The Italian Affair

by Helen Crossfield

  “As you will probably know Issy, as Jeremy was a former Master of yours, he had the most brilliant Classics brain I ever encountered and was such utterly charming and charismatic company. I actually can’t believe this has happened to be totally honest. No-one who knew him and loved him can. I dined with him in here only last week.”

  Issy nodded solemnly trying not to scream with pain. “What the HELL was she doing here listening to Max Monroe talking about Jeremy being dead, she above everyone else knew how utterly fathomless death was. She also knew all about his brain and his charisma He’d been her lover, her confidante, her first real love, her ONLY bloody love until Bruno had come along and given her a glimpse of Agape once again.”

  “There was a certain darkness about Jeremy of course,” Max said interrupting her thoughts. “There so often is of course with people like him.”

  “What do you mean people like him?” Issy said suddenly becoming the journalist she was supposed to be.

  “I mean the darkness that descends on people who’ve gone through the things that he had to endure,” Max replied trying to clarify what he meant without giving too much away.

  Issy watched Max intently staring at his fingers as they played with the stem of the crystal glass full of Merlot in front of him. “What things did he have to endure?” Issy said eventually when Max didn’t expand – half dreading the answer in case it revealed something she didn’t want to hear.

  “I’m not sure how much, if any, of what I’m about to tell you should be made public. As a former student of Balliol I know you will treat the information I share with you tonight with the utmost respect. Jeremy deserves a wonderful obituary and that is my main reason for seeing you tonight. He is a real loss to us all here and to his wife. But without understanding the darkness you can’t begin to comprehend the man he was.”

  “Of course,” Issy said biting her lip and wincing at the use of the past tense. “I can promise you that what I write will be a true reflection of the man you describe and the man who taught me most of what I know. I am not here to find out about his dark side I’m just here because.....my editor sent me and I have an obituary to write and it needs filing by 9pm. On top of all that I also knew him and respected him greatly as an academic.”

  Max relaxed his face muscles “Well, that is the truth and reassuring to know that you’re on our side. The fundamental thing about Jeremy’s background that hardly anyone knew because he simply refused to talk about it is that he lost both his parents at a very young age. They died in a car crash on the Costiera Amalfitana near Naples – on the winding coastal road just below Ravello. His father was a diplomat in Rome and his mother a teacher. They’d taken a short break and gone away for the weekend by all accounts. The father was driving, lost control of their soft top and the car simply went straight over the edge into the sea. Apparently, it was a lethal spot with no crash barrier to break their fall. Jeremy had remained in Rome with a nanny and he never saw either of them again. He was orphaned at a very young age – maybe three or four and didn’t even have surviving grandparents – which in itself was an unusual predicament.”

  “Did you say his parents had come off a coastal road near Ravello?” Issy asked her mouth wide open remembering in every detail the point in the Costiera Amalfitana at which she had felt she and Dan had come inches and seconds from death. As she remembered the exact spot, Issy also recalled the eeriness she’d felt and the fact that she felt intuitively that she’d known people in the past who had met their ends there and that she was somehow connected to them.

  Max cleared his throat and said. “Yes I did. It’s a beautiful place by all accounts although I’ve never been,” Max said before continuing in a darker tone. “As an only child, the crash and its tragic consequences shaped Jeremy’s life more than any other. Many of the decisions he took in later life came as a direct result of not having parents and suffering tremendous guilt at him surviving when they didn’t. He often said he wished he had been with them.”

  “Good God,” Issy said putting down her knife and fork as she started to digest the pain of knowing his past, the location of his parents’ death and how Jeremy’s young life mirrored her own in terms of parental loss. “I had absolutely no idea of any of what you just told me Max,” Issy continued trying desperately hard to remain calm but failing to do so as the panic of her loss and his loss rose to a crescendo. “I mean he never ever mentioned a word of any of that to me. I could have helped him why on earth didn’t he tell me all or at least some of that.”

