Bella and Anthony

D L Edwards

"Don’t cry because it’s over. Smile because it happened."

- Dr. Seuss

Mrs. Carmen Bellini “Bella” Martino lay as comfortably as she could under the circumstances. Every monitor that good insurance could pay for had at least one tentacle hooked to her body somewhere and as many as five. St. Mary’s Hospital of the Benevolence knew quite enough to tell Bella’s husband that she most likely would not make it through the night, but the state of Arizona required up-to-date information around the clock. Money was no obstacle. In fact, the good state of Arizona insisted on it.

Bella’s husband, Anthony, had just stepped out of the room in order to “get some fresh air”. Lord knows the air inside the room was not fresh. Stale air abounded in every corner of the room. Orderlies, nurses, doctors, aides, phlebotomists and poor Bella had used all the good air and all that remained was the air of death. Anthony simply had to get hold of some healthy air, so he placed Bella’s hand, the one he had held all afternoon, on the bed and walked into the corridor, over to the elevator, down to the first floor and out the revolving doors into the warm evening air.

Anthony inhaled deeply as he stood just outside the door, breathing in the smell of fresh bread from a bakery down the street. Anthony smiled. The sweet aroma reminded him of the pastry shop that he and Bella had owned back in New Jersey. Anthony wanted to call the bakery “Bella’s”, but Bella would not hear of it.

“I don’t want to look up every morning and see my name up there as big as my ass!” she had said. She was funny that way. So they had called the bakery “Joey’s”, because neither of them knew a soul named Joey. Their little shop made the best Italian pastry in Hoboken, and business was good for many, many years - before Google and Yelp. After forty-five years in the business, they had decided to retire to a gated community in Arizona, where many of their New Jersey friends had flocked after retiring. Now, just three years since the migration, Bella’s health had completely deteriorated at age 75. She had ignored her diabetes for years. “What’s wrong with a little sugar now and then?” she had asked Anthony. “It’s good food.” Now her kidneys were calling it quits and her heart was failing as well. Bella would not agree to dialysis, saying that “only the good Lord knows when my time will come, not some damned machine”.

Anthony placed his hands in his jacket pocket and pulled out a cigar. He had quit smoking three months ago, so the cigar was a pleasant surprise. He took off the wrapper and smelled it. Still has a decent aroma, he thought. He bit off the end and wet the tip. Just to help me get through this, he thought. He reached into his pocket for a match but found only lint.

“Who am I kidding?” Anthony muttered softly aloud. Nothing was going to help. His bride lay sick and dying on the fourth floor, and no one could save her. Anthony tossed the cigar on the ground and stomped on it over and over for several seconds. His anger surprised him, and he looked around to see if anyone was watching. He took one more deep breath and, steeling himself for whatever might come, walked inside.

"The best thing to hold onto in life is each other."

- Audrey Hepburn

Bella did not notice when Anthony walked back into the room. Not even when he resumed holding her hand. Bella was in Atlantic City on the night she met Anthony. Bella and three of her friends from work traveled from Hoboken to Atlantic City for a long weekend vacation in 1957. They were staying at the Colony Hotel, just off the Boardwalk, and the salt air and sunshine were making them feel daring and bold. Each knew that romance was lying in wait and would swoop them up if they would only position themselves in the right spot at the right time.

The first two days, the quartet spent their mornings and afternoons at the beach, getting a tan and watching the young men work out. In the evenings, they caught a singing and dancing act on Thursday night and Eddie Fisher on Friday night. Sitting in the fourth row on Friday, Fisher actually touched Sharon’s right hand when he walked through the audience singing “Sweet Heartaches”. Bella, Tricia and Roxie teased Sharon the rest of the night back at the hotel by rubbing her hand to get Eddie’s touch off Sharon and on to them - until she actually cried. Roxie had to tell Sharon that no amount of rubbing could ever peel off the magic of Eddie’s touch. She finally bought it and stopped bawling.

On Saturday morning, the girls hopped onto the electric trolley and rode further down the boardwalk to a less crowded stretch of beach. There, they met four local guys with whom they talked and flirted and promised to meet again that evening at the Stardust. One of those guys happened to be a handsome, 24-year-old baker named Anthony Martino, who was already smitten by petite, dark-haired Carmen Bellini. Her friends called her “Bella” - beautiful, in English - and she was achingly beautiful to Anthony.

