Apricot Kisses (21 page)

Claire whispers in my head,
“Who says it has to end that way?”

Maybe I’m more of a romantic than I let on. I have no idea if Fabrizio is thinking the same thing or if it’s all part of the game for him. Besides, what would I do in Italy? My life is in Berlin.

Claire again,
“What life, Hanna?”

Fabrizio reaches for my hand. I look at his fingers, long with straight-cut nails, and I tremble.

Yes. What life? I think of my empty apartment and all the unopened boxes; of the office, quiet at night; of my desk at the window and the lit windows across the street full of people enjoying themselves instead of working; of spending Sundays on a bench in the company of meerkats and a zookeeper whom I know only by his first name. I grip Fabrizio’s hand more tightly.

Fabrizio

She’s pretty, the way she sits there with closed eyes—even though her smeared eyeliner makes her look like a panda. I almost regret that I have to wake her.

“We’re here,” I whisper in her ear. Hanna responds immediately, and my heart leaps when she looks at me. I’ve known many women in many different ways, and they’ve all looked at me with different expressions. But even Sofia never looked at me this way. I can’t explain it, and I honestly don’t care what the explanation is. All I know is that I have to be alone with her as soon as possible.

Marco parks the Ford in the garage and gets out without saying a word, slamming the door. He unloads the tool kit, moving slowly and hanging around the truck longer than necessary.

“Would you go out with me tonight?” I say quickly, voice raised. Hanna’s gaze rests on Marco, who’s stopped to fidget with the gas cap, expressionless.

“I’d love to go out with you,” she says. There’s something in her tone that I don’t get—but at least she didn’t say no.

“That’s great,” I say, wishing Marco would go to hell so I could kiss her and do exactly what we did just a while ago—for hours.

Hanna helps me along: “What do you have in mind?”

“There’s a nice little osteria in Montesimo. Well, it’s the only osteria, but . . . it’s a good one.”

She smiles and kisses my cheek. It smacks too much of friendship for my taste. “Good, let’s go out to eat.”

Then Lucia saves me from my it’s-been-a-decade-since-my-last-date embarrassment. She rushes toward us, her dress waving in the wind, and embraces Hanna.

“What has this horrible man done to you? Were you in an accident? Are you all right? Are you hurt?” She shoots me a vicious look. “This jerk didn’t tell us anything. Calls, stutters about needing to be towed, and hangs up as if he’s late for the bus.”

“Everything is fine, Lucia.” Hanna gently removes herself from the hug. If Lucia weren’t my sister-in-law, I’d be embarrassed. But Lucia is Lucia, and her “bus” comment isn’t far off.

“Don’t just stand there and grin, Fabrizio. Tell me. What happened?”

Marco slams the trunk. “Calm down,
stellina
. We’re all here and nobody got hurt,” he says evenly. “At least not as far as we can see. Excuse me. I have to make a phone call.”

Lucia frowns and follows Marco’s head-down shuffle with her eyes. Then she examines me and Hanna, who lowers her eyes and blushes. Lucia takes a deep breath to say something, but seems to think better of it and crosses her arms in front of her chest.

“Signora I-Have-Better-Things-to-Do, are you growing roots over there, or do you want to learn how to make real pasta? Then get your bony ass into the kitchen.” I never thought Rosa-Maria’s voice would make me so happy.

“I believe she’s talking about me,” Hanna says with a smile, and fishes her handbag out of the truck. She hesitates, nods to me, and then dashes across the yard, giving the chickens plenty of room. Lucia squints.

“Hanna,” she shouts. “Your blouse is on backward.”

Hanna stops and turns around. She’s beaming.

“I know.”

Hanna

The kitchen is a haven for me this afternoon. Rosa-Maria’s strict regimen allows no time for brooding, and I plunge gratefully into the work. I wash the breakfast dishes without being asked and listen attentively when Rosa-Maria explains in what order to mix the pasta-dough ingredients. I learn how to knead air out and love in, and how to recognize when the dough is smooth enough to be pressed, in portions as large as the palm of your hand, through the pasta machine. Then I clean and quarter two cases of plum tomatoes, slice garlic so thinly that Rosa-Maria nods in satisfaction, and make a tomato sauce—a real pomarola—under her close supervision. It’s the first time I haven’t been in her way, despite the small size of the room. If Rosa-Maria is astonished that I’ve mutated into a submissive apprentice, she hides it well. But when I take off my apron in the early evening, she presses the tenth and final installment of
Propelled by Hope
in my hands, which are pruney from dishwater.

