Crossroads

By Matt Degennaro

"Callisto" is a moon of the planet Jupiter.

When the "ill-fated" Angelo DeMarra is hanged and nearly

killed as a child, it sets him on a course that would change

• Language: English
• Publisher: Global Summit House
• Release date: Oct 4, 2021
• ISBN: 9781956736243

Book preview

In the Bitter Sweet

Some say before you die, your life flashes before your eyes. I stand here alone in the night, looking into a cloudless Seattle sky, remembering the day I drowned in a Jersey lake before I was two, remembering how I sank under water, breathing it in and out of my mouth and remembering how easy it is to let go. I had nothing to hang on to. Dead or alive, I am a free spirit, even if the choice by some quirk of fate is not my own.

There is no struggle, and I have no fear. The sun, filtering down into the lake, actually makes me peaceful and I am not in distress. I am drifting in a timeless state and I don’t have enough life to pass before my eyes. I am unconscious through most of it. Thank God my uncle reaches down and picks me up from the water of Lake Hopatcong, turns me upside down, smacks me several times on my back, clears the water from my lungs and jump starts my breathing. I open my eyes and am alive again.

Two years later, when older kids from my neighborhood take me from inside my grandfather’s gate (I’m living there because my father is in Europe fighting Germans), I see them opening the gate, surrounding me, enticing me with candy and taking me to their house half way up the hill to Columbia Avenue to play Cowboys and Indians.

Well, as it turns out, I’m the only Indian and they decide it’s fun to hang me. They make a noose, put it around my neck and string me up me from the wood under-structure of steps going to the top floor. I expect them to cut me down, but they run away and don‘t return.

As the noose tightens, I stop struggling, look down and see my feet are really far away. This time, anger over dying at such a young age, keeps me alive long enough for an angel to come and hold me up by my thin, weak legs and keep me breathing.

Yes, that incredible anger swells the muscles in my neck, letting me breathe, but it also sets up a terrible and destructive pattern that runs my life into middle age. The angel leaves when Big Georgie comes home from work hours later and cuts me down.

Georgie removes the noose, shakes me and asks, Angelo, are you alive? No, I say, gasping for air.

Can you stand? No.

That’s a nasty rope burn on your neck, Georgie says, checking out how deep the rope cut.

It hurts.

Georgie carries me home. I’m lucky to be alive, and after visiting the doctor with my mother, the rope burn on my neck takes weeks to heal. To this day, I never close the top button of my shirt or wear a tight necktie. Writing about this incident leaves me with a lump in my throat and I gag.

I am the hanged man. I am the hanged man. The voice inside my head sings.

Do. Do. Be Do. I’m sighing.

It’s early 1990 and I’m in Seattle in Pop Mark’s kitchen, sitting at a table with Pop and watching steam billow from a pot of boiling water on his stove. The water contains my breath, exactly fourteen complete exhales. Shadowy places, bodies and faces swirl in a growing steam cloud that hisses and undulates from the pot like a cobra doing a dance of death. I am impressed.

Pop is a much older man, a slightly overweight Gypsy of medium height who has dark hair and a thin moustache. I’m younger, though my age doesn’t mean much in the scheme of things.

I can’t keep my eyes off the churning steam. My curiosity peaks, and I see my life, and all the people in my life, as a destructive, repetitive, never- ending, tragic-comic pattern. It’s the paradigm, the wheel, that inner force keeping us ignorant of who we really are, limiting our natural ability, and enslaving everyone in a totally predictable, reactive lifestyle.

What follows is the story of my release from this self-destructive behavior designed to keep me from achieving incredible potential.

Let me introduce myself… I am Angelo De Marra, and my life is flashing before my eyes. I really wonder what is going to happen to me. And there are even some moments when I don’t care, but let’s not go there.

I hate to say it, but I’m beginning to believe Pop’s insistence about my imminent death. That’s the ultimate con. What’s different is it’ll take weeks to see and discover the truth, rectify my life and reach a good end. According to him, I need to be free from anger, from violence and from all culturally imposed limitations (filthy habits like smoking and drinking) and to be free from ancient superstitions that run everyone’s life in this world… the conversations we are born into.

