We’re intrigued by the Cinderella story told in a unique way!
Thank you Laura Bellusci for submitting your prose piece “Blue Lotus” to the WriteAngles Journal!
The Blue Lotus: Cinderella Retold
by Laura Bellusci
– a work in progress; abbreviated excerpt
Several months before Signore Malatesta was to embark on a voyage, his wife announced that she was with child. The couple already had three healthy sons and with this, the fourth, La Signora proclaimed that it was to be her final pregnancy. Her husband wondered at the reason, after all, he replied, “Don’t I employ a balia whose tits flow with creamy health, able nurses to take on every duty and enough servants to run the household?” As a man, he could see only the outermost inconveniences, which he considered to be minor at most.
To this his wife complained: “This is my fourth pregnancy and I feel the load grows heavier and heavier, like I have an apron of rocks tied around my waist. With each baby, my girth grows and grows so that all my beautiful gowns of silvered brocade, silks and satins must all be remade.” But her husband just shook his head, retreated to his study and slammed the door. Undaunted and determined, she said to the closed door, “Go and find your delights elsewhere, from now you are not welcome in my bed.”
When La Signora’s belly was so big that she was apt to spread herself quite unceremoniously on a wide settee, her legs splayed, higgledy-piggledy, her head thrown back as though in silent retreat from her body. She might have been a drunkard whose last concern was to her manners and upkeep.
The mother of three sons, Signora Malatesta prayed each night for a baby girl. At the appointed hour, she shrieked and pushed till her eyes felt likely to pop out of her head and her face like a rash of red blotches to rival a dread disease. When finally the midwife brought the babe to the light, all the poor mother could see emerge wet and slippery from the gap between her bent knees was the infant’s perky little penis. And Lucina delightedly exclaimed, “Congratulations, you have a boy.” To this Signora, replied, “This one is my last child, and I will make him into a girl.” With that, she spat into the child’s tiny mouth, formalizing the duality implied in his new status.
La Signora named the boy Zeno, for the omni-god rejoiced as a gift of Zeus. In years to come, Zeno grew into a handsome and desirable young man. His prince knew him as Zena.
And so little Zeno was destined to become a femminiello, and part of that esteemed group unique to Napoli. Everyone knew he was a man, but he wore the clothes of a woman. As a baby his mother delighted in dressing him in frills, much to the dressmaker’s delight. With Zeno as a little girl to spoil, the older boys suffered for want of motherly attention and it wasn’t long before they exacted their wrath on their baby brother.
And so the plot thickens…..
Laura Bellusci is a writer and activist. Originally from East Boston, she writes on the immigrant experience. Her travel stories have been appeared in Italian American publications. She wrote and performed her one-woman show: the Original Mrs Drinkwater Presents for several years. Retired from teaching high school ESOL, she currently teaches Italian at the Northampton Senior Center. Laura is available for author readings told with slides of places depicted in her novel, The Eternal Pine. Her new novel, The Blue Lotus is a retelling of Cinderella. Both stories take place in Naples, Italy.