The groups met at seven that night to eat and then paired up to dance. Anthony had already made it known to his friends that Bella was the girl he wanted to dance with that evening so, of course, his friends all jumped up to dance with Bella while another ran interference on Anthony. He took it good-naturedly at first but by 10:30, his patience was running thin. Recognizing the setup, he tripped Tommy who was the next in line to dance with Bella, and pushed interference man Nick into the goldfish pond. He then whisked Bella onto the dance floor as a commotion played out behind them.

“I’ve been trying to get a chance to dance with you all night,” said Anthony.

“Oh, really?” said Bella. “I thought maybe you didn’t like me or something since you were avoiding me all this time.”

“Oh no, Bella, believe me. I’ve been wanting to dance with you this entire evening.”

Bella laughed and Anthony thought maybe he had blown his one chance.

“Nick told Sharon what was going on and she spilled it to me,” said Bella. “I’ve known all along that you wanted to dance with me. I’ve been wanting to dance with you, too, but I thought I’d let you make the first move.”

Make the first move, thought Anthony. He had been making moves all night long but laughed it off and squeezed Bella tightly and twirled her out to the center of the dance floor. He and Bella danced seven straight dances until they finally came off to get refreshments. After the dancing, the couples (everyone had paired up by this point) decided to take in a show at the Flamingo. All but Anthony and Bella. Anthony wanted to take her for a midnight walk along the beach. Both took off their shoes and Anthony rolled up his pants legs. Bella loved the sound of the surf and the way the moonlight danced on the incoming waves. When it cooled off, Anthony took off his coat and placed it over Bella’s shoulders and they continued their walk.

When they reached the Colony, Bella was sure that she didn’t want the night to end but didn’t want to say anything to Anthony. Anthony had an idea of his own.

“Bella, I’ve decided that I want you to come back to my house tonight.”

Bella’s smile faded suddenly and she gave Anthony his coat back. “Why did you have to spoil it, Anthony?” she said and started to sob.

“No, no. It’s not like that, Bella. I live with my parents. and brothers and sister. I want them all to meet you.” said Anthony. He handed his handkerchief to Bella.

“But Anthony,” she sniffed, “it’s very late and your family will all be in bed.”

“They won’t be for long,” he said. “My family will want to meet the girl I’m going to marry, don’t you think?”

"A life is not important except in the impact it has on other people."

- Jackie Robinson

Bella opened her eyes and looked around the room. It took them a few minutes to adjust to the darkness, but finally the shadows began to take shape. She suddenly remembered where she was - in a luxury room at the Claremont Hotel in Atlantic City. Anthony stirred next to her and rolled over.

“Are you OK?” he whispered.

“I’m fine,” she whispered back. “Oh, Anthony, today has been the most wonderful day of my life. I love you so much.”

Anthony smiled. “I love you, too. Can I ask you something, Bella?”

“Of course, you’re my husband now. We have no secrets from each other.”

“Good. Why are we whispering?”

Bella laughed and gave Anthony a light punch on the jaw and then a kiss on the same spot.

The wedding had taken place in the afternoon at St. Ann’s in Hoboken, her family’s parish church, and both families had gotten along very well. The dinner and reception had breezed by quickly and now Bella and Anthony were on their honeymoon. And where else would they honeymoon but the place where they had met two years ago?

Anthony continued his job at the bakery and Bella hired in as a secretary at a local insurance agency. She didn’t like it though. She wanted to be with Anthony all day, and that meant working together. But even more, she wanted a baby. She would then quit her job and have the most important career in the world. At least she thought so. But as time passed, her dream became a nightmare when she could not get pregnant. Try as they might, it would not happen. Finally, after several tests on both of them, they found out that it was Bella who could not conceive. She stayed home from work and cried for several days - not just because they would not be having a baby, but because she thought it would eventually ruin her marriage as well. Anthony assured her that he was fine with the situation. They could always adopt, he told her.

But fate had different plans. Her mother called her one day to say that the Home for Delinquents and Runaways for Hudson County needed house parents, and she knew that Bella was looking for a different line of work.

“But, Mama, I have no skills as a mother,” she said. “Those kids need a mother, not a middle-aged nurse-maid”

“They need someone to give a damn about them,” her mother had said. “Last time I looked, you qualified. Besides, the ad says that age doesn’t matter.”

