“You mean my mom, right?”
“Let me finish. So I met this woman, and I fell completely head over heels in love with her. I’d never felt that way about anyone before—it was like I'd been looking for her all along and just hadn’t realized it. I knew I had to do everything in my power to make her feel the same way, so I started by being her friend. I took an Italian class I didn’t need just so I’d have some extra time with her—”
“The beginners’ class?”
“Shh. Lina, listen. We took Italian together, I sat in on the rest of her classes, and I even worked my way into her circle of friends. But every time I tried to summon the courage to tell her how I felt, I turned into a blob of Jell-O.”
“A blob of Jell-O?” I said incredulously.
“Yes. You know, the gelatin—”
“I know what Jell-O is!” Apparently “good guy” does not equal “good storyteller.”
“What I mean by that is that I liked her so much it literally tongue-tied me. And then I found out I was too late. While I was bumbling around, carrying her books to class and pretending I liked to go out dancing, some other man had swooped in and carried her off.”
“Matteo Rossi.”
He flinched. “How do you know his name?”
“I’ll tell you later.”
He hesitated. “Anyway. I told myself that if this other guy was someone great, someone who really cared about her and made her happy, I would leave it alone. But I knew Matteo, and I knew what he was really like. Unfortunately, your mother was blinded by him for a long time, and even though we tried our hand at a relationship, she ended up choosing him. That’s how you came to be—her relationship with Matteo. But when your mom got sick, I was the one she asked to step in. And so I did. Because I loved her.” He nudged me. “And you’re kind of growing on me too.”
I groaned again. “Okay, nice story. But you got some of it wrong, and why did you and my grandma tell me you’re my father if it isn’t true?”
“I can see now that that was wrong, and I’m sorry. I wasn’t planning to at first. Your grandmother and I started communicating after Hadley passed, and a few weeks in I realized that your grandmother assumed I was your father. I knew it wasn’t true, but I worried that if I told her the truth, she’d change her mind about sending you, and your mother had made me promise to bring you here. I also thought it might be better for you. I thought that if you believed I was your father it would make you more likely to come here and give me a chance.”
“Except I was a total brat.”
“No. Under the circumstances, you were actually pretty great.”
“Liar.”
He smiled. “I guess I just didn’t know what else to do. Your grandfather was already struggling, and I didn’t know what the situation was with Addie’s family. I was worried you wouldn’t have anywhere to go. So when your grandmother asked if she could tell you that I’m your father, I said yes.” He shook his head. “I planned to tell you sooner rather than later, but after that night at the pizzeria, I thought I’d let you settle in first. But you don’t seem to be much of the settling-in type. I should have known you’d see right through it.”
“You’re like twice as tall as me. And you have blond hair. We look nothing alike.”
“True.” He paused. “So now it’s my turn. How long have you known?”
“About a day.”
“How did you find out?”
I picked up the journal from the steps and handed it to him. “This.”
“Your journal?”
“No, it’s my mom’s. It’s the journal she kept when she was living here.”
“This is her journal? I noticed it looked similar, but I thought it was just a coincidence.” He turned it over in his hands.
“She wrote about everything that happened between her and Matteo. Only for most of it she just called him X, so at first I thought I was reading about you. But then you didn’t know about the secret bakery.”
“Wait a minute. The secret bakery? The place Ren asked me about?”
“Yeah. He was trying to surprise me by figuring out where it was.”
“So Ren knows about all this too?”
“Yes. He actually helped me track down Matteo.” I looked away. “We, ah, met him.”
He levitated like half a foot. “You met him?”
I kept my gaze on the ground. “Uh-huh.”
“Where?”
“Rome.”
He was looking at me like I’d just told him I was actually half-ostrich. “When did you go to Rome?”
“Yesterday—”
“Yesterday?”
“Yeah, we took the express train. First Ren picked me up. Then we went to FAAF and I called Francesca—”
“Francesca Bernardi? How did you even know about her?”
“The journal. She told me what Matteo’s last name was and we found him online and went to his art gallery and it was . . . well, a disaster.”
His mouth was literally hanging open. “Please tell me you’re joking.”
I shook my head. “Sorry. I’m not.”
He rubbed his hand across his chin. “Okay. So the two of you tracked down Matteo. Then what? Did he know who you were?”
“He made up this story about my mom being crazy and faking her journal. It was ridiculous. I mean, we look exactly alike and he just kept telling me that he’d never had a relationship with her. We ended up just booking it out of there.”
Howard blew the air out of his mouth. “Your mother would kill me. Here I thought you and Ren were just out eating gelato and going dancing, but you were tracking down your father in another city?”
“Yes. But I won’t do that again,” I said hastily. “It was kind of a one-time deal. Unless you’re hiding something else from me . . .”
“Nothing. All my cards are out.”
“Okay, good.”
“But where did you get the journal? Did you find it after your mom passed away?”
“No. Sonia gave it to me.”
“Sonia Sonia? My Sonia?”
