediums, republished in a print or electronic book, reposted on any other website, blog, or online platform, or otherwise monetized without the express written consent of its author(s).