Page 96 of Mafia Bride
Deciding not to think too hard about the wordhomeand what house I associate with it, I stretch out on the rattan chaise lounge and nap in the salty air.
It’s the best nap I’ve ever had, because I awake at night, hungry and thirsty. I pad downstairs in my bare feet to find a tray of dinner, and a handwritten note in Italian.
Little Violet,
I’m out making plans for tomorrow.
Wait up for me.
Santino
Of all thetimes he’s left me eating alone, this is the only time he’s asked me to wait for him, and I try. I really do. After eating, I sit outside, turn on the news, find it in English, still get bored, turn off the news. I look in the cabinets and thumb through the books. It’s not too long before I go back upstairs, where the Mediterranean Sea lulls me to sleep yet again.
26
VIOLETTA
At sunrise, I’m fully refreshed and ready to explore.
How do I convince Santino to let us stay here forever? His house, for all its beauty, is nothing compared to this.
The scent of espresso from below lures me downstairs. I don’t even bother getting dressed. Santino greets me on the terrace. He’s on the phone again, but points to a plate set aside for me. Croissants and cappuccino.
I pick at the croissant while he talks and feel his eyes burning through me. A quick glance down tells me my robe isn’t giving me enough coverage, and it’s a quick reminder of what brought me here to paradise.
“Buon giorno,splendore.” Santino smiles at me and puts down his phone. To his credit, he doesn’t gawk or look disappointed I’m covered up.
“Buon giorno,” I say. Hoping to get enough credit toward speaking Italian to continue the conversation in English. No such luck.
“We will make a stop and then I’ll take you to Pompeii.”
I understand him perfectly, but putting together sentences this whole trip is going to suck away all the fun.
“Bella?”
“Bellisimo,” he corrects with an overstatement I’ll accept. I’ve never been to Pompeii—at least not as an adult capable of understanding its tragic history.
“I will get dressed,” I say in Italian and run upstairs before he can correct the conjugation.
I settle on a yellow sundress and strappy sandals, something comfortable and adorable and also respectful enough to tread on sacred grounds.And, I remind myself as I trot downstairs where he waits,respectable enough for a mob boss wife.
These are weird things to tell myself, but hasn’t that been the summation of my entire summer thus far?
* * *
We stopoutside an apartment building on a narrow cobblestone street in a neglected neighborhood. The street is pocked with beehive shapes of missing stones. Steel grates are rolled down and padlocked, stronger-looking than the stone walls that are split with cracks older than the pasted layers of curling paper bills. There’s music and tires screeching and motors running everywhere and nowhere.
Santino parks with a touch of reverence and as the roof motor churns the car closed, doesn’t look anywhere but at the graffiti-covered apartment building sitting two feet from the curb.
“This is my home.” He shuts off the engine. “Where I grew up.”
It’s an entire life away from where he lives now. A whole other universe. Did I live in a place like this? Were my childhood memories colored with the naïve shades of a child, not knowing any better? Did we live close by? Did Santino know my father when he was just a child himself?
And during all this, where was I? Did I walk this street behind my mother like a duckling? Had Rosetta and I played here, with him? Close to him? Had we been breathing the same air for my first five years?
I don’t want to know. I just want to have a nice time.
I appreciate Santino’s lack of answers more than ever.
