Chapter 22
They pulled up in the village car park. It was all as they’d left it: Uncle Domenico’s Fiat Panda with the bent door panel in the far corner, the rusty Ape truck Signora Togliatti’s husband drove to and from the goat farm still in its usual place.
‘We did it!’ Gino said.
Stella nodded, biting her lip, still half shy, half excited after their exchange of ‘I love yous’.
She was scared of looking at him, seeing wariness in his eyes but when she did they were full of love.
This time they didn’t go their separate ways at the top of the road but recklessly walked through the village together, high on happiness, not wanting to hide away any longer, careless of the consequences.
They reached the passageway beside Sant’ Agata’s.
Instead of a quick goodbye, Gino pulled her to him, kissing her deeply.
He pressed her up against the wall, uneven stone scraping against her sun-sensitive shoulders.
‘Ti amo, ti amo,’ he gasped out. She could feel he wanted more.
‘Ti amo.’ She sounded like a sexy temptress, nearly grown up, nothing like the virginal schoolgirl who’d sneaked out of the house that morning. She slid a hand beneath his shirt. Would she dare do something more?
‘Not here, we can’t.’ He seemed to come to his senses, backing away from her.
‘Where shall we go?’
Gino didn’t answer. A strange expression crossed his face.
Stella swung around. Fernanda stood at the entrance to the passageway, lips pursed, a tin of polish in one hand, an old rag in the other. All three of them stood frozen like actors in a strange, silent tableau, waiting for the curtain to fall.
Fernanda stuffed the polish into the pocket of her apron. The rag fluttered away; she didn’t seem to notice it.
‘Mamma…’ Gino began.
‘Don’t you “mamma” me.’ Fernanda’s voice was measured, cold. She grabbed her son by the arm, pulling him away so roughly that he stumbled on the cobbles. The key for the moped clattered on the ground. Puzzlement then understanding crossed his mamma’s face.
‘You disgusting, shameless girl, where have you been? Where did you take my son?’
‘Me? He was driving.’ Stella instinctively defended herself, immediately regretting getting Gino into more trouble.
‘Don’t blame him, you little tart.’
‘Don’t call Stella that.’ Gino’s eyes flashed.
‘I told you not to see her, I told you not to get mixed up with her.’
Gino opened his mouth but the look on Fernanda’s face would have silenced a mafia boss.
‘Go home!’ Fernanda said. ‘Now!’ She gave him a small shove.
Gino looked at Stella helplessly. She gave him a tiny nod.
Fernanda waited until Gino had reached the end of the passageway. Stella knew how much it had cost him not to turn around.
‘Say what you want to me, I don’t care.’ Stella raised her chin.
‘You’ll care by the time I’ve finished with you, young lady. We’re going to see your papà.’
Stella’s stomach lurched. She’d be grounded for a month; she wouldn’t be able to see Gino. She had to stop Fernanda.
‘No, no, you can’t!’
‘Oh, I can.’ Fernanda smiled.
Stella flicked her hair, trying to look nonchalant. ‘There’s no point speaking to Papà. He won’t take any notice of what you say. He hates you and your family.’
Fernanda winced. For a beautiful moment Stella thought she’d won, that she could turn around and go home and hope her parents never found out.
Gino would have to face whatever punishment his mother served up but Stella knew Fernanda was too scared of losing her only child’s love to be angry with him for long.
Instead, she’d blame Stella for the whole escapade.
Fernanda laughed, a cruel mocking sound. ‘Good. I am glad. If Arturo hates us, he’ll make sure you stay away from my precious boy.’
Stella had played her cards all wrong. She groped for words, desperately searching for a way out. Fernanda’s bony fingers gripped Stella’s lower arm as she steered her towards home. It was pointless trying to shake her off. Stella had nowhere to run.
Mamma opened the front door. Her hand flew to her face.
‘Go!’ Mamma hissed. ‘Please, Fernanda, go before Arturo sees you.’
It was too late. Papà lumbered into the hall, yawning as though he’d just woken up from a doze. His trousers were held up by braces and his sleeveless white vest was splattered with spaghetti sauce. Stella couldn’t help wishing he looked more dignified.
Fernanda launched into a tirade. Papà frowned, trying to grasp everything she was trying to say. Stella couldn’t follow it all either but she couldn’t mistake the list of crimes: joyriding, theft, fornication, corrupting an innocent boy.
‘I didn’t…’ Stella began.
‘I told you not to see that boy,’ Papà said quietly. ‘As for you, Fernanda, I’ve heard enough, you can go.’ He ushered her out into the street.
Papà waited until the door was firmly shut.
Then he began to yell. Never had Stella seen her father like this, waving his arms, shouting, eyes bulging.
She could hardly make sense of what he was saying.
Her younger brother and sister, who had been loitering wide-eyed and silent at the top of the stairs, had the sense to make themselves scarce.
‘You defied me! What do you have to say for yourself?’ he raged.
‘I love him!’ Stella wept.
‘Love him? You don’t know the meaning of the word, you silly girl.’
‘Yes, I do.’
‘Don’t answer me back.’ Papà raised his hand. Stella reeled back, whacking her hip on the edge of the hall table.
‘Arturo!’ Mamma’s voice was shocked.
‘I wasn’t going to hit her.’ Papà stood looking at his palm as if not sure what he’d been planning to do with it. Seizing her opportunity, Stella ran up the stairs two at a time.
‘I haven’t finished with you yet!’ Papà yelled.
