Summer in Tuscany (16 page)

“You are in the wrong,” Nonna said.

The two of us were in the little dining room at the inn, having dinner at one of those tables with a bright green cloth and a frilly pink carnation stuck in a San Pellegrino bottle. I had banished Livvie to the kitchen, where she was to help out cleaning and preparing vegetables and salads and doing dishes until such future time as I relented.

I ran my teeth down a succulent artichoke leaf that I had already dipped in the dressing, a vinaigrette made from the local olive oil and a little red wine vinegar. It was an artichoke I had no doubt my daughter had washed and helped prepare, but the thought gave me no pleasure. I could hear squeals of laughter coming from the kitchen, and I wondered whether Livvie was actually enjoying herself instead of suffering for her misdeeds.

“I’m wrong about what?” I said.

“It
was
Livvie’s fault—or at least her responsibility. She’s older than Muffie, and she knew better. You owe Ben an apology.”

“I
do
?”

“Don’t be snippy, Gemma. Of course you do. Livvie was wrong, and
you
were wrong to confront him like that. You should have accepted responsibility and apologized then and there.”

I nibbled thoughtfully on another tender leaf. “It’s still not his villa, though.”

“Listen,” Nonna paused, her fork with a circle of sautéed zucchini halfway to her mouth, “we may be at war with Ben, but we are still civilized. Right is right—and the man was
right
to be angry with Livvie, and with you for being so intractable.”

“Intractable?” I felt as though I were back in third grade—
Gemma is intractable, needs to pay more attention in class
….

Nevertheless, I couldn’t sleep that night thinking about what Nonna had said. I was out of my virginal bed at dawn, pacing the floor one more time, arms clamped across my chest again, staring out over the silent piazza and the fountain with the chipped cherubs and the dolphins; at the church just beginning its early morning honey-colored glow as the new sun struck it; at the empty bocce court with the umbrella pines waving gently in the dawn breeze; at the Motto station, where young Sandro Maresci, the proprietor, was just parking his truck, making an early start on his work; at the silent Bar Galileo where a lamp still burned over the door; and at Don Vincenzo waddling down the steps from his house next to the church, also getting ready to open for early business.

In Manhattan at about this time, I would be sitting on the subway, staring out the windows and seeing only my own weary reflection. I would be mulling over the past night’s dramas and turmoil, my head full of the cries, the wails, the smells, the desperation of the emergency room. And I’d be worrying about Livvie, about what was to become of her with her mother so busy all the time. Just the way I was worrying now. Except now I was with her, and she was in more trouble than she had ever been.

Nonna was right.
Ben Raphael
was right. And I had to swallow my pride and go and apologize to him.

I waited until the more or less civilized hour of ten o’clock. Then I drove up the hill to the Villa Piacere. I parked behind the fountain, where I was surprised to see that no water was spouting from Neptune and Venus. I climbed the stone steps and rang the bell, even though the door stood wide open. “Hi,” I called tentatively.

I shifted nervously from sandaled foot to sandaled foot. I had dressed carefully for my apology scene. Clean white cotton shirt, short khaki cotton skirt that showed off my newly brown legs, and thong sandals.

“Hi,” I called again, ringing the bell one more time. Nobody answered, so I stepped into the hall and stood looking hesitantly around. Somebody must be here. I mean, the door was
open
.

I peeked into the octagonal room where Luchay was perched on top of his golden cage, sharpening his beak against one of the jewel-encrusted gold finials. A half-finished canvas was propped on an easel, with brush and palette and oil paints on a table next to it. It was a painting of this very room, and I was thinking how good it was when Ben Raphael said suddenly, “Come to inspect your property again?”

I rolled my eyes. Here I was on my best behavior, ready to humble myself and apologize, and he was already on the attack. Reminding myself that I was supposed to be Miss Sweetness and Light, I turned to confront him.

“Hi,” I said, giving him my best dazzling smile, the one that made the patients feel better, or so they said. Didn’t work on him, though, no siree. He gave me that cold-eyed look and asked me again why I was here.