  “But why would he have told you Issy?” Max said looking quite startled by his dining companion’s reaction. “It’s not anything he told his students. It’s something he only shared with those closest to him. I can certainly tell you that the crash and its consequences were THE defining moment in what came next and ultimately led to his premature death.”

  “Sorry Max, could you please explain what you mean by the crash causing his death?” Issy said desperate for Max to provide more explanation about Jeremy’s life and ultimately his end.

  “It’s complicated but I’ll try,” Max answered sighing heavily before continuing. “After Jeremy’s parents died, a Catholic family with Aristocratic connections in North Yorkshire adopted him and that’s where he grew up.

  “In the space of a few months, he’d lost his beloved parents in a terrible car crash, his family home in Rome and London and was moved to the north of England to a completely new family and surroundings. It was probably too much for one small person to take on-board all at once. But despite all of that – or probably because of some of that – he did extremely well academically and became interested in philosophy and the Classical world feeling that somehow it gave him answers to the fundamental questions of life and death. In due course he came to Oxford to read Classics and became a fully paid up member of Opus Dei whilst a student here which is where he met his wife Suzannah.”

  “Opus Dei?” Issy said incredulously. “Isn’t that some kind of Catholic cult? I can’t imagine Jeremy ever willingly wanting to be a part of that. He had a much broader spectrum of the world than that kind of narrow controlling view. How, can you embrace the Ancient world and hold truck with that kind of brain washing.”

  “I understand your point of view,” Max said smiling drily. “But you have to try and see things from his perspective. I suppose one could argue it gave him the family he never had, a route to God and to his long lost family. It also pleased his adoptive family and it’s where he met Suzannah and she is devout to this day.”

  “But, how could someone so intelligent fall for that?” Issy said continuing her disbelief and disturbed at having known so little about Jeremy until now.

  “I’m not sure it has to do with intelligence Issy it is about finding a way to carry on. I think if you lose the very foundations that your life is built on, especially when they are taken from you when very young then you cling onto anything that grounds you and makes you feel just that bit safer. At its’ most basic it is really all about survival.”

  “Did Jeremy have children?” Issy asked changing subject but dreading the answer.

  “No they never managed to have children,” Max said. “Suzannah is a delightful woman, very caring and I know Jeremy loved her. But I’m not sure they were ever really in love if that makes sense. They married at a young age just after they both graduated. He clung to her because he couldn’t bear to lose the one thing in his life which gave him order, continuity and sanity. Without embellishing things any more I think it is fair to say he had reasons grounded in his past that made it possible for him to love her and made it impossible for him to leave her.”

  “Are you trying to say he was unhappily married?” Issy asked not caring how her question would come across.

  “I’m not saying more than I’ve said already. They were married at the time he died, and that is what I want you to put in the obituary. That and the fact he loved his wife. All I am trying to say to give you some context is t
hat his past gave him his present and he felt very unable to change it which I am in no doubt contributed to his deep sense of unhappiness.”

  “That’s a huge shame for both of them not just him.” Issy said surprising herself that she found generous words for Suzannah and Jeremy. “He was a hugely attractive and charismatic man. Do you think he had affairs?” Issy asked.

  Max sighed heavily and looked slightly offended by the question. “Issy, this is a very delicate question. I’m not sure I should even be answering it. And I don’t want this to appear in his obituary in any way either even as a hint that he might have done. I knew Jeremy very well. I loved him as a friend and I have no intention of betraying him beyond the grave.”

  “But he did have an affair, Max. I know he did so I will answer that question for you. The answer is yes he did” Issy said softly.

  Max started to play with his crystal wine glass once again and took a large mouthful of the Merlot before answering.

