Page 68 of A Place in the Sun
Nonna Teresa’s words ring in my ears.
I grab more dessert bowls from the work surface and spin towards the dining room, right into Giovanni, who is clutching two wine jugs for refilling.
‘Woah!’ he says, and laughs as I career straight into him. Immediately I remember his smile and look back at the table, at something we had created here this evening, something to be proud of, like Marco did with family meals in the restaurant, when we made the time.
I look back at Sebastian and, my thoughts spinning and twisting like the Waltzers ride at the fair, I smile and he smiles at me. It seems like a safe place. One in which I know I won’t get hurt. Maybe it’s a place I could revisit, if I was going to dip my toe into the dating pool … maybe.
32
The following morning, after a warm, restless night, I’m in the kitchen at Casa Luna, putting the coffee on before Giovanni arrives. As soon as he’s here, I want to go straight up to La Tavola. For some reason, I’m keen not to spend time alone with him. Something inside me has shifted. I don’t know what it is, but a wall has crumbled and light is coming in: a possibility, a chink of a new life, the other side of the grief. A possibility of finding comfort in Sebastian’s company maybe. Back to where I was when life was mapped out. A safe and comfortable place to land.
I feed the kitten by the back door and stroke him as I breathe in the morning air, as welcome as the first cup of coffee.
‘Buongiorno.’ I jump at the sound of his voice, which is ridiculous because I was expecting him and he’sletting himself in, as he has done every morning since he started putting Casa Luna back together for me. What on earth is wrong with you? I ask myself. But Marco is no longer in the house and I no longer feel like his widow. I’m Thea, a single woman with children, and that’s a very different landscape, a shifting one, as the sun rises slower in the sky, the heat not so intense. Summer will soon be retreating to make way for autumn. Nothing stays the same for ever. Everything changes. Like the seasons, time moves on.
‘Okay, I have to go,’ I say, wiping the work surfaces needlessly – I’ve already done them half a dozen times. ‘I’m going up to La Tavola to check everything is cleared away and get ready for tonight.’
‘La Tavola will be fine. Everyone helped tidy up last night.’ Giovanni chuckles. ‘Have a coffee.’
‘No, really, I should go.’
‘Thea, I’m grateful to you for making this weekend happen, but I don’t want you to run yourself into the ground.’
He takes hold of my shoulders and my nerve endings are standing to attention, like sparklers that have just been lit. ‘You should take some time to enjoy what you’ve done.’
He’s right. I can’t go back to how I was when Marco and I had the restaurant, the pressure it put on us, and we put on ourselves. I can’t lose myself in the kitchen again. I can’t do that to the children.
‘Sit. Let me pour the coffee. I’ll join you outside.’
I do as I’m told.
‘The boys will be here soon,’ he says, carrying two cups of strong coffee to the little table outside where the garden is looking trimmed and ready for some love. When we arrived, it was a jungle of long grass. Now the grass is short, there’s the swing and the kitten is lazily swiping at a passing butterfly.
I breathe in deeply. There’s that feeling again, which has been constant since the day I got here. It’s a cocktail of the earth warming up, the cobwebs glistening with dew, and the scent of coffee drifting on a passing breeze. I hold my face to the sun and the breeze, loving what they bring to the party, the sun for its warmth, the breeze for the fragrances it carries, printing this place on my mind. A memory of it. A memory of when life turned a corner for me. I’m not going home the same Thea who came here, still with images of Marco everywhere. I’m going home with Marco as part of my past, but with the possibility of a future, maybe with someone else in it.
Giovanni sits next to me at the table, gazing out over the rolling hills. ‘So, the cookery course is going well.’
‘Better than I could have expected, really,’ I say, breathing in the coffee. ‘And the house, will it be ready in time?’
He nods. ‘Don’t worry. A big push over this weekend and we’ll meet your deadline.’
‘Two years exactly,’ I say. ‘From the moment hebought it. Two years from when he died.’ There’s a pause when we’re both lost in our thoughts. It’s Giovanni who speaks first but doesn’t look at me.
‘So Sebastian. Seems like a nice man.’
‘He is.’
‘You worked together,’ he says, rather than asks.
I nod. ‘I didn’t realize he’d be coming when I booked the company in.’
‘You didn’t say that Sebastian was an ex …’
We’re staring straight ahead, looking out over the early morning mist rolling around the undulating fields and around the trees.
‘Yes. How did you …?’
‘Just got a feeling last night. Unfinished business.’ He sips his coffee, his leg slung casually over his knee. ‘And Nonna Teresa told me.’