“Yeah. My mom sent it in the mail last September and when it got to the cemetery Sonia was worried it was going to upset you, so she held off for a couple of days. But then you told her about the plan for me to come stay here and she thought my mom had sent it for me. But it wasn’t for me. It was for you.”
Howard held the book up carefully, like it was a bird he didn’t want to fly away.
“You should read it.”
“Mind if I start right now?”
“Please do.”
He slowly opened the cover, stopping at the sight of that first sentence. “Oh.”
“Yeah. I’ll leave you alone.”
Chapter 26
TWO HOURS LATER HOWARD CAME to my bedroom door, journal in hand. “I finished.”
“That was quick.”
“Want to go sit on the porch again?”
“Sure.”
I followed him downstairs and we settled ourselves on the porch swing. His eyes were kind of red.
“It was hard for me, reading all of that. I mean, she told me bits of it, but I didn’t know the whole story. There were so many misunderstandings. Missed connections.” He looked out over the cemetery. “She didn’t get everything right. For one thing, I never dated Adrienne.”
“You didn’t?”
“No. Matteo did.”
I looked at him blankly.
“Your mother wasn’t the only student Matteo was messing around with.”
“Ohhhh.” Another puzzle piece fell into place. “So is that why you told her the story of the bull and the baker? You were trying to tell her to look closer, because Matteo was two-timing her?”
He grimaced. “Yes, but I obviously wasn’t very successful. She had no idea what I meant by that story.”
“Yeah, that was pretty cryptic. Did you just make that story up?”
“No, it’s real. I think it’s pretty unlikely that it’s true, but it’s on
e of the legends that has been hanging around the city for centuries. I love stuff like that.” He shook his head. “Anyway, I knew that your mom was involved with Matteo. She kept it a secret because she was worried he’d get in trouble with the school, but he kept it a secret because he was a dirtbag. I knew he’d had at least a few affairs with students, and from what I’d seen of him, I knew he was bad news. I had my suspicions, and then one day I walked in on Adrienne and Matteo in the darkroom. That night when your mom saw us outside the club, I had been confronting her about it. I wanted her to tell your mother.”
“Why didn’t you just tell her?”
He shook his head. “Everyone but Hadley knew that I was in love with her, and I knew it would just look like I was stirring things up. I was also pretty sure that Matteo would just deny it and then I would lose your mother’s trust. Then once they broke up I couldn’t see any reason to tell her. Also, I was kind of a coward. The breakup was my fault.”
“Why?”
“Your mom was becoming withdrawn and started saying pretty critical things about herself and her work. So one week when Matteo went out of town for a conference, I called him up and told him that if he didn’t stay away from her I’d tell the school.”
“And that’s when he broke up with her?”
“Yes. And then I went ahead and told the school anyway, and they ended up firing him. Hadley was so heartbroken it was like the color had been sucked out of her. I spent weeks wondering if I’d done the right thing.” He pushed off, sending the swing gliding. “But then she seemed to get better. I convinced her to spend a summer here with me, and we were together for a while. But then I lost her again.”
“Because of me.”
He shook his head, gesturing to the cemetery. “She should have told me. I would have walked out on this in a heartbeat.”
“That’s exactly why she didn’t tell you.”
“I know.” He sighed. “I just wish she’d let me make that decision. One day with Hadley was easily worth a lifetime in Italy.”
“Tell me about it.” I studied him for a moment. He loved her. Like really loved her. And he’d been missing her for even longer than I had. It made me want to throw my arms around him.
I looked away, blinking back tears. Hopefully my eyeballs would dry out one of these days. Otherwise I was going to be offered a job as spokesperson for Kleenex or something.
“Did you ever try to get her back?”
“No. In my mind she’d chosen Matteo. If I’d known the reason why, it would have been a different story. It wasn’t until years later that I found out they weren’t together and then only recently that I found out about you. I worried a lot about her, but every time I thought about reaching out, it was like something stopped me. Maybe my pride.”
“Or just not wanting to get hurt again. She basically smashed your heart to bits.”
He chuckled. “Smashed indeed. And of course, I was eventually able to move on. But having you here . . . well, I’ve kind of been reliving it.”
We were quiet for a minute. The sun had risen full and hot, and my hair was practically sizzling.
He shook his head. “This isn’t at all how I’d imagined we’d have this conversation, but I’m glad that things happened the way they did. And now we don’t have to worry about Matteo. Your mom was really careful about keeping you away from him, especially once she was successful. She had always wanted to bring you to Italy but was too afraid to until now. I guess you being close to eighteen made her less afraid of Matteo.”
“She probably never thought I’d be the one to go looking for him.”
“Never. I think she underestimated you.” He chuckled. “I think I did too. I can’t believe you went to Rome.”
“It was stupid.”
“Well, that goes without saying. But it was also pretty brave.”
“Ren came with me. He helped a lot.” My expression fell. Ren.
“What?”
“Ren’s not . . . talking to me anymore. I upset him.”
Howard’s forehead creased. “Did you get in an argument?”
“Something like that.”
“I’m sure whatever happened, you two can work it out. He really cares about you. I can tell.”