  “I knew of one affair with a student. It must have been a number of years ago at around the time you were here. He battled with his conscience and his own moral code. That’s how I know because he came to me for advice. He told me he had never felt such a deep connection with anyone else, that he felt this person understood his pain and loss without him even having to utter one word about it. He told me he wanted a divorce and that to stay in his marriage when he had found something so meaningful would silently kill him. But after much deliberation and reflection he felt he owed it to his adoptive parents and his wife to remain married. He said that they had saved him from total obliteration and didn’t feel that he could cut them adrift for his own very selfish reasons even though he knew that it would have been braver and much more adult to speak to his family and his wife about how he felt, but he never did.

  “One night over dinner in the Summer Semester of 1986 Jeremy told me he had finished the relationship and that in the end he had concluded that he had no other choice. He faced destruction either way and that he had taken the least risky option. Soon afterwards he fell into a deep depression and drank far too much to self-medicate the pain. We’ve all been worried about him on and off for the past few years.”

  “Why, why did feel he had no choice and why was his other option so risky?” Issy said her face ashen.

  Max stared at Issy and said nothing.

  “PLEASE TELL ME. WHY HE FELT HE HAD NO CHOICE?” repeated Issy angrily. “Adults can make choices. That is what adults do. He could have continued. It could have been so different if he had only found the courage to be true to himself and his feelings.”

  As Issy’s world caved in AGAIN, she carefully replaced the starched white napkin on the table and walked out into the Quad. Another tragic death in her life and she felt the burden of pain. Hundreds of white stars twinkled in the jet black sky as she slowly slumped down on the cold stone steps outside the dining hall and cradled her head between her knees.

  Tears that had refused to fall started to flow. She cried for Jeremy’s lost soul floating somewhere up there in the constellation but she wept mainly for the final outcome.

  As the tears fell she felt a gentle hand on her shoulder. “You should come back inside Issy, it is too cold and lonely to be out here on your own tonight,” Max said trying his best to comfort a woman he knew as a student but not a woman.

  Issy looked up and said simply. “But Jeremy’s soul is with me here. This is practically the exact spot where my eyes first met his. It is comforting to be here I can almost hear his voice, calling me home. Please tell me it’s not true Max. Please tell me he didn’t die?”

  Max immediately stooped down and sat beside her and wrapped his arms around her shoulders. They now had a shared bond. “I am so so sorry Issy, that it was you that Jeremy loved so deeply. I never asked him to tell me who it was and he never said. Perhaps now you understand his past you can start to forgive him?”

  Issy looked up at Max with a tear-stained face, white with loss and said “I forgive him everything now that I know his story. I’m just sorry that you had to find out it was me in this way. When my editor told me to come here, I was shocked and should have said no. But I needed to hear what you just told me and so I don’t regret being here one minute but I should have been more truthful with you.”

  “I wouldn’t worry yourself about that,” Max said. “In an odd kind of way, I think I already knew. I’d had my suspicions long ago. You both had the irresistible contradiction of philosophical understanding and high intellect and a dark complex psychology all rolled into one. There is a huge pathos when those elements come together in one person. I can totally understand why you must have been attracted to each other and I learnt a long time ago not to judge anybody. My own moral code is agnostic.”

  Issy looked up and smiled through her tears. “Thanks for your kind and forgiving words Max. I have one last question if I may ask it. I loved Jeremy very much and I had no idea three years ago he was going to die so young. In my mind he will always be vibrant and full of life. The only darkness was when he spoke of his personal circumstances” asked Issy shaking her head. “What exactly did he die of?”

  Max took Issy’s hand in his. “He died of loneliness. Of trying to be someone he was not. He always told others to try and be themselves but he himself was unable to do so. In the end it was his undoing. Drink and nicotine played their part but ultimately the honest answer to your question is that he died of a broken heart. One that had fractured into pieces many years ago and which had simply become more fractured as the years passed. He simply could not see the point.”

  Issy prised herself off the stone steps and put out her hand towards Max and said quietly. “I have all I need to write his obituary, please stay with me while I write it.”

