“What sweetheart? Sweetheart indeed!” I say, since Maddalena is not speaking anymore. “He’s a Communist, too. I saw him at the Party headquarters before leaving.”
“So what? What does that mean?” Mariuccia insists. “Just because you’re a Communist doesn’t mean you can’t be a sweetheart, right?”
“That Communist?” I answer. “He has the ‘problem of the south’ to deal with; he’s not going to be thinking about love.”
“Love has many different faces,” Maddalena says. “Not just the ones you’re thinking about. For example, isn’t being here, with all you disobedient pests, love? And your mothers, who let you come on the train to go far away to Bologna and Rimini and Modena . . . isn’t that love, too?”
“Why? Does somebody who sends you away love you, then?”
“Amerigo, sometimes letting you go shows greater love than keeping you.”
I don’t understand but I don’t answer back, either. Maddalena says she has to go check on the kids in the other compartments to make sure everyone is okay, and so she leaves. Me, Tommasino, and Mariuccia start playing rock, paper, scissors to pass the time. After a while, the train slows down and finally stops. The signorinas tell us to hold hands and form a line, two by two; to be good, and to wait quietly until it is our turn to go out. Once we are out in the street, we need to stay put, otherwise we will get lost, and then where would the solidarity go if we were all in different places?
When we pull into the station, there’s a band playing, and a white banner that one of the signorinas reads us. It says, “Welcome to the children from the Mezzogiorno.” They have come all the way here to welcome us. It’s like the festival of Our Lady of the Arch, except there are no people dressed in white, throwing themselves on the ground in convulsions, shouting “Madonna dell’Arco” because they’ve received a miracle.
The musicians are playing a song all the signorinas know, because they keep shouting “bella ciao ciao ciao” and, when the song finishes, they hold their fists up to the sky. The sky is gray and full of long, thin clouds. Mariuccia and Tommasino think they are making fists because they are fighting, but I know it is the Communist salute, because Zandragliona has taught me. It’s different from the Fascist salute, which I know, because Pachiochia has taught me. In fact, when crossing paths in our alleyway, Zandragliona and Pachiochia greeted each other with their own salutes, and it looked just like they were playing rock, paper, scissors.
I hold hands with Mariuccia in one row and Tommasino is behind, holding a slightly bigger girl’s hand. We walk through the crowd of people waving white, red, and green flags and smiling, clapping, and shouting hello. It feels like we have won a prize, and we have come to northern Italy as a favor to them, not vice versa. Some men in hats with thick mustaches wave red flags with a yellow half-circle in the middle, singing a song I don’t know. Every now and again I hear the word in-ter-na-zio-nale.
After a while, the ladies start singing, too. They are the wives of the men in hats with thick mustaches carrying the red flags with the yellow half-circle in the middle. I know the song they are singing, because it’s the one Maddalena sang through the metal funnel to send Pachiochia away. The one about the women who are not afraid, even if they are women. Or maybe because they are women; I’m not sure. Their voices are getting louder, and many of them look like they are crying as they are singing. I can’t understand all the words, because they must be in the language of the north, but I know it’s about mothers and children, for one thing, because the signorinas from the train and the Communist ladies from northern Italy look at us and smile as if we were all their own children.
We are led into the big room full of Italian flags and red flags. There’s a long, long table in the middle full of good things to eat: cheese, ham, salami, bread, pasta . . . Us kids were desperate to throw ourselves on the food, but a signorina shouts into the metal funnel.
“Children, there’s enough for everyone. Don’t move. You will each get a plate, a napkin, tableware, and a glass of water. As long as you are here, you will never suffer hunger.”
The kids look around wide-eyed and dig one another in the ribs as if to say, “Today’s our lucky day; what was that about Communists eating babies?”
Gradually, we get closer to the food, and you could hear a pin drop. Mariuccia, Tommasino, and I sit next to one another. On our plates, there’s a slice of pink ham full of white spots, one soft cheese, one as hard as a rock, and one that stinks of smelly feet. We look at one another, but none of us starts eating, even though we are starving. You can read it in our eyes. Luckily, Maddalena soon arrives.
“What’s up now? Aren’t you hungry any longer?”
“Signorina . . .” Mariuccia says, “are you sure these northerners haven’t given us their old food? The ham is full of white spots and the cheese is soft and moldy.”
“Of course, they want to poison us,” the blond boy with no teeth says.
“If I wanted to get cholera, I’d prefer to eat the mussels down at the port, with all due respect,” Tommasino says.
Maddalena picks up a slice of the ham with white spots on it and puts it in her mouth. She says we have to get used to these new specialties: Bologna ham, Parmesan, and Gorgonzola . . .
I pluck up courage and try a little piece of the ham with spots on it. Mariuccia and Tommasino gape at me. They can see from my face, though, that it’s delicious, and so they tuck in, too. And then there is no stopping us. We polish off everything, including the soft cheese, the one with the green mold in it, and even the rock-hard, salty one that prickles your taste buds.
“Don’t they have mozzarella cheese here?” Tommasino asks.
“You can eat mozzarella back home in Mondragone,” Maddalena jokes.
Then a Communist signorina comes around with a trolley full of little cups with white foam inside.
“It’s ricotta, it’s ricotta,” Mariuccia says.
“It’s snow, it’s snow,” Tommasino says.
I pick up a teaspoon and stick a blob of white foam into my mouth: it’s freezing and it tastes of milk and sugar. It’s soft, iced milk.
“It’s ricotta with sugar!” Mariuccia insists.
“It’s grated ice with milk!” Tommasino answers.
Mariuccia eats it slowly, leaving a tiny bit in the cup.
“What’s wrong? Don’t you like ice cream?” Maddalena asks.
“Not really,” Mariuccia says, but we all know it’s a fib.
“Well, if you really don’t like it,” Maddalena goes on, “we can give what you’ve left over to Tommasino and Amerigo, okay?”
“No!” Mariuccia bursts out, tears squeezing out of her eyes. Then she looks down at the ground and blushes. “Actually, I wanted to save a little for my brothers, when I get back home, and I wanted to hide it in the pocket of my dress.”
“But you can’t save ice cream; it melts!” Maddalena says.
“If it melts, how am I going to do the solidarity thing?”
Maddalena dips her hand into her bag and takes out five or six candies.
“Here you go; these are better for solidarity. You can keep them for your brothers.”