Life with My Sister Madonna by Christopher Ciccone Read Free Book Online

brothers’ bullying behavior without realizing that we are robotically repeating their pattern. One time, Melanie and I are alone in the house babysitting Mario and Jennifer. We gravely explain that something terrifying has just happened. There’s been a news flash on the TV: a serial killer has escaped and just been spotted prowling around our neighborhood. We whisper that we have to turn off the lights so he won’t know we are home, otherwise he might break in and slaughter us all.
    Mario and Jennifer huddle together behind the couch, petrified. Meanwhile, Melanie and I sneak into the kitchen, grab butcher knives out of the kitchen drawer, and creep out of the house and into the street. About five minutes later, we burst through the front door, brandishing the knives, and chase Mario and Jennifer around the house in the dark. They scream and cry so much that, in the end, we get them a cup of granola and say we are sorry. When Joan discovers what we have done, Melanie and I are grounded for a week and forced to do double chores.
    In the best of times, even if we are all being close to angelic, chores remain a fact of life for us. First thing every morning, we all check the chore list Joan has posted on the refrigerator. An example from my late teens: “Christopher to do the dishes and clean the yard. Paula to do the laundry. Marty to take out the garbage. Melanie to polish the cutlery. Mario to match the socks. Anthony to cut the grass. Jennifer to mend the clothes.”
    Generally, my older brothers never have to do dishes or the laundry. And my sisters are never enlisted to cut the grass or take out the garbage, but I always have to do both the girls’ chores and the boys’. I never understand why. I don’t mind doing the laundry, though, because that way I can get a march on my brothers and sisters by grabbing the only 100 percent cotton sheets we possess, a floral print. When I do, I feel as if I am sleeping on silk. To this day, I retain an addiction to 100 percent cotton sheets.
    Joan rarely allocates any tasks to Madonna, in tacit recognition, I think, of her special place in our father’s heart. Besides, I believe Joan is a little afraid of her.
    I don’t recall my father ever scolding Madonna or disciplining her, except once. Madonna comes home late one night, Joan slaps her, and she slaps Joan back. Madonna is grounded for a week and banned from driving her car—a 1968 red Mustang that we all wish we had.
    Another time, Madonna and some friends drive over to the local gravel pit, about twenty miles north of Rochester, where we always go swimming. She and Paula much prefer swimming when they aren’t with our father and Joan because our father has banned them from wearing bikinis, which Madonna resents.
    During the summer, though, because Madonna wants to protect her fair skin, she never sunbathes like the rest of us. But she’s always been a good swimmer and enjoys swimming at the pit. On this particular day, however, we aren’t with her.
    Late that night, she arrives home with a black eye and a bloody nose. Joan is really upset because she does care about Madonna, and all of us, and asks her what happened.
    It turns out that a group of bikers drove up to the pit and started playing loud music. Everyone else was really annoyed, but only Madonna had the guts to go up and say something. So one of the biker chicks beat her up. Madonna shrugged the whole thing off, her confidence and bravery intact.
    Apart from the odd excitement, such as Madonna and the biker chicks, our lives fall into a certain rhythm.
    School days invariably begin with us all rushing to get ready, always late, flinging our clothes everywhere, making Joan so mad that she invariably comes out with her favorite phrases: “Your room looks like the wreck of the Hesperus ” or “Your room looks like the Russian army went through it.” We, of course, have no idea what she is talking