“Maybe.” We sat there for a moment, swinging back and forth, when suddenly a thought occurred to me. “Howard, were you trying to tell me something when you told me that weird story about the woman who gave birth to the boar?”
He laughed. “The porcellino. I’d better stop doing that. It really doesn’t seem to work.”
“No.”
“All right, yes. I was trying to tell you something. When we went to see the statue I realized it was the perfect symbol. Even though our circumstances are strange, and we’re a bit of a mismatch, I really do want to be a part of your life. We may not be a regular kind of family, but if you’ll have me, I’ll be your family just the same.”
I looked up at him and a thousand feelings swelled up inside me until I was as taut and full as a balloon. My mom had been totally right. No one would ever come close to replacing her, but if I had to choose someone, it would be Howard. She’d just been a few steps ahead of me.
“So what do you say, Carolina?”
I hesitated. I didn’t want to rush into anything, but I did know that today it felt right. And that was going to have to be enough.
“Okay.” I nodded. “I’m in if you’re in.”
He gave me one of his lopsided smiles, then leaned back in the swing. “Good. Well, now that we have all that cleared up, what about this Ren business?”
Chapter 27
HOWARD INSISTED I COULDN’T GIVE up. If I wanted to see things through, I needed to be good and sure that there hadn’t been some kind of gross miscommunication between Ren and me.
That’s really how he said it. Gross miscommunication.
I shoved my remaining shreds of dignity into the back of my closet, then called Ren’s cell phone. Twice. Both my calls went straight to voice mail and I did my best to block out the image of him hitting REJECT.
Finally Howard helped me track down the Ferraras’ number, and I called their house.
“Ciao, Lina!” Odette trilled. She obviously hadn’t been filled in on the state of affairs.
“Hi, Odette. Is Ren home?”
“Yes, just a moment.” She set the phone down. Then there were some muffled noises. Finally she picked it up again.
“Lina?”
“Yeah?”
“Ren can’t talk right now.”
I grimaced. “Could you ask him a question for me?”
“What’s that?”
“Is it okay if I come over? I need to talk to him.”
There was a pause. “Ren? Why are you shakin—” Then she must have put her hand over the mouthpiece, because I couldn’t understand anything else.
It was so unbelievably humiliating. My remaining shreds of dignity caught on fire.
When she came back on the line she sounded confused. “Sorry, Lina. He said he’s too busy. He’s getting ready to go to Valentina’s party.”
I perked up. “He’s going for sure? It’s for the girl who graduated last year, right?”
“Yes. I think it’s to celebrate her eighteenth birthday.”
At least I’d see him face-to-face. I took a deep breath. It was better than nothing. “Thanks, Odette.”
“No problem.”
I hung up the phone and sent a quick text to Thomas. Then I booked it all the way to the visitors’ center. I needed a favor.
When I came bursting into the visitors’ center, Howard and Sonia looked up in alarm. They were both going through a stack of papers and Howard was wearing these tiny old-man reading glasses that made him look like a nearsighted lumberjack. I giggled.
He put his hand on his chest. “Lina! One of these days you’re going to give me a heart attack.”
“Your glasses are so . . .”
“So what?” He drew himself up to his full he
ight and I busted out laughing again.
“Just . . . ignore me. Listen, I really need some help. I’m going to a party tonight and I really need to look amazing. I think it’s my best shot at winning Ren back. I need to find The Dress.”
He took his glasses off. “The one guaranteed to make anyone fall in love with you?”
“Yes! Exactly. Just like my mom had. Only hopefully I’ll actually get to wear it and it will do its job.”
“The Dress?” Sonia asked, looking back and forth between us. “I’m sorry, but I’m not following.”
Howard turned to her. “Sonia, we’ll have to close the cemetery early. Finding a new dress is probably pretty easy, but The Dress? It’s going to take some time.” He winked at me. “And by the way, I remember catching a glimpse of your mother in her version of The Dress. I think I walked into a wall.”
Sonia shook her head. “I’m still a little unclear about what we’re talking about here, but you know we can’t close the cemetery. It’s completely against regulations.”
“Fine, we won’t close it. We’ll abandon it for a few hours while the three of us take an emergency shopping trip into Florence.”
I bounced up and down. “Thank you! That would be really awesome!”
Sonia still didn’t look convinced. “Howard, I’ll just stay behind in case any visitors show up.”
He shook his head. “No, we’re going to need you. You know I’ll be completely useless when it comes to shopping. My closet is where things go to die. We need a woman’s opinion.”
She shuddered. “Your taste is pretty bad. Remember when I made you get rid of that horrible pair of corduroys? They were sprouting hairs.”
I clasped my hands in front of my chest. “Please, Sonia. I don’t even know where dress stores are, and I’m going to need all the help I can get. I have to look incredible tonight. Will you help me?”
She looked back and forth between Howard and me, then shook her head. “I think you’ve lost your minds. But all right. Pick me up at my house.”
“Yes!” Howard and I high-fived. Then I waited outside while he closed up the visitors’ center and we both jogged up the path to the house.
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