8. Elio
It was quiet when Elio woke up. Not only that, but sunlight was streaming through his bedroom window, warming his face and making him squint his eyes in the unexpected brightness. The storm had raged so hard for so long, that now that it was over, the world felt far too quiet and still.
Now fully awake despite the early hour, he pushed the bed covers away and wandered out onto the bedroom balcony in his boxer shorts, breathing in the scent of rain-soaked earth mixed with sea spray. It was nice to feel the sun, closing his eyes and letting it soak into his face, into every inch of his skin, feeling the warmth in his hair.
He was also… sad? God, what was wrong with him lately? This stupid lawsuit had him all mixed up if he was feeling sad about a torrential storm finally being over. But… well, it meant that Kayla would be able to leave now. The sea was still a little choppy, sure, but it was calm enough that a boat could get here safely from the mainland. Which meant a boat could easily be chartered to come and collect Kayla and take her away. Forever.
It was one of the most disheartening things that Elio had thought about in a very long time, and he really wasn’t in the mood to do a psychological deep dive on himself anytime soon.
He went back inside and dressed for the day in his usual uniform of linen shirt and trousers, going through the motions in a sort of haze. As he wandered down out of his bedroom, his feet took him towards the guest suite before he really realized where he was going. As soon as he noticed the path he was following, flushing bright red at his own subconscious wanderings, Elio was ready to turn on his heel and walk to literally any other part of the island. But when he spun around, Kayla nearly ran into him, her eyes wide with surprise. She was still wearing his clothes, mussed up from sleep, her hair wild and sticking out in all directions, and in her hand was a plate with an omelet freshly made.
“Sorry,” Elio said, stepping out of her way. But Kayla didn’t continue towards the guest suite. She just stood there looking at him with an amused little smile on her face.
“I couldn’t sleep,” she said. “So I got up and made breakfast. I left an omelet for you.” She tilted her head back in the direction of the kitchen.
Elio felt his chest grow tight at the thought that she’d made him food. Despite it being his house in the first place, it made him feel taken care of.
“Since you weren’t up, I was just going to eat in my room, but I can?—”
“No, no,” Elio protested despite the fact that he did very much want to eat breakfast with her again. But if he looked too hard at any of the feelings he was having this morning, it might actually kick off a proper breakdown and he didn’t have time for that. “I won’t interrupt you.”
“Okay,” Kayla said. Did she sound disappointed? Was he just imagining it?
“I just was coming to say that you should stay one more day,” Elio blurted, shoving his hands in his pockets and trying to look as if he hadn’t just surprised himself with the offer. Kayla watched him with those beautiful eyes of hers as if she was also trying to smother her surprise for the sake of politeness.
“Um, well…”
“Everyone’s going to be cleaning up after the storm,” Elio continued, gathering evidence as fast as he could think. “You know, better safe than sorry.”
“Yeah, sure.”
“Really?”
Kayla grinned and nodded.
“Right. Cool. Great.” Elio stumbled through the affirmations, forever on the back foot with this woman, but still awash with relief that she’d said yes. It was probably too late to make excuses for his intentions; he felt as transparent as glass in front of her, but it was worth a shot.
“I’ll show you around Malbia properly,” he said, shoving his hands deep into his pockets to stop himself from fidgeting. “You can get a proper idea of the place before you head back to the States. And feel free to tell the lawyer representing the idiot who nearly choked to death that I was a very generous host. I’d very much appreciate it.”
“So I shouldn’t pass on that you keep calling this guy who nearly choked to death ‘the idiot’?”
“Uh, no. Probably not. If you could keep that part to yourself, that’d be great.”
“No problem,” Kayla said with a solemn expression. “I’ll keep that locked down and talk about how the island is real, real pretty instead. And about how much I liked the onions and tomatoes.”
“If you wouldn’t mind.”
She smiled, and it was such a small, sweet thing compared to her unabashed bravado that Elio felt heat crawl up the back of his neck so fast it felt like a third-degree burn.
