Chapter Twenty-Six
MARINA
PRESENT
My motorbike rolls to a stop in front of my parent’s house. Every time I come here, a wave of nostalgia hits me like a violent storm. I don’t think I’ll ever stop feeling like that.
This is the place where I had my very first birthday, lost my first tooth, had my first time, and my first breakup. It’s the place where I fell in love with puzzles, and where I learned to ride a bike. This house will always be home, no matter where I live.
I push open the front door without knocking, my boots clonking on the brick floor as I step into the house, dragging Pa’s attention away from where he’s seated comfortably on the leather couch, the football on the TV.
“ Ah! Bambina! ” He catapults off the couch as best he can at his ripe age of sixty-two. “ Ti stavo aspettando!”
“Perché?” I ask, unsure why my dad was waiting for me.
“I need your help,” he mutters as he walks over to the table. I follow him and a smile breaks out on my face when I see the puzzle scattered over the surface.
“This piece,” he says, holding up a puzzle piece that I pluck from his grasp. “Is making me want to rip what little hair I have left out of my head.”
I just chuckle, searching for where it may go. Pa has always been like this. It will be easier to place this piece later on, when more of the puzzle is completed, but once he gets fixated on a certain piece, he can’t let it go.
“Ciao, baby,” I hear my ma from in the kitchen.
“Ciao, Mama,” I send back as I slot the piece into place.
“ Ah !” Pa laughs, throwing his hands up in agony, like he can’t believe he couldn’t figure it out. I just give his shoulder a pat.
He asks his tongue. “ Brava, brava.” He waves me away from the table before I can finish the puzzle for him.
There’s something about this place that feels so warm and cozy as soon as you walk in. And it’s not the multicolored rugs Ma got from the market, nor is it the warm colors on the walls. It’s them, it’s this family.
I can only hope to one day have a place that makes people feel like this. To have a home that people can walk into and know they’ll always be welcome.
“Can I help, Ma?” I ask when I see the table set ready for dinner.
“No, no, no. It’s ready.” She walks out with a steaming dish of her famous lasagna. So that’s why Pa was staying out of the kitchen. “Sit, sit,” she says, ushering me to the table. “ Luca, spegni la telivisione.”
Pa searches my gaze for sympathy, but he won’t get it from me. If he had it his way, the football would be on every night in the background of our dinner conversations, but Ma won’t have it. He reluctantly switches the TV off before joining us.
“This looks great, Ma, grazie .”
“ Prego ,” she draws the word out with pride as she sits down. “Thank you for joining us. It feels like we don’t see you nearly enough anymore.”
“I know, I’m sorry. I’ve just been so busy with work and?—-”
“And Miles?” she asks, her voice filled with suspicion and excitement. Finding out that Ma and Miles had met, and just how in love with him she is, is not helping my situation.
I sigh as I serve up a chunk of lasagna onto my plate. “No, not with Miles.”
Well, not physically, anyway. My mind has been entirely occupied by images of him in that stupid suit since the other night.
Him, Leo, Caio and Isla, and May and Rafael all headed out to Sorrento for a boxing tournament he’s fighting in today.
I haven’t heard a thing from any of them, so they must be having a good time.
I’ve tried to wash the sour taste off my tongue all day, but to no avail.
I don’t wish I was there, maybe I just wish he wasn’t so likable, that everyone didn’t soften to him straight away, even though that’s exactly what I did, too.
“Who’s Miles?” Pa asks. I just shove a mouthful of lasagna into my mouth, avoiding any kind of conversation about this.
“Oh, he is just this absolutely wonderful boy I met down at the bakery a few weeks ago. He has got just the most handsome smile and he is so kind.” I nearly roll my eyes at her flattery.
“Now, he told me that he came here to win someone back,” that makes me pause my chewing.
“Someone that he hurt many years ago, but someone he never stopped caring about.”
“He told you all of that?” I say, the sentence muffled through my full mouth.
She just tips her head. “More or less.” Okay, so let’s make room for embellishment here then.
I knew Miles wanted to talk to me, to explain himself and why he left, but I didn't quite realize why.
He took time off work to come here to win me back?
It sounds so ridiculous, I don't know what to do with it. It’s the complete opposite of what he did four years ago.
“And what does this have to do with anything?” Pa asks, still as lost as a chicken in the ocean.
“It’s Marina! He came back for Marina!”
“I don’t ever remember her dating someone called Miles?”
“It was when I was in Sorrento,” I say, filling him in at least a little bit .
“And even better,” Ma carries on. “He’s Isla’s brother!”
Pa puts down his fork. “Okay, I’m confused.”
“It doesn’t matter,” I say, shaking my head. “None of it matters because it’s not going to happen.” Even if my mind has been swirling with the very possibility of it happening far more than I care to admit.
“Oh, but he is such a sweetheart, principessa !”
“Okay,” I shrug. “I’m sure the pope is too, that doesn’t mean he should be my boyfriend.”
“All of Italy would be proud if you dated the pope,” Pa whispers. “Just saying.”
Ma gives him an odd look before bringing her focus back to me, but before she can speak, I stop her. “No, uh-uh. Not happening. We don’t need to talk about this.”
“You’re not getting any younger, bambina.”
I stab my fork into my meal, her words cutting straight to my insecurities. “Wow, thanks for that reminder, Ma.”
“I’m just saying, don’t you want to start a family soon? You do need a husband to do that.”
I just shake my head. Of course I want a family, she knows that. And watching everyone around me settle down does nothing but fill me with envy, with sadness that I haven’t found my person yet. Or that maybe I did, but he ruined our chances together.
“Vanessa,” Pa interrupts. “She’s twenty-six, not forty-five.
Ease up.” I see Ma’s body tense up, just as mine relaxes.
Pa grabs my hand that’s resting on the top of the table.
“What is meant for you will find you, bambina . You don’t need to force anything, you don’t need to rush just because you can see others moving faster than you. ”
My eyes well with tears. My pa has always had the ability to read my mind. Even when I was a teenager going through petty school dramas, he somehow always knew what I was thinking, and always knew the right thing to say.
“Life moves at different speeds for everyone. This lasagna takes nearly an hour in the oven. Your Ma’s panna cotta, six hours at minimum in the fridge. Everything has its own time, and so do you.”
I just nod, giving his hand a squeeze, knowing if I try to speak, I’ll choke on my unshed tears. It’s everything I’ve needed to hear, and I didn’t even have to say a word.
I clear my throat after a long moment of silence across the table. “You guys have your anniversary coming up, right?”
Ma’s eyes brighten once more, any awkward feelings long gone. “In a few weeks, it will be forty years together.” They share a look that makes me smile, they share the purest form of love I’ve ever seen.
They set me up for failure really, giving me an example of a healthy relationship ever since I was young. Maybe that’s why I’ve always been so damn picky.
“Maybe you could help us organize something, we want to have a party,” she says.
“Hell yeah, let’s have a party!” I say, laughing, before I hear my phone ringing from where I left it discarded on the couch. My phone barely ever rings, so it makes me pause.
“Give me one second and we can start the party planning,” I say, excusing myself from the table and reaching for my phone. Isla’s name lights up the screen, and I frown before answering.
“Hey, what’s up?”
“It, uh…” Isla’s voice is shaky immediately, and my heart begins to pound in my chest without a second to waste.
“Miles, um, he, uh…” I can hear frantic voices in the background, Caio’s voice standing out as he speaks sharply, but I can’t understand what he’s saying.
Isla lets out a shaky breath and I can feel my body reacting, like alerts are blaring in my system.
Something’s wrong. “Isla, what happened?”
“It’s Miles, he’s hurt.”