Page 29 of Far from Home
She sat there for several minutes, trying to digest what she had just heard. Assuming it was true – and she had no reason to doubt her best friend’s word – the idea of Gavin cheating on her didn’t come as a complete shock. He was a good-looking man and she had always known he had a flirty nature and it was probably this, as much as anything else, that had prevented her from taking the next step in their relationship. Something had stopped her from suggesting they move in together – although his almost constant presence in her flat and his use of her as his maidservant had been the next best thing, at least as far as he was concerned.
The news that he had been with another woman was still a slap in the face but somehow, deep down, she had almost been expecting it. All those trips away to romantic places, dinner assignations with unspecified clients, late nights and weekends away, had sometimes made her wonder if something might have been going on, but she had chosen not to confront him. Now it looked as though she had no alternative.
She felt a movement at her feet and a big black paw suddenly landed on her lap as Max did his best to offer support. Just like when she had been sobbing over the letter from her father, he must somehow have worked out that all was not well with her and he was doing his best to cheer her up. In fact it worked, and she found she could answer Lucy in a reasonably unemotional voice.
‘Thanks, Luce, you’re a good friend. It can’t have been easy telling me that.’
Lucy gave her hand a little squeeze. ‘That’s what friends are for, Amy. Better that you hear it from me than from somebody else or, even worse, that you just carry on blissfully ignorant of what he’s been doing behind your back. What are you going to do?’
By this time Amy had made up her mind. ‘I need to talk to him, have it out with him and, as far as I’m concerned, dump him as soon as I can. To be honest, I’ve been having doubts about the relationship for some time now so it almost makes things easier for me really.’ She produced a little smile for Lucy’s benefit. ‘But you’re here on holiday and I’m on holiday and I’m not going to let Gavin ruin that. I think what I’ll probably do is fly back to London one day next week and confront him.’
‘And then what?’
‘And then I’ll get on the plane again and come back here to finish my holiday. Hopefully by then I’ll be able to move out of the hotel and into the house. The builders reckon it should be habitable – although not finished – by the middle of next week.’
‘And then what?’
Amy hesitated before she replied, still doing her best to sound positive. ‘I’m not really sure. One thing at a time: first a great holiday with you, then go and see Gavin, finish off the house, and then I’ll have time to sit down and start thinking about the rest of my life.’
The next few days passed in a flash. Amy and Lucy made coffee for the builders – no easy feat after the water had been disconnected and power was only available via a long extension lead – walked in the hills with Max, had a series of excellent meals and visited a number of the surrounding places of interest. Beautiful as their surroundings were, as far as Amy could gather, the highlight of Lucy’s week was on Wednesday afternoon when Lorenzo the builder removed his shirt while he dug a hole. Amy almost had to pin her friend down to prevent her from jumping on him. He was doing a great job and the last thing she wanted was for him to be distracted.
On Thursday she and Lucy drove the twenty kilometres down to the pretty little seaside town of Castiglioncello with its fine sandy beach. They paid for rental of two sun loungers and a parasol for the afternoon and Amy had her first ever swim in the Mediterranean, or more precisely the Tyrrhenian Sea, finding the water remarkably clean and a most agreeable temperature. The biggest ice cream cone she had ever seen completed the holiday feel of the day and she returned to Sant’Antonio feeling mildly debauched. Having a place like that almost on her doorstep was a rare treat.
Another treat came the next day. On Friday they drove inland to Volterra to see what the Discover Tuscany website described as a ‘medieval town with its own special charm’ and it lived up to its billing. This historic walled town, perched on a hilltop amid a sea of gently rolling hills, was delightful. They parked alongside a remarkably well preserved two-thousand-year-old Roman amphitheatre and were surprised to discover that this wasn’t the oldest part of town. Lucy’s phone told them that Volterra had been an important centre belonging to the Etruscans – the predecessors of the Romans – three or four centuries before Christ, and the old walls and gates were still standing. The Middle Ages had seen the creation of a plethora of fine stone buildings in thecentro storico, ranging from the twelfth-century Duomo to a fortress built by the famous Medici family. The town was a historical gem.
Although Amy was familiar with northern Italy, she was unprepared for the sheer variety and antiquity of the buildings here in Tuscany, and she was as impressed as Lucy by everything they saw. After stopping for a snack lunch of focaccia bread filled with fresh goats’ cheese and grilled aubergines, they set off to look at the shops in the afternoon. It was while they were admiring the pots and dishes in one of numerous shops selling pottery and objects made of the local alabaster that she spotted a familiar face. Inside the shop, sitting chatting to the shopkeeper, was Danny from Sant’Antonio. She turned to Lucy.
‘I know that guy. He’s a potter and he lives in Sant’Antonio. Feel like coming in to meet him? He’s American.’
As they walked into the shop, an old-fashioned bell above the door started ringing and attracted the attention of both men, as well as an aged poodle with a pink neckerchief around its neck, who wandered across to say hello. When Danny recognised Amy he jumped to his feet and came over to greet them.
‘Amy, hi. Great to see you.’
Amy introduced Lucy and they chatted while the poodle sniffed Amy’s jeans with interest. She hoped this was because of some lingering aroma of Max, rather than grime. Danny pointed out a number of the items on display which he had made and he introduced them to the shop owner, whose name was Mario. Amy had secretly been hoping to find that this might turn out to be Pierpaolo and she wondered how she might be able to find out more about that mysterious man, or, indeed, about Danny’s relationship with Adam, but the subject didn’t come up. Mario, who had a fine head of glossy black hair that cascaded down to his shoulders, was Italian but it turned out that he had spent ten years of his life living and working in St Ives in Cornwall and he even spoke English with a bit of a West Country drawl. He insisted that they sat down and had cups of coffee with him and they were there for a quarter of an hour chatting, while Lucy bought a charming faux-medieval fruit bowl to give to her parents and Amy bought half a dozen mugs to replace the battered ones back at l’Ospedaletto.