I’m still smiling when I dry my hands in my dwarfish bathroom. I’ve grown so fond of Prudence and Hugh by now that I can hardly wait to witness their decidedly X-rated reunion. I’m contemplating starting to read before my date with Fabrizio, when I notice my phone. I haven’t touched it since I called Claire.

I suddenly long for my mother’s chatty voice. I’d like to tell her about Fabrizio, and about other things as well. She might have some advice for me.

My heart beats faster as I listen to the phone ring. It clicks, and I take a deep breath. “Mamma, it’s me, Hanna. I wanted to tell you—”

“. . . not home right now. In case of an emergency, you can reach me at . . .”

Disappointed, I exhale and end the call without leaving a message. I cross to the little desk under the window.

Paolo is pushing a wheelbarrow of manure across the yard—straight through a flock of chickens, to Vittoria’s great displeasure. I see Lucia walking to the herb garden with her little basket to pick wildflowers for the dessert plates. Men’s voices drift up from the barn, and then I see Fabrizio head toward the distillery. I need to ask him tonight if he’s discovered the secret of Nonna’s liqueur.

Tonight. Some butterflies flit in my stomach as I sit down in my bathrobe on the wooden chair, my knees pushing against the desk. While I boot up my computer, I stare at the letterhead on the writing pad—a curved
T
framed by a
C
, and an address in cursive. It’s simple and elegant at the same time, like Tre Camini itself. I glance at the wardrobe that hides my suitcase. My heart pounds. I imagine that I hear an encouraging whisper from behind the door.

I open a new document as soon as my computer’s awake and put my fingers on the keyboard. The sooner I start to set things right, the better. Then I close my eyes, tie an imaginary apron around my waist, and mentally rush back to Rosa-Maria’s kitchen in Lucia’s slippers. I’m going to write the most unusual restaurant review of my career.

I’m so engrossed in typing that I look up only when I feel a draft on my naked legs. Lucia is standing beside me. I manage to quickly press “Save” and close the laptop.

“Sorry to disturb you . . . but I knocked three times, and when you didn’t answer I thought—I want to talk about the flower arrangements for the community hall.” Lucia waves a notebook that I recognize—it’s her wedding bible. She’s been carrying it with her for days, looking very serious, as if planning a wedding were rocket science.
And I’m the explosive particle that will whiz around her ears
, I think and immediately feel guilty.

“You’re not disturbing me. I was just . . . working.” Shoot. Wrong answer. Lucia looks at the writing pad and the notes I’ve scribbled on it for the article.

“What exactly are you working on?”

I lean back in my chair and look up at her. Her hair has come loose from under her barrette, and it curls over her shoulders like a waterfall. Her sweet and trusting face is the epitome of innocence. I’ve suddenly had enough of all the lies. I’m fine with deceiving strangers, but Lucia is the first person, since I met Claire, whom I can call “friend” without hesitation. I get up and lead an astonished Lucia to my narrow bed and ask her to sit down next to me. She looks at me expectantly but also patiently, as if she knew it’s not easy for me to say what I’m about to say.

“I’m writing, Lucia. It’s my profession,” I say slowly.

“How beautiful. Do you write books, novels? Maybe love stories? I love romance novels.” She smiles.

Man, this is harder than a final exam. I shake my head. “I’m a restaurant critic, Lucia. I write articles about restaurants, good and bad. To be honest, more about the bad ones.”

“I don’t understand.”

I take a deep breath and take her hand. “Fabrizio and I didn’t tell you the truth. We don’t know each other from years ago, and we didn’t meet again by chance recently. I was here a few weeks ago, as a restaurant reviewer.”

“You mean here, at Tre Camini? But I didn’t see you.”

“I was just here for a quick dinner,” I say. “It happened to be the day when Carlo was the ruler of the kitchen.”

“Carlo, that . . .” Lucia snorts, but I press her hand.

“I wrote an article—not very complimentary. It was an unhappy coincidence. And then your grandmother died, and I . . . found her urn in an airport restaurant. That’s why I came to Montesimo, to return Nonna. But Fabrizio demanded that I stay here to form a second opinion about your restaurant.”

“You’re making fun of me.” Her face is pale. She jumps up and paces back and forth. Then she stops and points to my laptop. “I want to read the article. I mean the bad one.”

