Chapter 14 #3
“But it did,” Luca reminded her gently. “He’s got skill, but more than that he’s got talent.
” He hesitated, not sure how far he should go, but he saw her making the same mistakes he’d made with Gabriel.
With Chiara and Ilaria. Mistakes he’d told himself he’d work hard to right.
Didn’t he have a responsibility to say something?
“Talent he’s wasting, working here with you. ”
She frowned. “Having a business to support him? A legacy he can pass onto his own children? That couldn’t possibly be a waste.”
“It is, if it’s not what he wants,” Luca said.
He’d been blunt, maybe, but Luca told himself as she slumped against the back kitchen counter that she’d needed to hear it.
“He’s got so much talent, Giana,” he said softly. “You saw the sketches?”
She nodded, finally admitting it. “I just . . .I just wanted more for him than an artist’s life, you know? Never enough money, struggling to get by. I thought . . .why shouldn’t he have what the rest of the Morettis have?”
“We don’t all have it,” Luca said dryly.
“My brother Gabe left, started his own business, and when Ilaria graduated, she not only refused to come back home, she convinced Chiara to join her. They’re managing a coffee shop now, and I think they’re trying to turn it into a part-time art gallery.
Just because we’re Morettis doesn’t mean we all want the same things. ”
Wasn’t he learning that, the more time he spent in Indigo Bay?
He’d wanted more things, more different things, than he’d ever wanted back home in Napa. Even though that life was pulling him back in, he wouldn’t forget the way he’d felt here.
“In fact,” Luca continued, “maybe you should let him go.”
Giana looked at him like he was crazy.
And maybe he was, a little bit. Maybe the thought of losing Oliver was unhinging him.
“Send him off to the west coast, maybe even to my sisters. There’s lots of art schools in San Francisco.”
She shook her head. “No, no, that’s not what he’s meant for. I did all this for him.”
“I know, but that doesn’t mean it’s right,” Luca said. Trying to be gentle, but feeling like he was talking to a brick wall. Maybe she couldn’t see what he could so clearly. But it still felt like he should try. “Don’t you want him to have what he wants? Don’t you want him to be happy?”
“I wouldn’t think you’d give a shit about that,” Giana said, equaling his own bluntness. And that was fair. Before he’d come here, he hadn’t, not really.
He’d been putting one foot in front of the other, doing the same things every day, because they were “right,” not because he genuinely wanted to do them.
Some of them he did. He felt the weight and obligation of Nonna’s legacy, yes, but he loved it, too.
But fixing every problem his family had? He was more than that. He wanted to be more than that.
Maybe he’d go back to California, but at least he could do it on his own terms going forward.
“I do,” Luca said. “More than ever.”
She pursed her lips. “You really want to send him off to California, too?”
“It’s just a thought. He’d have family there, though. A support system. Just something to think about.”
She didn’t say anything. Was hopefully actually thinking about it, but Luca wasn’t going to hold his breath.
“And now,” Luca added, gesturing toward the front, “go back in there and tell him you’re excited to see what he’s going to create.”
“What if—”
But Luca didn’t let her finish. He could still be an arrogant asshole, sure of what was right, because he knew this was right. “Do it,” he said. “I don’t care if it turns out looking like a garbage fire. He wants to know you give a shit about him, about what he gives a shit about.”
She sighed. “Alright.” She paused, like this next part hurt. “And you’re probably right.”
“I usually am,” Luca said with a grin.
She smacked him on the arm, but she was smiling now too. It was a little bittersweet, but Luca got it. Sometimes it was hard to let go of a dream, even if it wasn’t your dream. “Be nice,” she reminded him.
“Not my forte,” Luca admitted.
“You’d be surprised,” Giana said. “You didn’t have to come here and help me. I know I wasn’t very . . .easy about it.”
“No kidding,” Luca said. She smacked him again, and he laughed.
“But it was what I needed,” she finished.
“Yeah,” Luca agreed.
“What I’m trying to say is thank you,” Giana said. “Don’t make it any harder.”
“Wouldn’t dream of it.”
“You know,” she said, right before she walked out the kitchen door, “you should take some of your own advice.”
“I’m trying,” Luca said ruefully. “It’s not that easy.”
“Easy isn’t worth doing,” she said, before disappearing out the door, and Luca froze.
She’d been Nonna’s youngest child, so of course she must’ve heard Nonna say that—it had been one of her favorite phrases, after all—but it hit him harder than normal to hear it repeated now.
Easy isn’t worth doing.
It wasn’t a question of what was easy, because it didn’t feel like any of the available choices were exactly easy, but maybe that was the whole point. If getting everything he’d ever wanted was easy, it wouldn’t be worth a damn.