They argued back and forth several days before Bella finally agreed to send in an application. Anthony was rooting for her, too. Four days later, Bella received a phone call from the home requesting an interview. Bella nearly panicked, wondering how these people would perceive her. She took two days off from work to travel to Hoboken - one day for the interview and the day before for her mother to convince her that she was right for the job.

Time had taken a funny waltz through her life, but at the age of thirty, Bella became a mother - a house mother. The job was hard at first, until she let her compassion and her common sense rule the roost. Bella always made it known that she cared deeply about each and every one of them, but discipline had to be maintained. Anthony was the greatest father, too, thought Bella. He had always been the cook in the family and got the boys interested enough to help prepare evening meals and do some baking on the weekend. He took them fishing, rode bikes with them and played baseball in the big field out back. For most of the boys, their time at the home with Bella and Anthony was the most stable relationship they had ever known.

So for twenty-five years, they were houseparents - though the institution changed names three times while they were there in order to keep up with the times. And even though the boys - and girls eventually - changed as well, the home remained a home for each and every one of them.

"I may not have gone where I intended to go, but I think I have ended up where I needed to be."

- Douglas Adams

It was after twenty-five years of caring for the young that Bella and Anthony decided to go into the pastry business together. Joey’s was a huge success and, besides the good food, a lot of the success stemmed from the love of the two owners. They were obviously in love with each other and finally could spend the time together they had always wanted. They loved each customer, too, just as they had the boys and girls of the home.

“Mr. Manetti,” Bella would say, “you have company stopping by tomorrow your wife said. I think she’ll want you to bring home a nice marzipan or struffoli.”

They knew their patrons better than they knew themselves. “But Mrs. Nicoli, I’m sure your family prefers their pandoro with vanilla icing sugar,” Anthony would implore of a customer, and he was always right. Their shop remained open for twenty years from 5 a.m. to 2 p.m. every day - even Sunday. They lived in a cozy suite above the shop that made it easy for Bella or Anthony to sneak down for a plate of biscotti or a cannolo late at night.

When they sold the place to move to Arizona, the neighborhood felt as though its heart had been snatched away. Oh, they could still buy the pastry, but they did not get the gentle reminders, the best wishes or suggestions for a sick relative. It just was not the same anymore.

What little time the couple had in retirement was well-spent. They and their friends went to spring training games in March and horse races or dog races during the winter. But it became more and more difficult for Bella to stand and walk.

“Anthony, I’m sorry,” she would say. “You got stuck with a slow horse.”

“So what do I need with a fast horse when I’ve got my Bella Dona,” Anthony would reply. But even with their many friends, it felt lonely in retirement. Especially around holidays when their friends’ children and grandchildren and even great-grandchildren visited. Bella and Anthony were often invited over, too, but they always declined. They would spend the time together.

A wonderful thing had happened in February. Twelve of their “children” from the home had shown up carrying a huge folded up banner. On the banner, every one of Bella and Anthony’s house kids that could be rounded up had signed and written a heart-felt paragraph or two on what the couple had meant to them. Many of them had noted that if it hadn’t been for their houseparents, their lives would not have turned out so well. They also noted what careers they had chosen. Signing the banner for Bella and Anthony were three doctors, a mayor, an up-and-coming artist, ten nurses, two lawyers, five police officers, four social workers, seventeen teachers and many, many more. Pictures and statistics were also added to the banner. Nearly two-thirds of the group had earned college degrees of one sort or another. The group had parented over two-hundred children of their own. “You are the only couple we know with over two-hundred grandchildren, and with too many great grandchildren to count,” said the artist. She presented three huge bags filled with drawings and letters from these children addressed simply to “Grandma and Grandpa”.

The banner was placed on the outside of the house by the group so that all could see just how successful the couple had been and what a legacy they were leaving behind them. The local newspaper came out to interview Bella and Anthony and members of the group, and it appeared in newspapers a few days later. Bella cried with joy leading everyone else to join her lead, including Anthony. He knew just what this meant to Bella. She could finally put the ribbon on her life she had so yearned for and tie it up into a beautiful bow. Her life had meaning. She was loved, adored, admired. She could die happy, and she did - three months later. Anthony had brought her home from the hospital, where she died one afternoon in her own bed. Anthony was holding her hand.