“Well, I’ll leave you to it,” he said, backing out of the hall so the back of his neck wasn’t exposed. He was sure the skin was as red as spilled wine back there because it certainly felt that way.
“To it?” Kayla asked, unable to help herself and continuing to tease him. “What are you leaving me to, exactly?”
“You know, your omelet, showering, preparing for the day, meditating if you want. You seem like someone who could use some meditation.”
“Oh really?”
“Yeah, take some deep breaths. Consider your place in the universe. Take a nap. Whatever you need to do.”
“This island tour sounds like it’s going to be very taxing.”
“It is, so you better get your affairs in order.”
He’d run out of things to say, and also found himself nearly entirely out of the hall. There was nothing left to do but turn and leave. The problem was that was the last thing Elio wanted to do. Luckily — or maybe unfortunately, he couldn’t tell which — Kayla put her hand on the door and did it for him.
“I’ll get ready, then,” she said, that small, beautiful smile still hovering around her lips as she entered the suite and closed the door with a gentle click, her footsteps padding away into the guest rooms.
So he said no to having breakfast with her, but he’d invited her to stay on Malbia for a full extra day. Yeah, that made sense. Elio rubbed his temples, hoping that it would somehow work to clear his thoughts, but no such luck. They were just as messed up as before.
* * *
Elio wanted to take a bit of time to plan something for Kayla’s proper introduction to the island. The problem was that he didn’t expect her to take all that long to actually get ready, despite his jests about meditation and spiritual reflections. She didn’t have any of her things here, after all, so he was going to have to think on his feet.
Picnics were good, right? They were universally considered a nice experience to have, and Malbia, with its general lushness, natural beauty and a view of the ocean in every direction, was the best place on earth for a picnic. He didn’t have one of those old-fashioned baskets like they used in the movies, but he had a canvas tote bag that his housekeeper Gianna used to bring produce over from the mainland. It was sturdy and clean, so it would have to do. He had plenty of wine; that wasn’t a problem. And Kayla had done nothing but rave about the produce here, so he opened up the fridge and scanned through it to find things that would serve as a last-minute charcuterie board that they could take into the vineyard.
Elio paused as he was looking through the fridge, taking stock of what he was doing and the frenzy he’d worked himself into.
It wasn’t romantic, what he was doing. It was just nice. That was all. The poor woman had been stuck here for days with a strange man she didn’t know, in the middle of a storm, in a foreign country, and she’d even cooked for him. It was the least he could do. This wasn’t a date. No. It was a thank-you, an apology, and a farewell all wrapped up in one very casual outing.
So as he prepared food in containers, shutting the lids tight and placing them in the bag, and as he selected the right bottle of wine to go with the flavors, he just kept reminding himself that this was a casual, relaxed, and entirely normal thing to do. If he was nervous, it was because conversation wasn’t his strong suit. That was all. And he had a lawsuit hanging over his head, which was giving him an anxious edge. That was it.
But when he met up with Kayla at the front of the villa, his bag of preparations in tow, all of Elio’s reasoning flew out of his head.
She had washed the clothes she’d arrived in and stepped out in the skirt and top in which he’d first seen her, and Elio felt a bizarre pang of grief at no longer seeing her wear his clothes, shocked at how much he’d come to appreciate the sight. It had felt… comfortable. Familiar and friendly. Now he was just reminded of how much of a stranger Kayla actually was and he didn’t like it. He didn’t want her to be a stranger. He didn’t want her to leave.
God, what a mess.
“What’s in the bag?” Kayla asked, trying to peek into the top of it.
Elio snatched it out of her line of sight, feeling like a kid as she grinned mischievously at his reaction.
“It’s a surprise,” he said pertly.
“Well, that’s not ominous at all.”
“You can be very pessimistic, you know.”
“I’m realistic.”
“You’re not realistic, you”re insane.”
“Hmm, maybe.”