Amy did, however, get a step nearer to discovering more about the Adam, Danny, Pierpaolo triangle when Danny offered to show her around his potter’s studio back at Sant’Antonio. She accepted with alacrity and they arranged that she would call round on Sunday afternoon after she’d taken Lucy back to Pisa to catch her flight home. The arrival of an elderly German couple a few minutes later made Amy think they should get out of the way of these potential customers, so they bade farewell to both men and left. She was pleased with her purchases and delighted that Sunday’s appointment might mean that the opportunity to quiz Danny more closely had presented itself.
That evening, as a change from the Corona Grossa, Amy took Lucy to a pizzeria tucked away in a little piazza behind the old medieval market at Sant’Antonio. Rosa had told her about the place and that they had tables outside in the market square. Amy had been here in Sant’Antonio for two whole weeks now but still hadn’t had an authentic Italian pizza and Lucy sounded equally keen to try the real thing. This would also allow them to tie the meal in with a walk for Max first and he could snooze under the table while they ate. The breeze was still blowing and it promised to be very welcome on a warm night like this.
At seven o’clock she and Lucy collected the happy Labrador from Signora Grande and they set off on a leisurely circular tour of the little town. The first ten minutes of the walk were a struggle of wills between Amy and the dog, who almost choked himself to death tugging at the lead and almost pulled her arm out of its socket in the process. It took a while but they finally came to a compromise that relieved the pressure on her arm while still letting him lead the way.
They had an enjoyable walk and Amy saw much of the little town that was new to her, including the medieval church and the gruesome gallows right beside it where convicted criminals had been executed in years gone by. The pizzeria was opposite the old market and the tables extended out into the shade provided by the ancient timber roof supported on massive brick pillars. The floor was made up of flagstones and it couldn’t have felt more different from London. When they got there Amy recognised a couple of familiar faces sitting among the diners. Over to one side were none other than Rosa and Vincenzo. As they spotted Amy, they waved and then, strangely, their table started to move across the ground all by itself, emitting a nerve-jangling screeching noise as the metal legs scraped across the stone.
The reason for this soon became apparent. Coco the Labrador had just seen her brother Max and had decided to come across to say hello, oblivious to the fact that she had been tied to the leg of the table. In consequence, the heavy table had followed her. Amy hurried over and introduced Lucy to them. While the dogs sniffed each other and wagged their tails and the table was returned to its former position, they chatted for a few minutes before Amy politely refused their kind offer to join them. She didn’t want to impose herself on these friendly people and, as Lucy spoke no Italian and they spoke no English, it would have been hard going. Wishing Rosa and Vincenzobuon appetito, she gently prised Max away from Coco and they followed the waiter to a table on the far side of the restaurant.
She noticed that most people around them were drinking beer with their pizzas, so they did the same. Lucy ordered aquattro stagioniand Amy just went for a simplepizza margherita. As she sipped her drink, enjoying the perfect temperature and the picturesque surroundings, she reflected on her good fortune. Interestingly, the fact that her boyfriend had almost certainly been cheating on her barely caused a ripple in her happiness.
After the scare of her collapse and hospitalisation, life had changed for the better so abruptly, and it was all thanks to a man whose existence had been completely unknown to her until a few weeks ago. Just as she had spent her life wishing she had known the man she had been brought up to believe to be her real father, she now also wished she had known Martin Slater. From everything she was hearing about him, she felt sure she would have loved him just as he – quite evidently – had loved her. She still had to make a start onFar From Home, telling herself she hadn’t yet because she had been so busy, but she knew deep down that it was almost certainly because it was going to be an emotional read.
Lucy must have read her mind. ‘This place is amazing, and I’m not just talking about this restaurant. Sant’Antonio and Tuscany feel like a whole different world. Your fabulous house, the surrounding countryside and don’t let’s forget your four-legged friend – you’re so incredibly lucky. And all thanks to a man you never met.’
‘I know, Luce, and that’s down to my mum. I’ve been doing a lot of thinking about her. The fact of the matter is that she lied to me all her life. If she hadn’t been so stubborn, I could have met my real father. She had no right to deprive me of that.’
Ever pragmatic, Lucy was upbeat. ‘I can’t imagine what you’re feeling but think of it this way: you never knew him but you also never knew the man your mum told you was your dad. It would be far worse if you’d grown up alongside a man you loved, only to discover that he wasn’t what he seemed. Nothing should stop you continuing to love the memory of that man but, at the same time, nothing should stop you loving this unknown man who’s turned out to be your real father. And the same applies to your mum. None of this should change the way you feel about her. Okay, so she didn’t tell you the truth, but try putting yourself in her position. Guilt is a powerful motivator, and as the years went by and the dust began to settle on the upset surrounding your birth, she understandably didn’t want to put you or herself through the heartbreak that would have ensued if she’d told you the truth. Sleeping dogs and all that, Amy. It’s only human.’
Amy’s eyes strayed for a few seconds to the black shape lying stretched out across her feet beneath the table. Lucy was right. Her mum had taken the cowardly, but eminently understandable, way out. Why should she have wanted to risk stirring up a hornets’ nest? She had clearly decided it was better to leave well alone and Amy couldn’t help feeling sympathy for her. She certainly hoped her own life would prove to be less complicated. Any further reflection was interrupted by her phone telling her she had a text message. She looked down at it and was surprised when she saw who it was from. She glanced up at Lucy.
‘A text from Gavin. It’s only taken him two weeks!’
