Page 87 of My Lemon Grove Summer
‘This is how your town used to be.’ I hold out a hand to the street party. ‘This was the growing-up you had. This is what you want for Sophia, right?’ And above us I can hear a canary singing from the rooftops. ‘Look around. This is a town people will want to come to, because they have heard of the limoncello and the fabulous street parties. You said you owe me . . .’ I try and keep my voice steady.
He nods once.
‘Then let the townspeople have their land back.’ I look around. ‘Turn the water back on. Let the town grow lemons, then I can buy the verdello to make Nonna’s recipe and sell it. Città d’Oro will be back in business!’ I say. ‘We will all be back in business! Let the town live again.’
Romano is silent for a long time. Finally he looks at his great-niece and nods.
‘I will turn the water back on . . . and yes,’ he shrugs, ‘I will take down the fences.’
At first there is a stunned silence. I’m the first to realise what he’s just said, and I throw my hands in the air and whoop with elation. Everyone else follows. A cheer goes up like a Mexican wave. Elderly couples cling to each other, just as they have clearly clung to the dream of this happening one day. Then they turn and hug us, the newcomers, kissing us loudly on each cheek. Giuseppe is brushing away tears as he embraces older residents and then bear-hugs me, thanking me in between great gulps.
‘Where is Luca?’ asks Emily amid the celebrations, and I realise that she might have needed to speak to me, but Luca is the one she really wants to see. I look around and frown. WhereisLuca?
‘He can’t still be working,’ I say, looking around the happy gathering, realising I haven’t seen him since I left him finishing off my dress at the apartment. ‘I’ll go and find him, tell him you’re here. I won’t be long.’ I realise too that I’m dying to tell him the good news about the order and Il Nonno finally giving the town back its lemon groves. He must come and join the party.
I skip over the cobbles off the main street and down to Luca’s lemon grove.
‘Luca! Luca!’ I call out as I run up the wooden steps to the apartment. But the door is shut. I push down the handle and it opens. ‘Luca?’ There’s no reply, and I step in tentatively.
There in the middle of the living room is the mannequin, and on it, my dress, finished, with a tiny piece of lemon blossom attached to the bodice. On the table is a note. I look down at it and read it with tears filling my eyes.
He’s not coming. I try and practise saying it in my head, and big fat tears fall onto the page in front of me, because Luca has gone.
Chapter Forty-eight
I walk back up to the town square telling myself it’s best for both of us. When I arrive, Lennie is dancing with Sophia, getting her to stand on his feet while he moves, and as he looks down at his feet and then glances up laughing, the happiest I have seen him in weeks, I see him look straight at Matteo, and Matteo smile back at him, like . . . like they only have eyes for each other.
I’d recognise that look anywhere, just like when I first saw Luca. Oh God! Is this what I think it is? How could I have missed it?
Chapter Forty-nine
The air is hazy and heavy again, just like when Etna blew up. There’s a strange feeling everywhere, and the light is somehow weird again too. The wedding is just a few days away – three days, four hours and twenty-nine minutes, to be precise.
Lennie has been looking so preoccupied. I’m worried. I need to talk to him about what I think I saw at the street party. He’s been helping to pick the verdello early in the mornings, then spending the rest of the day working with Matteo at the houses, which, from the sound of it, are nearly ready to move into. But every time I’ve attempted to talk to him about the wedding, whether he still thinks we’re doing the right thing, he’s brushed me off.
I tried again this morning when we got up, bumping into each other in his haste to get ready and out of the house to get to work. ‘The wedding, Lennie – you do want to go ahead, don’t you? I mean, if there was any reason . . . if you didn’t want to, you’d say, wouldn’t you?’
He was sitting on the edge of the bed to pull on his boots. There’s a whole no-man’s-land down the middle of the bed between us. An uncrossed line. He smiled at me, but I know there’s a secret behind that smile. I’m sure of it.
‘Everything is fine, Zeld,’ he said, like he keeps saying, and kissed the top of my head. ‘The town is out in force getting ready for it!’
And he’s right. Doors are being painted, front steps and streets swept, window boxes planted. The whole town is coming back to life. Ralph is opening a gallery to display his drawings and paintings in one of the shops in the main street. He and Tabitha seem to be talking about doing some exhibitions together. She wants to put up some of her photographs from the lemon groves. In fact, they’re doing a lot together these days, I notice. Everyone is getting the town ready for the big day.
‘But if you really didn’t want to . . .’ I tried again. ‘If you were worried about anything, anything at all . . .’
‘Zeld, it’s fine!’ he said firmly, almost sharply. ‘I’m fine. Really.’
I’d like more than ‘fine’ for my wedding. But this is what I signed up for. The slow-cooked meal, rather than the blow-your-mind banquet. ‘Fine’ really means ‘not fine’. I know that from my growing-up, when teachers or care workers asked if everything was okay. I always said I was fine when actually I was as far from fine as can be. I have to try and talk to him.
Later that morning, I walk slowly to Luca’s apartment past people out on the streets, leaning on brooms, chatting with each other and waving and smiling and wishing mebuongiorno, to pick up my dress that he’s left there for me. Then I walk back through town to find Lennie at the houses – our new house.
‘Zelda!’ He practically jumps when I step in through the lovely wooden front door to see him sweeping the floor.
‘Thought I’d come and see how . . . things are going,’ I say. I have to find out what he’s thinking. If he really is in love with someone else.
‘Brilliant! Let me show you around,’ he says, and he does, proudly pointing out everything that he and Matteo have done. I get the full tour of the terrace. The houses are really lovely. Especially our one, with the balcony on the corner looking out to sea one way and towards Etna the other.
‘Lennie,’ I start. ‘About the wedding . . .’