It was so easy to talk to her. Elio had never met anyone this easy to carry a conversation with, even if it was about nothing, just tit-for-tat banter as they strode towards the vineyard. He led her down the path which was now littered with leaves and sticks after the chaos of the storm, with plenty of puddles and stones still slick with rainwater. Kayla didn’t seem to mind though, peering about her with no mind of where her feet were landing, a contented look on her face. Soon enough, they made it to the chairs and table that Elio had set up at the bottom of the slope long ago. They’d been knocked over by the wild winds but had dried enough in the early afternoon sunshine that they could sit down without getting wet.
Elio took the bottle of wine out of the bag, setting everything down and motioned for Kayla to take a seat.
“A picnic?” she asked.
“It was the best I could come up with on short notice,” Elio said, trying not to sound defensive.
“I don’t know… I don’t think I could get much better than this,” Kayla said and nodded out across the vineyard, behind which was the ocean and a sky as blue as it was possible to be.
They were nestled in amongst the vineyard, which smelled fresh and sweet after all that rain, the leaves bright green and bunches of grapes starting to blossom. Elio couldn’t help himself and reached out to several of the blooming blossoms, stroking fingers over the delicate petals, eager for the fruit that they would bear.
“So that’s all future wine, then?” Kayla asked, watching him with that bright gaze of hers.
A little embarrassed, Elio pulled his hand back. “Yes, yes, it is. If nature continues to do its work and everything else falls into place. It should become a bottle just like that.”
He nodded to the bottle of Oro on the table, and Kayla, without hesitation or shame, uncorked it and sniffed at the bottle. Her eyes widened and she pulled her head back for a second as if the smell were too potent for her, and Elio felt himself preen. It was a simple pleasure in life, to know that you’d done a good job on something.
“Is this from your company as well?” she asked, sounding sincerely interested.
Elio nodded. “But it’s different to what I served with dinner. This is the newest line; a better, improved line.”
“It smells really sweet. Is that what Oro means?”
“I thought your Italian was ‘decent’?”
“Decent, yes. Perfect? No.”
“It means gold.”
Kayla rolled her eyes. “Billionaires,” she scoffed. “You’ve always got gold on the brain.”
“Yes, well, that is usually how one becomes a billionaire.”
“Are you going to pour me some?”
“I…” Elio hesitated, suddenly realizing that despite his frenzied efforts in the kitchen, he’d forgotten something. “I didn’t bring any glasses.”
He expected Kayla to sigh with disappointment, put the cork back in the bottle and set it aside. Instead, she shrugged and took a sip straight from the bottle as if it were the most natural thing in the world.
“That’s really nice,” she said, passing him the bottle. “Maybe the name gold isn’t so presumptuous after all.”
Elio took the bottle from Kayla, but instead of drinking as she had, he just looked at her, trying to figure her out.
“What?” she asked, narrowing her eyes under his scrutiny.
“You’re very carefree.”
“You say that like it’s an insult.”
“Far from it. I’m just admiring it.”
“You have all of this,” she said, waving a hand out in front of them, to the vineyard and the rest of the island beyond, to the waves in the distance. “How can you not be at least a little carefree when this is at your fingertips?”
Still holding onto the open wine bottle, Elio looked out in front of him. She had a point. Elio had a longstanding habit of getting lost in thought and forgetting that it was not socially acceptable to just stop mid-conversation in order to get a handle on your own thoughts.
Speaking of which…
“You do that a lot,” Kayla said with a teasing smile. Elio’s attention snapped back to the present moment and he looked over at Kayla, who still didn’t seem offended.
“Do what a lot?”
“I don’t know… kind of forget that you’re in the middle of a conversation and drift off to another planet.”
“Sorry,” he said, hating how obvious it must be for her to bring it up.
“No need to be sorry,” she said. “But if you’re not going to drink that, I’ll take it off your hands.”
She nodded at the bottle, still cradled in his lap.
Well… what the hell? After everything that had happened over the last few days, what did it matter? He put the bottle to his lips, just like Kayla had done, and took a long drink of the wine he was so proud of. Kayla grinned, a wide, beautiful thing, and he half thought that she might break out into applause. Instead, she took the bottle off of him and drank, a more discreet sip this time.