Stella burst into the bedroom she and Marta shared. Marta fell backwards against the wardrobe, she’d obviously been listening at the door. Stella grabbed one end of the blanket box but it was too late to barricade themselves in. Papà burst into the room.
‘Stella!’ Papà panted, his face red.
‘Get away from me!’ Stella screamed.
‘I told you…’ Papà stopped abruptly. His face contorted. He slapped one hand to his chest, grabbing at the bed’s headboard with the other, doubled up in pain.
‘Papà?’ Stella said.
Papà gave a strange groan. His body seemed to crumple. Marta screamed. The bed broke his fall.
Stella stumbled onto the landing. ‘Mamma, come quickly.’
‘Stella, call an ambulance!’ Marta yelled.
Mamma burst out of the kitchen screeching: ‘I’m coming!’
‘I’ll get Uncle Domenico.’ Her brother Giovanni brushed past Mamma on the stairs. The front door slammed shut behind him.
Stella ran to the hall. She grabbed the phone from its cradle, dialled 112, her fingers fumbling out the number. Upstairs Mamma screamed, ‘Arturo, Arturo,’ over and over again.
Her sister walked quietly downstairs, hand gripping the banister.
‘Oh, Stella,’ Marta said. ‘What have you done?’
* * *
For once in her life, Lauren was silent. Apparently, none of her management training had prepared her for this. No pithy soundbite culled from a PowerPoint presentation could save the day. Stella almost felt sorry for Lauren. She’d never seen her daughter flounder for words like this.
‘It wasn’t really your fault, Mum,’ Lauren said at last. ‘You were just a foolish teenager; you didn’t mean any harm.’
‘Sometimes it doesn’t matter what our intentions are, the results are just the same.
It didn’t matter to your Uncle Domenico whether I meant to kill his brother or not.
I’ll never forget his face that day.’ And she’d never forget the terrible groans Domenico made, thumping up and down on his brother’s chest. They might have saved Papà if it happened now, Stella thought.
Earlier that day she’d noticed a glass box holding a defibrillator, screwed to the wall of the bar.
‘Domenico was probably just in shock. What about your mamma and your brother and sister?’
‘Mamma couldn’t look at me. At the funeral I put my hand on her arm and she shook me away. I know Marta and Giovanni blamed me too. Of course, they said they didn’t but I knew.’
‘Is that why I never met them? Why we never went out to Italy to see your family?’
‘My sister did invite your dad and me to her wedding years later but I didn’t even tell Ricky about the invitation. I knew she didn’t really want us there. I never heard from Marta or Giovanni after that.’
‘And Gino? What happened to you and him?’
Stella swallowed. It was still so painful to go there.
‘Gino wanted us to keep seeing each other but after we met up once or twice, I knew it had to end. When I closed my eyes to kiss him all I could see was Papà collapsing, clutching his chest. As soon as I could, I left the village for England to stay with an old friend of the family. She got me enrolled into a school for my A levels and looked after me. I thought at first I might go back to Italy after that but I could tell when Mamma answered the phone that I would never feel truly welcome there. I never blamed her. Papà was the love of her life, as important as Gino was to me.’
Lauren’s face clouded. ‘Is that why you married Dad? For security, to create a new family because you couldn’t go home?’
‘I never thought of it like that. I fell for your dad because he seemed so like Gino, wild and full of life, fun and exciting. Not the best qualities for a marriage, I suppose.’
Ricky had the same sparkling green eyes as Gino, the same untamed hair.
He would have jumped on that red moped just the same.
With Ricky she could dream those same crazy dreams. But her ex-husband had turned out to be nothing like her first love.
Gino was a charmer, spontaneous, occasionally reckless too but underneath he had a serious side.
His anchors were family – no matter how much he railed against Fernanda’s rules, he loved his strict mamma – and community.
If there was a stage to be built for the village festa he’d be helping the men to secure the scaffolding, if there was an appeal for funds for Sant’ Agata’s he’d go through his old books and toys finding something he could donate or sell.
Ricky had been all surface charm, no substance.
When she’d looked for something more, her husband had made her believe that she was at fault for being boring.
In Ricky’s words she was ‘no fun any more’.
It wasn’t until she sat alone for hours with baby Lauren that she finally saw him for what he was but she had stuck it out until Lauren went off to college, determined to give her daughter a stable home.
‘Dad was always fun though,’ Lauren said.
‘He never picked you up from school.’
‘Somehow that never seemed to matter. But that’s because I had you.’
‘And I had you, so everything worked out for the best.’
‘I thought you were rushing into this marriage but I can see why you want to be with Joe. He’s so different from Dad… I saw Dad in town the other day, did I tell you?’
Stella plucked a leaf from the basil plant, holding it under her nose and breathing in its comforting scent. ‘No, you didn’t. He didn’t ask you for money again, did he?’
Lauren laughed. ‘Dad gave up asking me the day I offered him a loan and presented him with a list of repayment conditions. He seemed shocked that I equated the concept of lending money with getting my cash back.’
‘I’m so sorry.’
‘It’s not your fault, Mum. Anyhow it doesn’t really bother me. Dad’s a loveable rogue. He’ll never change. He was with another new girlfriend, Maya she’s called. Apparently, she plays the tambourine in his new band. I’m not sure how old she is but I’d say she’s younger than me.’
‘Oh dear.’ Stella cringed.
‘It’s not a good look. You’re so much better off with Joe.’
‘But Joe’s not here.’
‘He will be, Mum. He’ll come back.’
‘Of course he will,’ Stella said briskly. ‘Now, tell me about this personal shopper business. I’m sure she can help you find a nice outfit but I do hope you’re not going to spend too much money.’