I gulped, got up my courage, and said, “I’ve come to apologize. I was wrong. It was Livvie’s fault. She’s the older girl, and she should have known better. I want you to know that she’s being punished. She’s on kitchen duty at the inn until further notice.”

There, I’d done it. I glanced hopefully at him from under my lashes. I had to admit that he looked good, in a fresh blue shirt, paint-spattered jeans, and sneakers. And his mouth, such an attractive mouth, damn it, was twitching at the corners.

“That must have taken a lot of effort,” he said.

“Yup. But I did it.”

He turned away. “How about some coffee?”

“Wait a minute. I need to know if you accept my apology.”

“I accept your apology, though I still don’t know what I’m going to do about my daughter’s hair, nor what her mother is going to say when she sees it.”

“It’ll soon wash out,” I said. I had to admit it would be quite a shock to the society dame and her friends, but actually I thought it didn’t look half bad.

I followed him into the kitchen, where a pot of coffee waited on top of the stove. He poured two cups, asked if I liked cream and sugar, then carried them outside. We sat in a sunny little paved courtyard by the kitchen door, under a blue awning that cast a shadowy twilight over us, almost as though it were evening. We sipped our coffee in silence. I could smell roses.

“I guess it’s not entirely Livvie’s fault,” Ben said, and “Don’t be too hard on Muffie,” I said, both at the same time. We grinned at each other. “You first,” he said.

I considered what to say. “You know what, Ben,” I said finally, “our daughters are alike. They both have parents who are too busy for them, even though
my
excuse is that my job is an essential one, and
yours
is probably that hundreds of people are dependent upon you for their livelihood. Our lives are too busy, and theirs are not full enough. And
you
and
I
are alike. Both too concerned with our own lives.”

“I wonder what would happen if we both just quit.”

“I can’t do that.”

“Why not?”

“I need to work. I have to make a living. I’m not independently rich, like you.”

“I wasn’t always rich.” He was sipping his coffee, looking curiously at me, as if to see what made me tick. I wished
I
knew what made me tick; Lord knows I
should
know by now.

“What happened to your husband?” he said.

“Ha! He-who-is-better-not-spoken-of, you mean. He left before Livvie was born. He’s never even seen his daughter.”

“Fool. He’s missed the best thing in his life.”

“Well, we certainly don’t miss him.” I was brisk again, fortified by the jolt of caffeine.

“So? What happened after that?” He stretched his long legs out in front of him, looking sideways at me. “You ever fall in love again?”

Heat flashed up my spine, and I felt my face flush. God, could this be early menopause, or were my hormones raging for a different reason? I hated myself for blushing, and I saw his little smile as he caught that.

“I was too busy to fall in love. I had to finish med school, as well as work. You know, that ‘reality’ sort of thing.”

“And after med school and work? You fell in love?”

Our eyes met. “None of your business.”

“Jesus,” he groaned. “You know what it is about you? You’re hermetically sealed in your own neat little Ziploc bag, the one you shove in the freezer every time reality—a man—
me
, for God’s sake—every time I get near you. What’s
wrong
with you anyway?”

I stared at him, wide-eyed, shocked. Nobody had ever talked to me like that. Ever.

He grabbed my hand and led me back through the kitchen and down the hall, through the doors to where his Land Rover was parked.

He held the car door open for me. “Get in,” he said.

“Where are we going? Where are you taking me?”

“I’m kidnapping you,” he said, pushing me into the car. I wasn’t sure I really cared. I was too numb with shock.

“We, Gemma,” he said as we drove off, “are going to see Real Life. The one with the capital letters. You say you want this villa? You want to live here in Tuscany? Well, what do you
know
about it? What do you know of the
real
Tuscany? I’ve been coming here for years. This is my refuge, my
place
. God knows, every time I plan to come here I ask myself whether I’m not just running away from life. And then, when I’m here, I
know
I’m not.

“Look out the window, Doctor. Tell me what you see. An empty white road and a little path wandering up the hill; poplars casting their shade; sun, wind, the elements that give us the grapes and the wine and the sunflowers and…oh hell, woman, just look at it, absorb it through your pores.
Feel
it. Feel
something,
for God’s sake.”