“Well then, what are we having for dinner?” she asked, turning that megawatt smile in his direction.
Elio wasn’t blushing. Definitely not. If anyone asked, he would deny it until the end of time and then some. But there was definitely a certain heat creeping up the back of his neck that had nothing to do with the sun.
“I’m afraid I can’t live up to your culinary expertise,” he said, unpacking the contents of the tote bag onto the table.
“I wouldn’t dream of holding you to such high standards,” Kayla teased.
“Oh gee, thanks. But I hope this peasant meal will suffice.”
He’d done his best with the ingredients he could find in the refrigerator, and so what he set out on the small table were containers of salad with pine nuts, feta and drizzles of olive oil, toasted bread and different cheeses, capers and fresh tomatoes, with pickles and crostini… Kayla’s smile never faltered as she watched him serve their meal. As much as Elio would deny he was anything remotely close to blushing, he couldn’t ignore the light and airy feeling that her approval sent shooting through him.
“Well,” he said, making a distinct effort to seem cool, calm and collected. “Dig in.”
“Just with hands?”
“I mean, you drank wine from the bottle. Are you seriously worried about using your fingers?”
“No, I couldn’t care less. I just thought I should show some semblance of manners at some point.”
Elio laughed. “Don’t worry about it. I already know you’re a complete heathen.”
“So there’s no use trying to hide it, then?”
“I’m afraid not.”
“Oh, well,” she said with a sigh and began picking through the food with an almost holy reverence.
“You said you’d never eaten produce like this before,” Elio said, taking a piece of crostini for himself. “I figured you would like a simple spread.”
“You remembered?” she said, sounding pleased if a little surprised.
“We only had that conversation yesterday.”
“Still. Some people have awfully short memories.”
God, why was he seeking her approval like some little schoolkid trailing after their crush? The heat up the back of his neck seemed to grow warmer by a few degrees and he became even more determined to ignore it. Instead, he watched Kayla as they enjoyed the meal, both of them too busy eating to really talk much. And Kayla was too busy looking around her like she always seemed to do, as if she was trying to take a mental photograph of her surroundings down to the very last detail.
“I have a question,” she said eventually, the sun starting to get lower and lower in the sky, kissing the edge of the ocean.
“Should I be nervous?” Elio asked, even though she seemed to be making him nervous all afternoon for no discernible reason.
Kayla rolled her eyes at him. “What, are you scared of me or something?”
“No.”
“Are you sure? Because it seems like you’re scared of me.”
“Just ask your question.”
Her mouth quirked as if she had to physically stop herself from continuing to tease him. Instead, she looked back out over the tail end of the vineyard. “How does someone even buy an island?”
“With… money?” Elio said, not entirely sure what she meant.
Kayla shook her head at him. “I mean, is there an actual retail listing for an island like there is for a house? But it’s only accessible to rich people, not to the rest of us mere mortals who live in crappy one-bedroom apartments?”
“I wouldn’t put it that harshly…”
“But basically, I’m right?”
“Basically, yes.”
She smiled, just happy to be right about anything, it seemed, and Elio found himself smiling along with her.
“So why this island?” she asked, taking a small sip from the wine bottle that was very nearly empty. “You saw photos and thought it looked real pretty?”
“No, I used to come here as a kid,” he said. “I loved it so much I ended up buying it.”
Kayla looked surprised.
“What?”
“Nothing, it just wasn’t the answer I was expecting. You don’t exactly seem like the sentimental sort.”
Elio shrugged. She wasn’t wrong.
“My parents would rent it for our vacations. It always felt more like home than home did, you know?”
That probably didn’t make any sense at all, but Kayla was sitting quietly, watching him, waiting for him to continue. So he did; inclined, for once in his life, to keep talking.
“It was the one place I could just go and explore. During the school year, I would study most of the time, or I would follow my dad around the office and have him teach me things. This stuff they don’t teach you in school, he’d say and have me listen in on business meetings and negotiations, but all it really taught me was that most people seem to be okay with lying through their teeth and you have to pretend that you don’t notice them doing it.