So it’s true, Angelo says nervously. Your life flashes before your eyes? Pop smiles and answers, I’m afraid so, Angelo. You need to accept your fate. Only then will dying be easy. Only then will you see and know its meaning. No matter how difficult or painful, keep watching your life unfold. Upon hearing Pop’s words, and still mesmerized by the billowing steam, I shiver uncontrollably, wondering if there’s anything I can do to stop or slow the process. Then I’m still going to die? I ask, not totally convinced, more curious about him than me.

Yes, he answers with resolve. It’s inevitable. And there‘s nothing you or anyone can do about it. Of course, the God always has the final say.

Why are you being so harsh, Pop? I don‘t deserve this terrible, cruel and uncalled for treatment from you because I haven‘t done anything to you. Pop laughs. Not to me. But I know the ruthless, crazy life you lead and if I don’t clean you in time, you’ll be going straight to hell. Lucifer already has your name. He has had you for a long time.

You don’t like me, do you? I ask, knowing deep down it’s nothing personal for him.

I like you, Angelo, but how I feel about people doesn’t matter. I have a job to do and I’m good at it, he says, pointing to the steam. Like I told you, he continues. I’ve watched your life several times from start to finish. In many ways it is different than most I’ve seen, and in some ways, it’s strikingly similar.

My life flows before my eyes in the steam, but all I can see are jumbled, rapidly moving images. For a moment, I close my eyes and lower my head and massage my temples with my fingers. When I look up, I see Pop, grinning like the Cheshire Cat. He stands and faces me. His eyes appear to be on fire.

I call it like I see it, Pop interjects. It’s the way it is. Nothing anyone can do about it. Not even me.

I fidget nervously. It’s difficult for me to accept what Pop is saying. I still believe it’s a con and I am the bull’s-eye. Any minute, he’ll tell me the same old, tired, gypsy story about how much it’ll cost to lift the curse and save my life from an all consuming negativity. I stare at Pop. I’m forty nine, healthy, and I don’t feel like it’s my time. However, I don’t like being conned by a gypsy. Wiping sweat from my forehead on my sleeve, I ask, Can you focus it better, Pop, so I can see if this is for real?

My chair suddenly becomes uncomfortable, and I stand up and do a little dance to loosen up. Pop motions for me to sit down and points to the steam. I sit down and look at it intensely.

Yes, he answers, shifting his weight on the kitchen chair, looking at the quality of the steam images. I’ll make it so clear Angelo that suddenly it’ll look like you’re right in there, reliving each moment. You’ll see your mistakes and be given a chance to rectify your life.

"Really?’

Yes.

How will you do that? I ask, wondering about the extent of his magical power.

Like this! Pop exclaims, waving his hand like a wand in an arc like motion. Suddenly, the chaotic haze clears and Lisa, a beautiful, young woman with dark green eyes and long black, braided hair appears. I see she has a young, pretty face and a body to die for. When she opens her front door a crack, her blouse slips down over her shoulder, revealing a pentagram tattoo, and in her hand, she holds a large crystal dangling from a silver chain. The crystal’s brightness is reflected in her eyes.

I am reminded about the time I first met her. I am with my frat brother Joe and we are down on Benefit Street looking for a party to crash when we are waved up to a second floor apartment by two girls. Joe and I ascend the stairs and make a left down the long hall to the front apartment where the door is open. When we enter, it doesn’t take long to figure out the party is a dud.

Let’s get out of here, I say to Joe, who nods an agreement as he was already walking to the door. As I turn to follow him, I see Lisa sitting cross legged on the floor.

I agree, she says. Come to my place in the back. I have a bottle of wine I’ll share with you. Tell your friend to go on without you. He’ll understand. Suddenly, in the steam I see the door to Lisa’s house on Woodstock Mountain pushed open, and two scraggly, young men with long, unruly hair force their way into Lisa’s living room, surrounding her, grabbing for her. Take your filthy paws off me, she says, pushing the closest guy away.

She drops the crystal, realizing her spell to repel them is not working. Help, Angelo! She cries out. I’m being abducted! Help me!

I see myself clearly in the steam, rushing out from behind a wall to confront the two alien creeps who attempt to take Lisa, my girlfriend, away with them. I watch a much younger me thunder into the room, charging head down and legs churning. I can almost feel adrenaline pump through my veins giving me super human strength, and I know I need every bit of power I can muster to save her. The aliens point their index fingers and discharge a plasma like ray at me, but I absorb its gut wrenching impact with my head down and keep moving forward.

From Pop’s