Meadow: A Sopranos Fanfic

Burnt Hair & Horses

Ivy walked into Valentina's hospital room with less in her pocket than she had when she'd arrived, having payed for the left over portion of the bill that couldn't be taken care of even after using all of Valentina's savings.
Vee, as Ivy liked to call her, was depressed beyond anything she'd ever seen before (with good reason); indicated upon finding her sister sitting on the edge of the windowsill wearing a simple shirt, a pair of slacks and a bandanna wrapped around her head, while looking out at nothing at all.
They'd talked about the source of her depression of course, and she was certain it wasn't because of the man who had just left her, but what the man had done and what he represented in her life; a string of very bad decisions.
Not only had Vee set her hair on fire while making this man his breakfast;
Not only had the original doctor's assessment been wrong and the fire did destroy enough follicles on her head to ensure she would need wigs for the rest of her life;
Not only had he left her as soon as she was drugged up enough to sedate a small horse, ensuring she wouldn't make a scene;
But this hijodelagranputa had also skipped out on the bill that he had promised he would pay, leaving her to fend for herself.
This was the normalcy Valentina had created for herself in the midst of sex, parties and horses (of all things). Now all she had to show for it all was burnt hair and an empty bank account. After this no man would touch her and she was sure there was nothing at all to be festive about. Valentina suddenly got up and ran to the bathroom of the large hospital room, pushing aside a wheelchair in the process.
From inside Ivy could hear her sister puking her guts out and it made her cringe up from her head to her toes as she helped her pack her belongings into a little suitcase.
There was a flush and Valentina poured out of the room like a slug, looking down at the floor without a single desire to continue living life written all over her face.
"You ok?" Ivy asked her without looking and while folding some pants.
"I'm pregnant," Vee replied soullessly and nonchalantly while wiping her mouth clear of morning sickness.
Ivy whipped her head around, pants still in hand and half shouted "WHAT?!"

***

Carmela was just following her daily routine as she sat in the car, drinking some hot coffee and looking at the government building on the other side of the fence.
In her mind it looked like a gulag, not that she even really knew what a gulag looked like.
The thought crept into her head yet again that she didn't belong there, but she tried to push it away while gripping the steering wheel of her Volvo just a little tighter.
She'd been doing this for about a month now without any real plan as to what she was actually going to do, but she knew she needed to do something, and soon.
"It's a fucking gulag," she whispered under her breath, pressed the 'On' ignition button, and then hit the gas and left, just as a bell within the building sounded off and teenagers began pouring out unto the recreational area outside.

***

Ivy knew she had something bad. She could feel the strange alien thing inside of her, pushing her organs aside. It had been like this for a very long time now but lately it was getting worse. Lately when she moved, her insides hurt and she had to move carefully so that the alien thing didn't touch anything else inside of her, like swallowing a sharp stick that stays inside your stomach and then grows and moves around, poking at and rupturing soft tissue from within.
Gio was getting to be old enough to take care of himself, and for that she was happy. He'd need that if she wasn't around, especially knowing that his real mother, Valentina, would never take care of him; even for all the money in the world. She was nice enough to him as a tia, an aunt, but she knew her sister wasn't interested in anything other than a yearly check in on the boy.
Ivy had never bothered to tell her selfish, irresponsible sister that shortly after having Gio, and subsequently giving him to her to raise as she saw fit, a man had come knocking on the door. An old Jewish gentleman by the name of Hesh Rabkin.
Mr. Rabkin had been an associate of the man who'd been with Valentina, and knew a little bit of what was going on there.
"I never had any real close feelings towards, uh, you know...," he had twirled his finger about with one hand while holding his ice tea with the other, both sitting on the porch and looking out at the people coming and going on the sidewalk.
"Anyway," he had continued, "His father, Johnny boy, was a close friend and I liked his kids when they were younger. All except his wife, she was a real piece of work from the beginning, let me tell you."
"Mr. Rabkin," Ivy had asked, still puzzled at his visit.
"Hesh, please," he interrupted her.
"Mr. Hesh, you knew Gio's father?"
"Oh yea. Yea. Yes, we had a lot of going ons, this that and the what have you's," Hesh answered absentmindedly, rocking himself in the chair.
"And you know what he did?" She half-whispered.