THE BLOODY LAMB

THE BLOODY LAMB

After the succulent appetizers, after the first, tortellini in broth, the highlight of the lunch would be the LAMB. Fried lamb would be served, but also stewed lamb, and roast lamb too. They would eat lamb as they always did at the great Easter lunch, to which there were present aunts, uncles, cousins, nephews, children of cousins, of nephews…. Eating lamb at the Easter lunch was a tradition to which her family, her relatives would never give up.  Since years she had refused to eat lamb, even thought she had not become a vegetarian. It had been since she had seen a skinned lamb, with its whole body bloody, that, no, it was not exact to say that she had made the decision to never eat lamb again, because it had been as if that decision had been made for her by the bloody body of the lamb. That day, it was winter, an icy wind was blowing. The door had opened wide (open) and the wind had entered, it had turned, circled in the entrance, it was so perceptible that you seemed to see that transparent and icy wind. And together with the wind the skinned lamb, its head and body all red with blood, had entered. Those there, the two men, were holding the skinned animal, one for the front legs, one for the roar legs, to take it under the stairs. They would have hung it with a hook to a beam of the basement. They, had something stealthy, those two, while they were carrying the skinned lamb under the stairs. ( to the basement). You could see, it was evident ( she understood) that they ( those two) would not want to be seen, and , least of all, would they have liked her to see them. She had screamed at the sight of the lamb’s body all colored in blood red. Now she couldn’t remember if she had shouted : “ KILLERS!” , or something worse at the address of those two. Instead she remembered very well what she had felt at the sight of the skinned lamb , all red with blood. She remembered so well that even now she would have started screaming as then. Now that she seemed to see the blood of the lamb dripping from the mouths of the diners, who were eating, tasting that meat . Yes, that was precisely the blood of that skinned lamb…it was filling their dishes full of abundant portions of roast lamb, stewed lamb, fried lamb. “ Oh, don’t you eat lamb, Agnes?Is it possible you don’t like it? It is so good!” The great aunt Ida said, her mouth full of lamb. “ In fact, I don’t eat the lamb, because it is too good” Agnes muttered. “ Eh, but what does she say?” the great aunt giggled.

“ No, aunt….She, that there, you know, she is like that….she has her fixations” Her mother said, snorting. “ Ah, really a delight this lamb…ah, what soft meat” Her cousin Joe said, smoothing his stomach, with a very satisfiedd air. She, Agnes, stood up and went out of the living room. “ But look at that rude!” Her father shouted at her behind, in an irate tone.

“ Oh, she must have had to run away to the bathroom” Her grandmother Elvira observed, conciliatory.  “ But sure, it will be she went to the bathroom to throw up the lamb! The lamb she didn’t ear! “ Her cousin Clelia burst out, laughing.

“ Ah, at my venerable age I did not spend a Holy Easter without eating the lamb” Grandpa John said, wiping his mustache with a white napkin, of an immaculate white. “ Your daughter Agnes should respect traditions. Didn’t you teach her to respect traditions? Ah, parents who don’t teach their children to respect traditions, but what parents are they?” The old man said these words looking at her son, sitting opposite him, with a stern frown. “ Dad, you know what the children are like, they want to do their our minds….I too, do you remember? I too was like that “ Peter said, while Agnes came back in the room and she sit down again at the table.

“We were talking about you, darling” Grandma Ada said “ We are sorry that you do not join us to taste the Easter lamb” “ Oh, the paschal lamb” Agnes snorted, with a grimace. “ Listen to me, my girl: the paschal lamb, precisely, which also represents THE LAMB OF GOD, who takes away sins from the world” Grandpa John admonished her, raising his index finger, while she was speaking.

“ Good thus one!” Agnes snorted. “ What do you mean? A little respect when it comes to the Lamb of God!” The angry grandfather cried. “ Oh, certainly, respect for the Lamb of God! You respect him so much that you eat him! You are cannibal too!” Agnes said, in a mocking tone.

“ But listen to her! Oh, this girl is blasphemous! She is making fun of the Lamb of God!” The enraged grandfather shouted. “ Ah, if anything, you are those who are making fun of him! You who eat him! The Lamb of God!” Agnes cried, pointing to the lamb in the dinner dishes.

“ Augh! Peter! Mary! If you don’t slap this decreased, I’ll take care of it!” The grandpa shouted, his face becoming more and more red. He stood up and, staggering, moved topwards Agnes, giving her two loud slaps. Agnes, holding her hands on her cheeks, run away from the room.  “ Ah, that bad, very bad decreased!” The grandfather, trembling with rage, continued to shout.  “On, grandpa, why take it so hard for what Ages said? After all, even when we receive the host of the Eucharist we eat….the body of the Lamb of God “ Alex said.

“ What did you say, villain?” The grandpa screamed, indeed his scream sounded like a roar. “ Oh, damnation!All my grandchildren are villains, are blasphemous!” The grandfather shouted, kicking the table, and also the people sitting at the table. Dishes, glasses fell of the table to the floor. All the diners got excited, more and more excited. The grandfather John continued to rant against his grandchildren, those blasphemous!

She, Agnes, was crying, closed into the bathroom. She heard the screams and the noises, indeed the roars from the living room. She saw again the bloody lamb, and she felt as a skinned lamb she too.