Chapter 36 #2
I do the same. It tastes delicious. Creamy, peppery, comforting.
Just like it did on that first day. ‘Giovanni, I don’t want things to be awkward, me staying here, but we’ll make it work.
’ I don’t want to add that I’m sorry about the nonna s match-making us, and I wish I could tell him I’ve moved on.
That there is room for him in my life, as well as my past, which is Marco. But I don’t know how.
‘I don’t want it to be awkward either,’ he says.
And we have both forked the same piece of pasta, sucking it into our lips like the Lady and the Tramp.
I could bite or … I could suck some more until our lips finally meet.
And they nearly do, but he bites the spaghetti, setting me free.
I slurp and stop, my lips trembling, swollen, wanting his on them.
‘What I mean is,’ he says, ‘maybe I did need a nudge out of my comfort zone, which is La Tavola. It needs to be run better than I’ve been running it. It needs to be the cookery school you’ve started. It needs you. I need you.’
I blush and cough.
‘To run more cookery weekends.’
He smiles, but not the full Giovanni smile.
‘There I go messing it up again.’ He waves his fork around.
He reaches for the wine bottle and refills my glass.
I wish time would stand still and let me stay in this happy place.
Here, in a village I’ve come to love, with a man I find very attractive, a bowl of pasta and a glass of wine.
It doesn’t get much better. He puts a fork into the pasta, twirls it again and puts it into his mouth, sucking at the loose ends.
‘So that’s why I’m leaving.’
‘What?’
He puts down the fork and dabs his mouth with the napkin he’s placed in front of the two of us.
‘It’s time for me to move on. Like I say, you nudged me out of my comfort zone.
I’d got stuck here, playing it safe, too scared to venture out into the world of food again.
Too scared of being burnt. A bit like with love. ’
He looks at me. ‘But … I can’t be second best again. And I can’t stay here, if it’s not with you.’
‘You know I’m not going to be seeing Sebastian again, not romantically anyway.’
‘I see.’ He sips the wine.
I look sideways at the rucksack. Of course it’s not Stella’s. It’s Giovanni’s.
‘We’re going to stay friends, but I can’t go back to the past,’ I say, sipping my wine. My cheeks are flushing and I’m not sure if that’s from the wine or how I’m feeling about Giovanni.
‘I don’t think Sebastian is the problem here,’ he says, looking straight at me.
‘I’m not Marco, Thea. I’m just Giovanni.
A burnt-out chef whose fire has been reignited since you’ve been around.
You’ve lit up the whole place. But I can’t stay to watch you be here and me not able to love you.
It’s best I move on. La Tavola is safe in your hands.
I’d like to try to tell other towns how they can set up a community kitchen. Roll the idea out.’
‘So that’s it? You’re leaving?’
He gives a little nod.
‘But …’
‘I know that’s not easy for you. But if it helps, we’re all about the experiences we’ve had, where we’ve come from. The past is a part of who we are now, and where we’ll go in the future. I won’t forget this time.’
He moves towards the door, picking up his rucksack.
‘Wait!’
He turns back slowly. I don’t know what I’m going to say, but I do know what Marco would tell me to say.
Not to lose someone important in my life.
To seize the day. To enjoy the moment, and the journey, for as long as it lasts.
And he’d say I made the right decision last time, choosing him, that I should follow my instincts this time too.
And he’d be right. What am I scared of? Of loving again?
Marco is part of my past, my children’s life, but he’s not here now.
I am, and so is Giovanni. A lot has changed.
Having Stella in our lives for starters.
‘Your pasta. It’s … too salty!’
He turns further towards me. ‘Too salty?’
I’m gathering confidence. ‘It needs more pepper!’
‘More pepper, you say?’ A smile is tugging at the corners of his mouth.
‘Let me try it again.’ He marches back into the kitchen and picks up a fork.
‘The pasta is not too salty, and it has just the right amount of pepper. Here, try!’ He twirls a forkful and holds it out to me.
Slowly I open my mouth, put my hand over his, and I’m trembling.
This is me taking a gamble, a chance … a second chance on love.
He feeds the pasta to me. I close my mouth. He slides out the fork and watches me eat.
Slowly I chew. ‘You’re right. I can taste it now.’
‘My secret ingredient?’
My eyes are filling with tears.
‘It’s made with love.’
And a single teardrop spills, a teardrop of surprise, trepidation, excitement, and the thought of losing something that I never thought would come my way again: love.
‘I know you’re not Marco.’
‘He was your husband, Thea. He’s part of your life. But that doesn’t mean you’re not allowed a future too.’
He’s not Marco, and he’s definitely not Sebastian. It’s not a safe, secure future.
‘I think we could run courses here for people, carers, and patients who suffer from dementia so that food can take them back to their happy place. And for young people too, young men like Alessandro, who are going down a wrong path. Food can help them find their way back on track. And for the bereaved, to remember their past and let it be part of their now, celebrate what they had and who they are today.’
‘You’re quite something, Thea. It’s exactly what this place should be about. Sharing the recipes and love. It’s not about the food on the table,’
‘It’s about who you share it with. And I can’t think of anyone else I’d rather be sharing it with than you,’ I say, suddenly feeling as if I’m standing in front of him completely naked, as vulnerable as I’ll ever be. ‘This works, the two of us together. Sharing our skills and our past …’
He looks down at me. ‘You and me, together?’ He smiles slowly.
