Postcards from Sicily

Chapter 1 March

Villa dei Respiri Spa

Contrada Belvedere

Lago Maggiore

Italy

Mrs Olivia Dawson

c/o Timber I didn’t want to ruin everything we’d built with a spur-of-the-moment confession.

And speaking of, my father is still waving that blasted invitation in my face.

‘Just promise me you’ll give it some thought,’ he insists gently. ‘Just think: luxury rooms, swimming pools, Jacuzzis, fine cuisine, beautiful gardens, no cooking, no ironing, no school runs…’

‘Exactly. Who’s going to do the school run if I go? You have enough to do here between the house and the business. You’re retired, but you haven’t stopped since.’

‘I’m retired, sweetheart, not dead.’ He chuckles. ‘Besides, the last time you did the school run you almost literally ran over a father.’

‘I didn’t run him over. I just… over-zealously honked him out of the way…’

‘That, my dear, is called road rage.’

‘He was being too slow on purpose…’ I argue.

Dad shakes his head. ‘You are too highly strung lately, Livvie. You need to decompress. Please, take the offer.’

I don’t want to admit that he’s right. I am at breaking point – with my marriage, with the long hours, with my overwhelming crush on Markus – and I could use the rest. To reset.

But I can’t just leave. ‘What about the kids?’ I reason, looking for any excuse to say no.

‘Joe’s okay, but Cassie? She already hates me.

She’ll never forgive me for leaving her for two entire months. ’

‘Cassie doesn’t hate you, Olivia. It’s just the teenage phase. She’ll get over herself.’

‘But what if she doesn’t? What if she hates me for ever?’

‘Well, then you’ll know how your mother feels.’

Ouch. That is not like Dad at all. Yes, he’s tried to convince me to give Susan and Aldo a chance, but he’s never tried to make me feel bad about it. Not that I do. My mother did the unthinkable by abandoning us, and she’s had to face the consequences.

Which is what I’m suffering from with my own daughter, Cassie.

She really, really worries me. When she was little, she used to love me ‘to the moon and back’.

She’d always wrap her arms around my neck and give me ‘star-kisses’, as she used to call them.

But now she won’t even give me the time of day.

Anytime I try to speak to her, her eyes will start rolling and she will groan and leave the room as if I’ve committed a capital offence against her and humanity.

If I’m not careful, she’ll become like me.