Chapter 13
Saturday morning, Rachelle woke up early to prep for what Diana called “one of the biggest days at the restaurant of the summer.” She went for a run, lifted weights in the living room while listening to a podcast about modern cuisine, then showered and changed into her chef whites.
Throughout, Riccardo slept soundly, as he’d been out late with Arturo, singing karaoke and seeing old friends.
Right before Rachelle left to meet Diana at the restaurant, she checked her phone to find a voice message from Valeria, Riccardo’s mother. It was brief, less than thirty seconds, so she listened to it as she sped out the door.
Rachelle stopped short on the cobblestones outside her apartment, her heart thudding.
Three thirty this afternoon was smack-dab in the middle of the rowdiest time of Diana’s party, which meant that Rachelle would be needed in the kitchen.
She was needed with her knife and her culinary know-how and her whip-smart attention to detail.
She couldn’t be off in some boutique somewhere, trying on wedding gowns.
But how could she explain that to Valeria, who didn’t think she should be working at all?
Anxiety shot through her. But she didn’t have time to dwell on it, not just then, as she was needed at the kitchen. She hurried along, shoving her phone into her purse and telling herself to deal with the problem of Valeria later.
When she entered the kitchen, Diana put her to work immediately.
Because they’d worked in kitchens together for many years, they had a sort of symbiosis that bordered on telepathy.
Diana and Rachelle told the lower-line cooks what to do and where to go as they prepared the first line of appetizers to go out to the waiting guests.
Diana blushed and offered Rachelle a rare smile.
“How’s it going?” Diana asked, although they’d hardly spoken since Rachelle arrived more than an hour ago.
Rachelle considered Valeria’s voice message and how Valeria was assuredly losing her cool as she waited for Rachelle’s reply. But she didn’t want to tell Diana about that.
“Good! Excited to be here,” Rachelle said.
“That’s the spirit,” Diana said. “Let’s get through this. Then we can have a glass of wine together? Catch up?”
“Absolutely.” It was true that for the past few weeks, Rachelle had been more or less consumed with wedding planning.
She’d worked all her shifts with Diana, but she’d often had to speed off to meet with Valeria, or dine with Riccardo’s extended family, or go see a wedding venue, or some other thing.
Rachelle had decided to listen to her friends, who’d told her that marrying into Riccardo’s family was a Cinderella move. Who would throw that away?
After the second round of appetizers went out, one of the servers ducked into the kitchen and called back, “Rachelle, your boyfriend’s here.”
A shiver ran down Rachelle’s spine. But she was in the middle of plating the third course! How could she abandon her post to go see him?
“Tell him I’m in the middle of something,” she said, her voice tight. She could feel Diana’s eyes on her, assessing her next move.
“He says it’s really important,” the server said, shrugging.
Rachelle rolled her eyes over to Diana, who made a face. “I can take over from here,” Diana said. “But be back soon, okay?”
As Rachelle hurried out of the steaming kitchen and into the front of the restaurant, she glanced at the clock to see that it was nearly one thirty.
Two hours till Valeria’s so-called “impossible to get” wedding dress appointment.
Riccardo waited for her outside the doorway, his eyes hidden behind expensive sunglasses.
He didn’t look pleased to see her. Despite that, she rose on her tiptoes and kissed him.
His lips were cold. He was probably hungover.
“What are you doing here?” Rachelle asked him.
Riccardo looked miffed. He removed his sunglasses. “That’s what I’m here to ask you.”
Rachelle raised her eyebrows, then glanced back through the restaurant to see the general chaos, the diners awaiting their next courses. Through the window, she could see Diana, hustling, sweat glinting on her cheeks and forehead.
“My mother arranged something very special for you today. For us,” Riccardo said. “I can’t believe you’d disrespect her like this. She’s panicking, saying that you aren’t answering your phone.”
Rachelle gestured back toward the restaurant. “I have to work! I’ve had this party booked for weeks!”
“But this is important to my mother,” Riccardo stammered. “Parties like this come and go. But we’re only going to have one wedding, Rachelle. Right?”
He said it almost as though it were a challenge. Rachelle was stunned into silence. She knew it was wrong that she hadn’t answered Valeria, that she’d ignored the voice message and thrown herself into work. But she’d felt so overwhelmed!
“My mother is starting to think you’re not serious about our family.” Riccardo’s voice wavered. He sounded like he was going to start crying.
Rachelle felt it like a slap. “She didn’t say that.”
Riccardo nodded and pressed his forehead with the back of his hand, as though he had a fever.
Rachelle wavered. She thought she might faint.
She imagined Valeria telling Riccardo not to marry Rachelle.
She imagined removing the engagement ring, returning it to Riccardo, moving out of their apartment—and into what?
Fear rocketed through her. Riccardo was her life and her love.
He was the only person in Italy who really understood her. They were a perfect team.
It wasn’t like she could go back to Nantucket. It wasn’t like she could call home for help.
Rachelle limped back into the kitchen to find Diana hard at work, her eyes alight. When she saw Rachelle’s face, she raised her sharp knife. “What’s going on?” Diana could read her like a book.
Rachelle spoke delicately. She could hardly look at her boss and friend. “It’s Riccardo,” she said. “Something is going on with his family. A sort of, um, emergency?”
