Chapter 12
Twelve
Lexi
Guests linger over the fruit and drinks at the dinner table long after the plates of salmon have been removed.
String lights under the tent add a soft glow to the scene of crystal stemware and gold flatware.
I pop a strawberry in my mouth, nodding at the husband-and-wife duo seated across from me.
They’ve been explaining the pottery process for twenty minutes.
“This is fascinating, and I’m glad we decided to have you do a demonstration at the festival. People will love seeing how it works.” I point at each of them. “Out of curiosity, who makes the pottery and who paints it?”
They glance at each other and chuckle. The wife, a woman with gray streaks in her dark hair and the kind of wrinkles that show a lifetime of laughter, lifts her hands from her lap and shows me the specks of dried red paint decorating her wrists.
“Well, I paint and he does the rest. Technically I can throw clay and technically he . . . can’t paint. ”
The husband elbows her with playful offense, but turns to me, rueful. “It’s true. We tried switching it up a few years into our marriage and it was a disaster. I ruined so many of her average pieces. We decided to stick to our original roles.”
We rise from the table, and I join one of the younger, lesser-known guitar players standing alone near the half-wall, sipping from his wineglass. “That tarantella was the most impressive thing I’ve heard in ages,” I say. “How do you move your fingers that fast?”
He shrugs with a wry grin. “Years of practice. Don’t ask me to handle a soccer ball, though. Only my fingers are trained.”
I wave Anna Leone and her friend Joseph over. “Have you met Aronne?”
Anna rushes to shake his hand. “Oh wow, you’re the guitarist with the lightning fingers, aren’t you?”
I excuse myself while they make introductions.
Behind all my calm and conversation, I can’t shake the image of that program burned in my mind.
Now that I have a free moment, I head down one of the gravel garden paths away from the villa until I reach a stone tower with a bronze bell hanging at the top.
We arranged for all the gardens to be lit with lanterns, but most people have stayed close to the house, preferring to mingle near the food and music.
I have the secluded area to myself. The air is spiced with sharp zest and woody herbs, a combination of expectation and shadows that makes me shiver.
The door to the tower swings wide with a rusty groan.
Not creepy at all. The winding wooden stairwell, lit with my phone, is cold and damp.
I emerge onto the belfry, where a narrow walkway circles the massive hanging bell.
There’s a brilliant view of the mansion over the tops of the olive and citrus groves between the taller cypress trees.
Like something from an Austen movie adaptation, the formal gardens unfold between the villa and the tower, a symphony of symmetry and well-planned beauty.
It’s close to midnight, but the lawn is still full of people. With my phone camera zoomed in, the colorful, distant figures come into focus. Faces sharpen. Gia is talking with wide gestures to a few people near the double staircase, and Ms. Accardi is shaking someone’s hand.
I leave the tower and sink onto a cool bench under a gnarled tree that must be older than America. In the shadows, the dangling olives look like teardrops.
Finally alone and without the need to pretend all is fine, I pull Mark’s program from my skirt pocket and unfold it, gazing again at the hot air balloon. My breath hitches, and I shake my head, unable to take my eyes off the whimsical artistry.
This isn’t the design I signed off on to send to the printers.
It was supposed to be a stunning cityscape drawn by one of our festival artists.
Not that the replacement program is a disaster—it’s perfect.
I would recognize that style anywhere, the way a child can pick out his mother’s voice in a crowd.
The hot air balloon design is an exact replica of what my mom painted on the Trevi envelope.
I’m used to seeing my mom’s artwork in various, unexpected places.
Small prints for sale as cards in coffee shops and bookstores.
Mugs in the North End restaurants with her Spanish Steps painting printed on the side.
In a bank, once, I saw a blown-up, framed poster of Boston’s Faneuil Hall.
Her iconic pieces from before I was born are so prevalent I’ve almost stopped noticing them.
It’s been easy to keep Mom’s public artist life separate from our private life.
Not many people realize I’m her daughter because she used her middle name for her art, and I don’t usually enlighten them because I prefer keeping our home life separate from the public.
Especially after a few friends who were also fans got weird when they found out.
But those two sides of my mom are suddenly blurred into one. The envelopes are mine. Not Reena Brooke’s art but a mother’s art painted just for her daughter. So as touching and apropos as the hot air balloons are on the program, it hurts too. Like something precious and private was stolen from me.
How, how, how did it happen? I don’t know whether to cry, laugh, scream, or hunt Gia down for an explanation.
A footstep crunches on the gravel, and I spin.
Unbelievable. Mark is here. As if the artwork on the program wasn’t enough to deal with, I’m faced with the blindside of running into him this evening thrice.
(I’ve never even used that archaic word.
That’s how unsettled I am right now, I’m pulling vocabulary out of the thirteenth century.)
I scowl at Mark over my shoulder. “I believe we’ve already said everything we need to say to each other for now.”
That was lousy of me, but it’s been a long day, and I’m tired of being conscious of wherever he is instead of focused on the evening. I do not need this kind of emotional whiplash on my first day in Italy.
Before he can respond, the event photographer swoops in out of nowhere and smiles at both of us. She must be headed to the tower for some shots, but she made me jump as if I were guilty of something.
“Let me get a picture of you two.”
This is so not what I meant when I hired her to take pictures of all the guests interacting.
“Oh, we’re not—”
The last thing I need is a photo with the man who thinks my whole purpose here is destined to fail.