THE SHORT LIFE OF ALEXANDRO

By Author Paul Hughes

This is a fun prompt from my Writers’ group, where we were challenged to write up to 1,000 words using one or both of the phrases “Up the Spout” or “Down the Gurgler”.

THE SHORT LIFE OF ALEXANDRO

Twelve-year-old Alexandro Lombardi stared in awe at the imposing red brick Victorian-style house where his mother was the new housemaid and cook. Known simply as One-One-Five, it was set on five landscaped acres in Carlton street, Carlton and had been extended over the years to accommodate eight bedrooms.

There was just the two of them now, and they’d struggled since his father was killed in a robbery last year. While the hours were going to be long and the pay wasn’t the best, the job came with a small two-bedroom cottage set in the grounds, so his mother accepted it with relief.

One-One-Five was the home of Alphonso and Maria Luchiano, who Alex later discovered had many ‘interesting’ businesses across Melbourne. The property was bordered by a high red brick fence overgrown by sprawling red and pink bougainvillea whose sharp thorns – coupled with the huge iron gates – made it like a fortress.

There were seven Luchiano children, including Sonia, Sergio, Stephano, Silvio, Santonia and Sandro, who were all in their 20s and 30s and had already left home.

Then there was Sophia – a solid, gangly 11-year-old with long dark pigtails, thick glasses and a real tomboy attitude. She arrived at the cottage door before their bags were even taken inside, demanding his name and age, and insisting he must “come and play!”

Alexandro's eyes pleaded with his mother to reject the offer but, buried in stress, she failed to catch the desperate glance and sent him to what he thought was his doom with a nod and flick of her head. 

Within minutes, his fears of playing with dolls or skipping ropes had dissipated. They screamed with delight racing around the gardens, climbing trees, and exploring the many “wonders”, including the big tree house the older children had built years ago, high in a massive tree.

It looks like 1994 wasn’t going to be such a bad year after all, Alex thought, as he drifted off into an exhausted sleep that night.

***

Alphonso Luchiano was a big, formidable man in his early 60s who maintained the heavy accent he brought when he migrated from Italy to Australia 35 years earlier. While his children adopted modern dress styles, Alphonso was more suited to the Roarin’ 20s – white shirt, tie, baggy suit, polished black shoes and hat. And he was constantly smoking a cigar.

A few weeks after they moved in, Alex was picking some flowers for his mum from the abundant offerings in the many garden beds when he heard the crunching of gravel behind him. A deep voice behind him suddenly boomed so fiercely he dropped the flowers and felt a couple of unexpected drops moisten his shorts.

“What-the-heck you think you doing, boy?”

The thick, guttural sound made him spin around so quickly he sprawled on the ground, shaking as he looked up at more than six feet and 120 kilos of power towering above him.

“Nobody a-touch or take anything belonging to Alphonso Luchiano without-a Alphonso say you can. You understand?”

Alex bit his lip and nodded furiously, fearful of what might happen next.

“Leave him alone Daddy – I said he could pick some flowers for his mum,” Sophia yelled stridently as she bounded down the path, the crunching of her feet on the gravel only adding to the drama.

“Sophia, darlin-ga. How many times I have to tell you, only Daddy can give anything away in this household!

Sophia just helped Alex to his feet, swept up the flowers and led him to the tree house.

***

Over the next five years, two things made a lasting impression on Alex’s brain.

The first was the constant flow of big, black cars and vans that regularly visited the property at all hours, going into the huge garage, where the doors would be closed. Occasionally he would hear shouting and even screams of pain coming from that building, but he never asked about it.

The second was how Sophia morphed from a gangling tomboy into a beautiful young woman. Although she’d just turned 16, the thick glasses were gone; her unblemished skin shone; she was tall and slender; where once there was nothing, her perfect soft breasts would firm at his touch; and her eager, passionate kissing always left him breathless.

Needless to say, their games in the tree house also changed, and Alex thought that life couldn’t get much better.

It was almost five years to the day that he’d arrived a One-One-Five that he climbed the rope ladder after school, pulled it up behind him and gave Sophia a passionate kiss.

Sophia finally broke away and looked at him with a strange smile on her face. 

“I did a test today. It showed two lines. I’m Up the Spout!”

Although the words were softly, almost excitedly spoken, they hit him like a sledge hammer. Stunned, he looked down at the garden path where he’d laid sprawled among a bunch of flowers five years earlier and recalled Alphonso towering above him.

Those words boomed into his memory: “Sophia darling-a. How many-a-times I have to tell you, only Daddy can give anything away in this household!”

Alex swivelled his glance to the six-car garage, before he slowly turned fear-filled eyes back to Sophia.

“Oh shit,” he said. “I think my life is about to go Down the Gurgler!”

© Paul Hughes