“Out here, though, there was none of that. Back then, there wasn’t an internet connection, not even a landline. You were cut off from everything unless you wanted to take a boat to the mainland. So there wasn’t anything for me to do except read books and go wandering around the island. And I always loved the vineyard. It felt like a forest and a maze combined, and I’d hide out in there for hours, eating all the grapes even though I wasn’t supposed to. I looked forward to it every year. Then college happened and my dad retired, and we were never that close in the first place, so we all just drifted apart… I took over the business and moved it specifically into wine, and honestly, I think I did that because I’d always loved these vineyards so much. Wine felt kind of magical to me because of all those memories. I missed this place so much that the first chance I got, I made it mine.”
“That’s how important it was to you?” Kayla asked, actually looking impressed for once. Elio shrugged.
“It was the only thing I ever really wanted. That wasn’t work related, that is.”
“I’m sorry,” Kayla said, her tone shifting on the turn of a dime.
Elio looked at her, confused, especially because she looked genuinely contrite. “What? Why?”
“Because you came here to get away. It’s this special place for you and I rolled on in with a lawsuit and a storm on my heels.”
Elio felt a tightening in his chest, not so much from the apology but from the fact that Kayla, in such a short space of time, seemed to understand how he felt about this place. That it wasn’t just a holiday house. It was a whole world.
“Don’t apologize,” he said, sitting back in his chair and watching the sun turn the leaves orange. “It’s been nice. Having you here.”
“You’re just saying that to be nice.”
“I don’t know if you’ve noticed this about me, but saying things just to be nice isn’t really my strong suit.”
“Yeah, well, I’m not much better at that if we’re being honest.”
“Really? I hadn’t noticed.”
Kayla slapped his arm playfully, and Elio, possessed by some force he had no control over, reached out and took her hand in his. Her fingers were warm and light as he held them in his own. When Kayla didn’t pull her hand away, he felt brave enough to look her in the eye. She was just watching him back, those mismatched eyes taking him in like they took in everything else around her. She wasn’t smiling, not exactly, but she looked happy.
He’d done so much talking with her over the last few hours, the last few days, more than he ever usually did. The words had flowed so easily around her, like wine straight out of the bottle. But now they had gone and abandoned him, leaving his mouth dry and empty. How did he put what he was feeling into words? This mix of feeling flushed and weightless mixed with the feeling of standing on the edge of a precipice. After a few seconds of trying and failing to form a sentence, he gave up and, still possessed by that force, took her hand and put her fingers to his lips.
She didn’t pull away, and the world around them seemed to become very soft and still. For all Elio cared, this island was the extent of the universe. Nothing else mattered. Nothing else could compare to this. The sun seemed to disappear fully then, the orange glow being replaced by the cool blues of evening.
“It’s getting dark,” Kayla said simply. But she still didn’t pull away.
Elio still had her hand, and quite frankly, he never wanted to let it go, so as he stood, he pulled her to her feet along with him. Maybe it was the wine, maybe it was just some sort of cabin fever after being stuck here through the storm. Hell, maybe it was some sort of mental break caused by stress. He couldn’t really find it in him to care as he leaned down and kissed Kayla, pressing his lips to hers, their noses touching, reaching up to caress her cheek with his hand, his eyes closed the whole time.
For a split second, panic ran through him, turning his blood cold. He’d been presumptuous. He’d overstepped. Of course she didn’t want this. He was being absurd… But then her lips started moving against his and his blood thawed instead, beginning to boil in a matter of seconds. As she kissed him back, her free hand caressing its way up to his neck, he felt himself stepping off of that imaginary precipice into the unknown.
They had to break for a breath at some point, as loath as Elio was to pull away from Kayla. Though looking at her like this, so close that their noses were still touching, her eyes bright and her lips flushed, he ceased to mind.
“We should probably head inside,” he said, his voice husky and raw, even to his own ears. Kayla nodded, licking her lips, her breath quick as it hit his cheek.
“Yeah, that sounds like a good idea.”
But before they could start walking, they were kissing again, and Elio was lost in it.