Diana raised her eyebrows. Her expression was difficult to read, which was funny, as Rachelle had always thought she could understand her. Maybe Rachelle simply didn’t want to read what Diana was thinking just then. Maybe it was too mean-spirited.
“But I can work another hour,” Rachelle hurried to add.
“I thought it was an emergency,” Diana said.
Rachelle couldn’t say it was a wedding dress emergency. She couldn’t say it had anything to do with Riccardo’s family’s tremendous wealth.
“I don’t want to leave you in a lurch,” Rachelle said. “I’ll finish out the next two courses and prep as much as I can for the last one. You’ll be fine by the time I leave.”
Diana let her eyes drop back to the task at hand. Thrumming with sorrow and anger at herself, Rachelle pushed herself through the next hour, doing two hours’ worth of work before she removed her chef’s whites and changed into a simple black dress.
“Thank you, Diana,” she called as she hurried through the kitchen. “Let me know how the rest of it goes!”
Diana gave her a look that Rachelle was sure meant: Do you know what you’re doing? But Rachelle didn’t have time to answer it.
The wedding dress boutique was a twenty-minute cab ride from Diana’s restaurant.
In the back of the car, her knees clacking together, Rachelle called Valeria and said she’d meet her there.
Valeria sounded cold on the phone, and Rachelle was terrified.
But before she hung up, Valeria said, “I knew you’d make the right choice. ”
It was true that the wedding dress boutique was the fanciest shop Rachelle had ever entered.
Only a few dresses were on display, and classical music sprinkled from the speakers, and there was Prosecco on ice and fancy cannoli (that she assumed nobody ate) and fine, tiled floors that shone.
Valeria’s laugh came out of one of the back rooms. After that, Valeria’s rapid Italian, which was so often hard for Rachelle to understand, filled the space.
Rachelle’s stomach thrashed. It had been a while since she’d let herself eat anything, as she wanted to fit into the smallest possible wedding dress.
Italian food was decadent and filled with carbs.
But Italian women were meant to be slender, almost nonexistent. It boggled her mind.
Valeria and the designer came out to greet Rachelle with a sense of Italian coldness and formality that frightened Rachelle.
But Rachelle was accustomed to serving very wealthy people, so she ran with it.
She ignored Valeria’s annoyance about earlier and fell into a conversation about her wedding, about how she imagined everything to look.
“Like an Italian fantasy,” the designer gushed, clasping his hands. “But Valeria has updated me on all the work you’ve done so far.”
Ultimately, Rachelle knew everything was up to Valeria.
Riccardo’s family’s money was paying for the wedding, and Riccardo’s family would be in attendance.
Inviting the Colemans seemed out of the question at this point, especially now that Valeria thought that Rachelle’s family was “totally out of the picture.” That was what Riccardo had told her. And Rachelle supposed it wasn’t false.
She smiled and let herself be led from dress to dress.
Over the course of the next few hours, she tried on a dozen dresses, all of them sensational, all of them worth more than she made in two months at Diana’s restaurant.
As the designer and Valeria spoke in rapid Italian about how she looked and what was best, Rachelle smiled and played along and reminded herself how lucky she was.
Riccardo was right. She needed to respect Valeria, the process, and the family.
Valeria selected two dresses for Rachelle to choose from.
When Rachelle opted for the one that was slightly less expensive—a simple ivory with a swoop neckline—Valeria clucked her tongue, looked at the designer, and shook her head.
Obviously, Rachelle had chosen the wrong one.
“Or the other one?” Rachelle asked. Valeria nodded. Yes. That one.
“We got your dress!” Valeria cried, popping a bottle of champagne later on, at the family villa.
Gia and Teresa were there, as were Riccardo, Tony, and a few other family members.
That morning, their great-uncle had arrived, the one who’d spent so much time in America.
He was resting in his room, waiting to be called for dinner.
Together, Rachelle and Riccardo’s family celebrated the wedding dress, drinking and laughing. Rachelle checked her phone several times to see if Diana had written back, since she had sent a very formal apology. But Diana hadn’t. Maybe she was too busy at work.
Eventually, Tio came downstairs to meet everyone. He looked world-weary, his eyes dark and mysterious. He shook Rachelle’s hand and said, “It’s a pleasure to meet you.” He spoke English, which was wonderful to hear.
“We speak Italian here,” Valeria reminded her uncle.
Tio smiled and took a glass of champagne. “I suppose we have a series of upcoming parties for your wedding,” he said, switching to Italian smoothly.
“The engagement party is next,” Valeria affirmed.
“How wonderful,” Tio said. “My great-nephew found a great American to pair up with.”
Riccardo pressed a kiss on Rachelle’s cheek. Everyone cheered. “I have the best girl in the world,” he said.
With July coming to a close in a couple of weeks, Rachelle knew that she had to decide on her old restaurant space and whether or not she wanted to keep the lease and try to build it back up, try to repair all the damage, repaint, restyle, and hire everyone back again and reopen.
Goodness, it was so much work. She knew that with the stress of the wedding and everything, it would be more than difficult. It would probably rip her in two.
The morning after she’d selected a wedding dress, Rachelle got on the phone with the owner of the restaurant space and committed to breaking her lease.
The owner understood, although he was sad for her.
“You’ll come back from this, kid,” he’d said.
But Rachelle had a hunch she wouldn’t, that she was on track for motherhood and wifedom and tremendous Italian wealth. That was that.