I stared out the open window, not knowing what to say. The countryside slid by like a magic show, shadow and light, colors, scents that were not the hospital. I stole a glance at him.

“Where are we going?” I asked again as he swung the car up the hill and through a lopsided wooden gate to a small farm, a hodgepodge of lean-tos and sheds, a cow barn, and a small stone farmhouse.

A pond the size of a beach blanket floated two or three optimistic ducks. A couple of dogs came nosing at us as we got out of the car, the bitch no more than a couple of years old and already obviously into serial breeding. A pretty white cow peered at us from inside the barn, her liquid dark eyes fringed with the longest lashes.

“We’re here for what she produces,” Ben said, grabbing a bottle from the backseat.

We walked through the knee-high grass to the rear of the stone barn. “This is Rocco Cesani’s cow,” he said. “I don’t know if she’s aware of the prestige that carries, but the milk she gives is superior.” He opened the lid of a refrigerated steel vat, turned a tap, filled the bottle, capped it, and we were back in the car again.

“Milk delivery, Tuscan style,” he said, as he handed me the bottle to taste.

It was thick and creamy; rich as ice cream with the tang of vanilla and sweet hay. It was milk heaven, the way we never,
ever
taste it in this era of 2% fat, homogenized, pasteurized, decreamed, transparent “milk,” and it gave me a creamy mustache.

We saw Rocco coming through the field with pink-and-white Fido. He was wearing a pair of shorts that hung around his sturdy knees, a ragged T-shirt, his old rain hat, and green rubber Wellingtons. He waved his stick in greeting, and we waved back, called our thanks, and were on our way.

“Where now?” I asked, suddenly enjoying myself.

Ben flashed a grin at me. “Getting interested, huh?”

“Maybe.”

“We’re off to market,” he said.

It was a Sunday morning, and the piazza by the church in the nearby village was thronged. The church bells clanged the time for services meant to sustain the spirit, while the stuff of life went on under its stained-glass windows.

We browsed our way along the stalls, delightedly checking the produce. There was the
signora
who specialized in
lamponi
—raspberries, lustrous as rubies and picked that very morning. The
signora
herself was not your usual idea of a market vendor. She was of a certain age, blond and charming, smart in a Versace silk scarf. She told us about her berries and about her special raspberry mustard and raspberry vinegar.

Three packets of berries and the mustard later, we were at the fish stall staring into the bright eyes of salmon and trout, striped bass and eels. We browsed through the vegetables, admiring a kind of broccoli they told me was called Romanesque, swirling minispires of beautiful apple-green florets that I had never seen anywhere else, and we bought radicchio and butter lettuce and goat cheeses and pecorino.

The woman at the bread stall spoke English. She was olive-skinned with bright Gypsy eyes. She told me she and her husband had looked for their farm for seven years. Now they had found it, and they were growing their own grains, grinding them on their own mill wheel, and baking their own breads in their kitchen ovens. “My husband bakes our bread with love,” she said, clutching a hand to her heart. And I believed her. I bought a heavy rustic loaf, and we tore off delicious chunks to eat as we pushed our way through the crowd en route to the next stop, the bar.

It was already well populated with locals—the real Italian locals, that is, plus the imported locals from Britain, Holland, Germany, and America, who had left urban delights behind for the simpler pleasures of a country villa, a rural market, and a Sunday espresso with a cognac. First, though, we picked up custard-filled pastries called
sfoghiate
from the
pasticceria
opposite. Then we joined the crowd, sipping our coffee—large with hot milk on the side for me, so I could judge how milky I wanted it; straight for Ben. We tried not to breathe in the cigarette smoke, an impossibility, and Ben shouted
ciao
to the proprietor and other acquaintances as the church clock loudly chimed the hour. Then we shuffled our way out through the throng and back to the car.

“Rural pleasures,” I said, giving him a long glance from under my lashes, the way I remembered from my old teen-flirt days. “I’m all for them.”

“Have you ever really
seen
Florence?” he said.

I shook my head. “Then that’s where we’re going,” he said, putting the Land Rover into gear.