Chapter 22
RESEARCH NOTES
A controversial aspect of Maslow’s third and fourth tier of the hierarchy is the idea that the quest for esteem from both internal and external sources may outweigh the quest for romantic love for some individuals.
As modern society continues to reprioritize career and family goals, it is possible that certain individuals do not and will not recognize the need for personal, romantic relationships as fundamental.
As such, they may have different thresholds (or none at all) for romantic connection, coupling, and partnerships.
Her stomach clenched. Who had delivered the card?
It was impossible to imagine Franca tottering down to the house on her Serious Lady pumps at six in the morning.
It had to have been Andrea. The last time she saw him, he was sticking his neck out for someone who was walking out of his life in theory, and now there was a date to walk out in practice.
He hadn’t knocked or called or texted. But what exactly did she expect him to say?
On the first day of the sagra, Lora went for a walk in the morning, did some laundry and a bit of writing.
She then decided to scrub a section of the grout on the backsplash that seemed to still have construction dust coating it, folded the clothing that had been hanging on the line, dusted the stairway, Windex’d the inside of all of the windows in the house, and bleached the inside of the commode.
She would have polished the brass sconces but knew that it would be impossible to get to the hardware store for the right polish, so she settled for sweeping the back terrace.
When she found herself seriously considering reorganizing her underwear drawer in rainbow order, she knew that she wasn’t just opting out of the sagra; she was avoiding it like the plague.
She looked into the mirror in the bathroom as she wiped down the counter between the double sinks and frowned. Coward.
On Sunday, she decided to get herself over there, no matter what.
At first, she wondered if she would feel weird walking around alone.
But then she realized that she could stop by and see what Giada and Vivi were up to.
She could also say hello to Beatrice, Carola, and even Luca.
Plus, she knew Luciano, Romina, Franca (if Franca did anything fun ever), and possibly even Andrea’s parents would be there.
She had even cultivated a waving relationship with the Tramonti twins.
The more she thought about it, the more she realized that there were plenty of people to talk to, even if she didn’t talk to Andrea himself.
The piazza was packed with people: old, young, families, couples, teens.
They held wax-paper-wrapped slabs of focaccia, plastic cups filled with wine, and cones of gelato.
Food and craft stands lined the streets, adorned with strings of lights and brightly painted signs describing their wares.
Kids ran by with their faces painted into butterfly wings, and the same band that played at the yacht club ran through a mix of songs in Italian and English.
They were currently making their way through an acoustic version of “Zitti e Buoni,” the lead singer encouraging the crowd to get in on singing the chorus with him.
“Cia-oo,” sang out Giada as Lora approached the café.
She had asked two of her cousins to help her out during the sagra, and the brothers were buzzing around the outside tables while Vivi ran the kitchen on her day off from the restaurant.
“You’re here! I was hoping you’d stop by. I have something for you.”
“Ciao,” Lora said, double-kissing her hello. “You do? Wait, I want to tell you something. I’m going to become a citizen on August 3.” It was the first time she’d said it out loud and she found herself grinning with the sound of it. It was pretty exciting. Giada’s smile went wide.
“Ahhhh! I’m so happy for you! This is great news! I knew it would work out. Ma che velocità! So fast!”
“Yes! I have to thank Andrea. I haven’t seen him yet.”
“Now I really have to give you this so you remember us. Vivi and I went to the mercato dell’usato again, and this is something you can take with you to Switzerland.” She reached behind the bar to pull out a small paper bag and handed it to Lora.
“You didn’t have to get me anything!”
“It’s nothing! Just look at it.”
Lora reached into the bag and pulled out a small, pen-like tool with a wooden handle and a spinning, fluted metal circle on the end of it.
“A pansotti cutter!”
“Sì! Vivi said you thought it was the greatest thing ever, so when I saw it, I wanted to get it for you so you can remember your first day as a chef.”
“I love this,” Lora said, clutching it to her chest. It was so perfect, so thoughtful. “Thank you. This means so much to me and I am going to take it with me everywhere. I can’t promise I am going to make the pansotti, though.”
“That’s optional,” Giada said, laughing.
She looked over Lora’s shoulder and waved. “Here comes our sindaco now, so you can thank him. I hope he’s feeling better today.”
“What do you mean, ‘better’?” asked Lora as Andrea walked over. His eyes were rimmed in red, and although he had on a clean shirt and was shaved, he looked like he’d been lying in a heap until ten minutes before.
“Did you get some sleep last night?” Giada asked him.
“Not really. Some of the vendors started setting up at six this morning, and I made the mistake of falling asleep with my window open. It’s fine, though. I’m good. Only a few hours to go,” he said, looking down at his watch.
“Thank you, by the way,” Lora said, touching the side of his arm. “I got the postcard with the good news.”
“You’re welcome,” he said, nodding. “I’m glad I could help.”
“I’ve got to get back inside,” said Giada, turning to look at the line of customers building by the cash register. “Good luck with the speech, Andre. I know it will be great.”
With Giada gone, Lora could do nothing but feel her feet rooted to the ground while she stared at Andrea.
His eyes locked with hers, though neither of them spoke while the noises of the piazza swirled around them.