“It’s in German,” I say.

“Then translate it for me.”

Fifteen minutes later, Lucia is sitting silently in the wooden chair. I shut the computer and wait while she stares at the ceiling, her lips pressed together, for a long time. Then she begins to laugh. “That’s Fabrizio for you. He makes a reporter slave away in Rosa-Maria’s kitchen because he’s mad about a bad review.”

“You aren’t upset about the article?”

“We’re in Europe, Hanna. People aren’t stoned for voicing their opinion. Besides, Carlo is an abominable cook.”

My relief lasts only a few seconds. Lucia continues, “But before we discuss you and Fabrizio, I’d like to find out more about Nonna.”

I explain about my meeting with Hellwig at the airport, and how I ended up with the urn, and how Fabrizio made me agree to kitchen duty. I skip the part about the wedding deal so that my future husband doesn’t get into more trouble than necessary. She doesn’t interrupt me once. Then I end by liberating Giuseppa from her suitcase prison.

Lucia solemnly accepts the striped urn. She stands very still for a moment before carefully putting the container on the desk and taking a step back. “Hello, Nonna,” she says quietly.

I feel like a criminal. I should have returned the urn long ago, never mind Fabrizio’s stupid terms. “I’m so sorry. I don’t know what came over me. You can take her with you, of course,” I say.

“I could.” Lucia’s still looking at the urn. “But I’m not sure it would be the right thing.”

Not again! I almost cry out. Lucia sizes me up and clicks her tongue. “Do you know that Giuseppa and Alberto were in love their entire lives, but they were never together?”

I shake my head. What does Nonna and Alberto’s sad love story have to do with the urn? But Lucia doesn’t seem to be finished. So I sit down on the bed, happy that she’s still my friend.

“When Nonna was young, she had everything a woman can have. She was beautiful, smart, the daughter of a rich businessman who sold cheap olive oil. Giuseppa could have chosen an equally wealthy husband and spent the rest of her life in a palazzo. But
la dolce vita
, as we Italians call it, meant nothing to her. Actually, it bored her. So she started to criticize everything. Her anger was mainly directed against her old-fashioned parents. And since her fight needed more than just words, she married a simple farmer just to spite her father. What she didn’t count on was that she would fall in love—only not with her husband, Eduardo Camini, but—”

“With Alberto Donati, his estate manager,” I finish, and Lucia nods.

“There’s no happy ending, unfortunately. Giuseppa was her father’s daughter, after all . . . and he had brought her up strictly Catholic. For her, her vows continued even after Eduardo’s death, and so she kept her love for Alberto secret.” Lucia smiles dreamily. “But you had to be blind not to see the bond between the two.”

“And since Giuseppa was unhappy, you aren’t sure if you’ll accept the urn? I don’t get it, Lucia.”

“But it’s very simple,” Lucia says. “Giuseppa wanted to give to others what she most wanted for herself.”

“You’re saying—” I laugh. “Giuseppa was a matchmaker?”

“Well, she just made sure that people who belonged together found each other. And she was very successful. She dragged Marco along to the same café in Florence so often until he couldn’t help but notice the shy server.” Lucia blushes, adding, “That was me.” Then she counts off on her fingers: she brought Rosa-Maria and Paolo together, Signora Giancomelli, the Portinaris, the Baglionis . . . She put friends together, too. When Signora Caleppio lost her husband and almost died of sorrow, Giuseppa introduced her to Signora Valuzi, who’s also a widow. The two became best friends. She persuaded old Benito to share his garage with Stefano, and the old grouch has been a completely different man ever since. They also say that Giuseppa once adopted a young girl from the village whose mother died. But people talk.” Lucia paused meaningfully. “Anyway, I believe it’s no accident Giuseppa landed in your suitcase. She decided to end up there.”

I gulp for air. “Lucia, Giuseppa is dead. She doesn’t make decisions anymore.”

“You obviously didn’t know her,” Lucia says. “How many people are at an airport at any given time, Hanna? Tens of thousands. Do you think it’s a coincidence that you, out of all of them, found the urn on a windowsill?”

I open my mouth but can’t come up with a counterargument that would shake Lucia’s belief in fate and divine providence.

“Giuseppa was obsessed with finding the right woman for Fabrizio,” Lucia says. “And she succeeded even though she’s no longer with us. She did succeed, didn’t she?”