  Naples – 4pm 4th November 2000

  Returning to Naples with Dan by her side felt so different second time round.

  “When I landed here four years ago,” Issy said as they sat in a cab on the way to their old language school “my heart had been broken by Jeremy and I was petrified of the future without him. Now he is dead and I am here again to find an underpant salesman from Pompeii. Do you think that makes me crazy or just plain stupid?”

  Dan smiled “Most definitely crazy. “But you still have feelings for Bruno despite my best efforts and need closure so as your best friend I am here to support you and do your bidding. I totally understand why you want to take the chance after what you learnt about Jeremy from Max.”

  “It’s still so chaotic here,” Issy shouted as they thrown around in the back of the cab by a madcap driver. “It feels so good to be back though despite everything that happened when we were last here.”

  “Um, let’s just hope we don’t bump into Giuseppe. Hopefully he won’t recognise us even if we do. Last time we saw him you were wearing a biking in the San Carlo if my memory serves me correctly,” Dan said with a grin on his face. “Oh, and by the way. Now we’re here I just want to remind you of our little promise. This holiday is not just about you finding Bruno. We’re also here to have a good time. Hanging around in Pompeii looking for an underpant salesman is not my idea of fun so I hope we find him sooner rather than later.”

  Issy looked up at Dan and smiled. “Ok, we only have to go to Pompeii for one day out of seven. Because if we don’t find him at the beginning of our stay I’ll take it as a sign that it is not meant to be. When we get to the centre of town we should go straight to school first and catch up with Gennaro and then go out for a pizza. We’ve got a hotel booked in Naples tonight and then we’ve got six days in Sorrento with day trips to the islands to look forward to. So it’s not all about Pompeii.”

  “Ok, agreed I wouldn’t mind going back to the school before we do anything else,” Dan said enthusiastically. “I wonder what Gennaro will say when he sees us – he may feel let down by us just simply taking off and going to the airport. We left in such a hurry and never really said goodbye.”

  “He’ll be fine,” Issy said.
“He’s Neapolitan and I’m not sure they bear grudges. I just want to see him and apologise for leaving so abruptly. None of the mess we got into even involved him and he did his best to make it easy for us to leave and we even got paid.”

  As the taxi arrived at their old language school, Issy drew in her breath. “All those memories,” she said to Dan out loud “are just flooding back. That room up there is the one where I first met you reading Brideshead Revisited do you remember? And look over there,” Issy continued tugging at Dan’s shirt sleeve, “our favourite bar is still exactly as we left it. Can you remember all those friars breakfasts we ate and drank in there. And it’s where I first heard the shot that led me to Bruno – all those little coincidences which are the reasons why we are both here today.”

  “Well, before we meet Gennaro I want a real espresso from our favourite bar. I’ve been gagging for one ever since you suggested we came back to Naples after you found out about Jeremy. Let’s pop in and see what if anything has changed on the inside.”

  As they entered the familiar bar under the school the smell of freshly ground coffee beans hung seductively in the air as it always had done. And just as he had done so many years before, the same barista with greyer hair tended to his Gaggia and spoke and gesticulated to his regulars. The pastries from the morning had been replaced by small trays of pizza and savoury parcels. Nothing had changed since they’d last been in there and they were welcomed like long lost friends.

  “This is just one good thing about Naples I’ve missed,” Issy said excitedly as they drank their coffee smiling and chatting to their barista. “Listen to the drama and passion for life all around us and the smells of exquisite food. I’ve really missed all that and the spectacular views; the heat of the sun, the colour of the sea, the fabulous pizzas, the buffalo mozzarella and the bunches of fresh basil leaves I used to get at the market and even the profanities and the bloody crazy driving. But above all I realise how much I’ve missed Bruno, and the bar and the school are bringing it all back to me. His smell, his hair, the looks he gave me, his piano playing – everything about him really. I hope that by coming here I can see him again. I’ll be absolutely devastated if I don’t just to put you on warning.”