He looked so tired—it was in the way that he stood, the set of his shoulders.
She wanted to reach up and put her arms around him, giving him a place to rest for as long as he needed.
But she couldn’t offer him that. And staring at him was becoming awkward.
She wanted to think of something to say, but nothing came to mind.
Her fingers closed around the pansotti cutter, and before she could control the muscles in her very own body, she raised it up in front of his face.
“Look what Giada and Vivi got me.”
“It’s for pasta.”
“Yes! Isn’t it amazing? They are the sweetest. I will really miss them,” she said, looking at the cutter in her hand.
“I am sure they will miss you. We all will.”
“I’ll miss you too,” she said, feeling her eyes go glassy.
Andrea reached down and took her hands. No matter what she said to Vilmari, what she kept telling herself, and what that postcard read, she could not deny the surge of sparks in her chest. She wanted it to stop but also to never end.
The lead singer of the band rolled into singing an a cappella chorus of “Take Me Home, Country Roads” before the band joined in, and she laughed.
“What is it with this song? And you were right. It doesn’t matter if it’s about West Virginia.
I know if I ever hear it again, it’s going to remind me of this little town on the coast of Italy. ”
“Good,” he said. “Maybe you’ll take a little bit of us with you.”
“I hope so,” she said, not letting go. “This really has been unforgettable. So far.”
Andrea pulled one of her hands, tugging her to the back side of one of the stands, and turned to face her. Dusk was falling, and the lights hanging overhead cast a glow down over them. She was buzzing, every synapse lit up as he pulled her closer.
“Lora, I know this is probably the wrong time. And I know that one of the first things I ever said to you was that this relationship had no future. But I think I was wrong. Maybe it doesn’t have to be that way.
It’s not that far from here to Zurich. There are trains and planes.
Europe is small compared to the US. And one of us will have enough time off to come to visit the other. Lots of people do it. Why not us?”
Her mind raced forward, flashing a scene of the two of them standing on a platform waiting for her train to arrive to take her back to Zurich.
In less than a second, the image made her feel the sadness, longing, exhaustion, frustration that would inevitably win over the romantic idea of gutting it out from afar.
Long-distance relationships were like defying physics—two people trying to make time and space bend to their will with calls, texts, visits.
But in reality, there was no beating the laws of the universe.
No one was closer, and in the end, it was just two lives that were still separate and could never move forward.
She’d made a promise to herself. It was the only thing that she could rely on and the only thing she could hold on to.
She would make it to Zurich, and all of this odd music and the new friends, Andrea’s town house and the kayak, city hall and the Panda, and even that terrifying bank and the damned box that was still sitting on the kitchen table—all of it would be an amazing memory.
“It’s a really beautiful idea. It’s not that I don’t feel it too, Andrea.
Everything about you and me has been intense since the day we met.
When I look at this place,” she said, waving around at the twinkling lights, “everything is conspiring to make someone fall in—well, to make someone feel a lot of things.”
“But—” he said, his shoulders sinking again.
“But we are two very busy, very dedicated people who likely won’t have time to text good morning, let alone find a couple of free days where we can hop on a train to see each other.
We might make one visit. Two? Then how long until one of us says to the other ‘I need more’?
How long until we realize that neither one of us can give up what we do to be closer? ”
“Maybe we’ll be so busy that neither one of us will need more. Maybe it will be enough to see each other when we can.”
“Until when? What’s the endgame? Because it seems to me that people can’t go on forever on ‘when we can.’ Andrea, you deserve more.
I do too. If either one of us could be satisfied with only a little piece of something, neither one of us would be where we are right now.
I’d probably be fine as a teaching assistant, and you might still be trying to avoid passing out on the F train. That’s not us.”
“You’re so sure that we’re doomed. I’m not that sure. I didn’t expect any of this, and yet here we are.”
But she was sure. And she hated that she was, but he needed to know. She swallowed, looked up at him.
“I want to tell you that we can defy expectations, but I also need you to understand that my life is what it is because a long-distance relationship wasn’t going to work. It’s hard for me to ignore the consequences. For everyone.”
His eyes widened and he took a step back. She could see that he finally understood, and it felt like a door slamming, even to her.
“Tell me that you are not upset,” she said, watching as he let go of her hands. “I don’t want to hurt you.”
“I can’t do that,” he said, shaking his head very slowly. He turned his wrist up to check the time on his watch. “I have to go give a speech.”
“Andrea, I’m so sorry. You’ve been so kind to me. I appreciate everything you’ve done.”
“Wait a minute,” he said, stepping close to her again.
“I am going to say this once, and then I am not going to talk about it ever again. Everything I did was because I wanted to, because it was the decent thing to do. You needed help and I gave you that help. You asked me and I was there. It was not because I wanted something from you. It’s because I wanted things for you.
I am sorry that it is so hard for you to understand that you don’t have to protect yourself from literally everyone, but…
” He trailed off, turning and stepping away from her.
“Andrea—” she started, but couldn’t find words. Hot tears threatened the corners of her eyes.
“I have a speech,” he said, waving toward the stage. “I really have to go. Everyone is waiting for their mayor.”