I nod, matching his smile.
‘A new beginning for all of us, here, at La Tavola, where our past and our future met. I don’t want to do this without you, Giovanni. You are the heart of this place. But we could do it together.’
He steps even closer and I can feel him, smell him, almost hear the beat of his heart.
And then he steps forward and takes my face in his hands.
‘I think we could,’ he smiles slowly, ‘as long as you remember always to cut the garlic with a razor blade when you’re making lasagne.
’ His head is slowly dipping towards mine.
‘Oh, and you remember to use the blue lasagne dish because it’ll taste better.
Always,’ he says, and slides his hand around the back of my head. ‘But I prefer sauce first, then pasta.’
‘That’s something we’ll have to argue about.’
‘Of course, for as long as you like.’ Finally his lips are on mine and they’re everything I want them to be. Not like Marco’s, not like the past, like a whole new exciting future.
His fingers entwine with mine, and I feel exactly where I should be right now. Home.
We pull away from each other, still holding each other’s hands.
‘Let’s take things slowly. Keep things to ourselves for a while, allow us time to get used to being with each other,’ says Giovanni. ‘I don’t want you to feel rushed.’
‘I agree. This is our secret.’
‘Like a family recipe we’re creating,’ he says, moving in to kiss me again, and I like the idea of a recipe for which we’re still finding the ingredients. But the most important one is love.
‘It has too much coffee!’
There is a clatter as we turn from where we’re standing, against each other, holding hands, the abandoned rucksack on the floor.
‘Giovanni, try this tiramisu!’
‘It has too much coffee, try mine, it’s much better!’
‘I’ve made a different version from my home town!’
‘It’s not even real tiramisu!!’
They stare at us. The three nonna s all clutching dishes in front of them are suddenly silent. And then they explode.
‘They are together!’
‘I knew all along that they were right for each other!’
‘You said we should try to get her with Sebastian!’
‘Until I realized how they felt about each other!’
‘I noticed it first!’
‘I think you’ll find I nudged you!’
‘Ladies, please.’ Giovanni holds up a hand, silencing them. ‘We’re just starting out. We’re taking things very slowly.’
They put their tiramisus on the table and rush forward as one to embrace us. It’s like being hugged by a huge duvet, warm, comforting and suffocating all at the same time.
‘We should throw a party!’
‘Yes, a celebration!’
‘A new family in the village!’
‘It could be a celebration-of-love party!’
‘An engagement party!’
‘An engagement party!’ they agree and, try as we might, we can’t get a word in edgeways.
‘I can bake the cake!’
‘I have a family recipe!’
‘We could make three cakes, like tiers!’
‘Excellent idea!’
‘Mine will go on the top!’
‘Why will yours go on the top?’
‘People will taste it first!’
‘I don’t know why yours will go on the top. It’s bound to be denser than the other two!’
‘Okay, a competition, a cake competition,’ says Nonna Lucia. ‘A tiramisu competition.’
‘Who will judge it?’
We’re sliding towards the door, without them noticing.
‘Giuseppe, of course.’
‘He’s always loved my tiramisu.’
‘You’ve been taking him tiramisu?’
‘So have I!’
‘We’ve all been taking him tiramisu!’
‘He probably fed yours to the goats.’
‘I don’t fancy Giuseppe’s chances on this one,’ says Giovanni, quietly.
‘Perhaps,’ says Nonna Teresa, ‘we could make a new recipe, between us.’
‘A new one?’
‘Yes.’
‘Get the children to help.’
‘A Tavola recipe.’
‘Yes.’
‘I like that.’
And after a pause. ‘Yes, I do too.’
‘Now we just have to work out what to make.’
‘I have an idea.’
‘So do I.’
‘No, listen, I think I do.’
‘I’d like Luca on my team. He has very good ideas.’
‘He learnt them from me.’
‘I met him first.’
‘He will make an excellent chef one day.’
‘I can see it in his eyes. He has the love for it.’
‘I’m sure I noticed it first.’
‘He’s a lovely boy.’
‘A lovely family.’
‘So good to have them as part of our family.’
‘That lasagne recipe will be passed on for years to come.’
‘I thought I might ask for the recipe myself …’
We slip out of the front door, and across the road, stand and look out at the view. I’m here in my now, gazing over my future. I look back at Giovanni.
‘Some things are so much better because of the people you share them with. I’ve stood here and looked at this view many times.
But now I’m here with you I love it even more.
It’s not about where you are in life, but who you’re with.
And it’s not about the recipe but who you share the experience with. ’ I smile. ‘Like a good lasagne.’
In the background we can still hear the nonna s declaring loudly that they all have the best recipe for the tiramisu.
And they’re right: because they have each other and sharing food tastes so much better when you find someone to love.
I want to share all my meals with the children, Stella and this man … the man I know I’ve come to love.
Somewhere in the wind that’s bringing relief from the hot, hot summer, I hear Marco agree and give a hearty laugh, a laugh that loves life, and that is something I’ll never forget.