Chapter 44
Forty-Four
Lexi
I don’t catch a single name except Alba’s, but the women pull me into the chaotic, busy kitchen before I can process that I’m in the villa from Mom’s painting.
The aromas of six or seven dishes in various states of preparation weaken my knees. Tomato, garlic, guanciale, sardines, pecorino cheese, toasted bread loaves . . . It’s a lot for my senses to take in.
“Mark said you were just visiting Rome, but you speak Italian?” Alba, the grandmother of the large family, is short, her gray hair is pulled into a bun, and her welcome smile is open and accepting.
“Coming here has always been my dream.”
She hands me an apron and a wooden spoon. “Then you should learn how to make this sauce. Keep stirring and tasting. I need to watch my noodles. The pasta has to be perfect tonight.”
And with that, they’ve folded me into their group with the ideal mix of including me and asking questions, but not putting me in the spotlight. I’m just here with them.
I have friends back home, but I’ve never experienced much in the way of family. My mom was enough. But with these women—steam frizzing their bangs, chatting over one another, hollering to the kids to stop swiping the bread on their way through the kitchen—a longing washes over me.
“It’s so exciting that he brought you,” one of the younger aunts says to me when she comes to the sink to wash a few dishes. “We thought Mark would never recover.”
“Recover from what?” I have the feeling I’ve missed something. I run through her Italian words again, making sure I’ve translated correctly in my head.
The women exchange significant glances.
“Why would he mention Zoe to her? That’s well in his past.” Stella (I think?) turns back to me. “Mark is very un-Italian in that he doesn’t open up to people very quickly.”
“I picked up on that.”
She giggles at my dry tone and starts cutting tomatoes.
Who is Zoe?
“He was so upset about her leaving I think he forgot to eat. She was the whole reason he moved to Italy—she talked him into it, then up and walked away right after he committed to an apartment lease and everything. If I could wring her neck . . .”
“Stella, we’ve moved on and forgiven, remember?” Alba sprinkles chopped fresh basil into the sauce over my shoulder. “It all worked out for the best.”
“Without a thought for the mess left behind.” Mark’s warning on the plane makes sense now. He was the mess a tourist left behind. Compassion floods me, and I want to hug him, or go back in time and redo my reaction to him on the plane.
A door slams somewhere, and then a familiar voice calls out from the hall. “Mark brought a girl?” Mariella rounds the corner into the kitchen. Eyes wide, she rushes to hug me with a tiny squeal. “Lexi? What in the world?”
I squirm. Mark should be the one explaining this. “There was only one Vespa.” I give a short version of the day—to an audience of every woman in the family. Trust me, it’s as awkward as it sounds.
And Mariella pounces on every detail. “So you gave him the address of your hotel, and—?”
“Well, he already knew from when we filled out the luggage forms—”
“You’re Luggage Girl?”
“Yeah, our luggage got switched, so it was good we’d already exchanged phone numbers for this stupid bet we—”
“You’re Bet Girl?” Her voice gets louder and louder, and she has her fingertips pressed into her scalp like she’s trying to hold her brains in.
“I’m going to kill him. He deliberately let us think there were multiple American women, and that he met you for the first time at Luca’s restaurant.
He is so dead.” She hugs me again—guess she doesn’t care that I played a part in the deception.
“Ooh, this is great. You’re perfect for him. ”
Whatever she thinks is going on here, she’s wrong. Mark might be a strong possibility and give me all the feels, but the geography and timing are off. Way off.
Mark is a very off-limits cookie jar. Put that cookie jar in a box tied with string on top of the fridge.
Before I can set her straight, Alba calls out, “Al dente!” and the chaos shifts seamlessly to the table out on the backyard patio.
The girl I recognize from the photo on the airplane squeezes in next to Mark and peers up at him, adoring.
He tugs her ponytail absently and smiles at me across the table with a question in his eyes. You good?
My whole body responds to his smile. I just need a ladder and scissors and that cookie jar is mine. Forget willpower. I want those cookies.
I force myself to look away before I make a fool of myself in front of his whole family. The gaggle of women are starting to separate into individuals. I’m trying to make sense of which man is married to which woman when I glimpse the elderly man at the head of the table.
I do a double take, he winks, and my jaw drops.
“Santino?”
His face breaks into a grin and he holds out his hands as if to say, And here we are.
After he says grace, Mark asks, “You know my grandpa?”
I tell him about running into him at Trevi Fountain and Mark rounds on his grandfather. “So that’s how you knew whose lira I was extracting.”
“Admit it, you thought I was omniscient for a minute there, didn’t you?”
Alba hands me a plate of steaming pasta, rolling her eyes. “These boys and their tricks. I swear every time we get together someone or other is figuring out some big life mystery that turns out to have been a prank.”
Laughing, I dig into my dinner. Mark was right about this being the best meal I’ll ever eat, which he knows because his nod is smug after I moan over another heavenly bite.
No meal will ever top this for the rest of my life.
Every ingredient is showcased and complimented, and the homemade pasta itself is divine.
But it’s not just the food. They pull me into their stories and ribbing as if I were part of them, and I don’t know if I’ll ever recover from the feeling of sitting, accepted, in a large family gathering.
As we near the end, Alba stands, a little shaky. “I have a few words for Mark, so hush, everyone.”
When the laughter dies down, she continues, “Thank you for finding your family when you came to Italy. And it was just in time. I had my work cut out putting meat back on your bones. Do you remember how much pasta you consumed that first month?”
They’re all smiling at the family memory, but then Alba sobers and tears swim in her eyes.
“You filled a hole . . . No parent should ever have to lose . . .” Her voice breaks, and I remember that Mark said his dad left and broke all ties with his Italian family.
“I’m sure your mother in America wishes she could love on you there.
With burgers and ketchup or something.” She shudders.
“We’re thankful for the time we have with you. Happy birthday, Mark.”
Mark’s gaze moves down the table and settles on me, raw and bittersweet.
Then the pieces come together. Trevi Fountain, the Aventine keyhole, the Roman Forum, and every other gorgeous sight in Italy hasn’t touched my heart the way this family meal has.
I think of my mother’s letter. You are what matters most to me, because I love you.
One of the most powerful things in all the world is the love of a mother.
I remember Santino’s words. “My heart would beat faster when I talked about my mom’s pasta. ”
Alba hadn’t offered Mark mere pasta when he first came to them—it was the love of a grandmother trying to reduce the suffering and heartbreak in her grandson’s life.
I take a shaky breath. And I know. This. Family. A mother’s love. This is the heart of Italy. For him and for me.