“Hey, I’mtryingto get married. It’s not working,” I retorted.
Natalia laughed. “I’m fine waiting a little longer!”
“For what?” Romeo growled.
Natalia held up her free hand. “I don’t…”
“Want to rush,” everyone answered for her.
She rolled her eyes. “Exactly.”
Each couple had gone in different directions, relationship-wise. Marcello and Chiara did things the proper way, at least by society’s standards. They’d eloped a few months back and had clearly wasted no time in getting pregnant. Loved the Bonifacio women, though they did, getting their heirs were not far from the Cavetti men at any point in time, though all being cooped up for the past year could be to blame as well.
Romeo and Lucia were second to traditional as Lucia wastechnicallypregnant before she got married, but they were engaged before they knew and married before she gave birth. The fact that they were already on their second wasn’t, honestly, that much of a shock to me, although I thought they might have taken alittlemore time. Dante was still only five months and would be just a little over a year when the baby was born.
No rest for the wicked.
Savio and Alessandra had gotten engaged almost immediately, but had yet to set a wedding date. Alessandra claimed she wanted a big, extravagant wedding, but anytime Lucia, Chiara and Natalia approached her to start planning it, she would break down into tears. She’d always dreamed of my parents walking her down the aisle – a dream she’d never realize. The guilt it riddled Savio and the rest of the Cavettis with often kept conversations from getting much further, leaving them engaged until Alessandra had finally come to terms with our unfortunate reality. She’d never confirmed as much, but I had a feeling that was why Chiara opted to elope. Not being able to have my parents and Antonio at her wedding would be too painful, so she just cut her losses. Alessandra was a little more attached than that.
Then that left Natalia and I, already on kid one, but not even engaged yet. I firmly believed it was my fault because not long after Angelo’s funeral, I proposed to her and wasn’t eloquent in choosing my words, leading her to believe it was more about the fact that she was pregnant than the fact that I loved her and wanted to spend the rest of my life with her. She turned me down, and I tried again about six months later the night she gave birth to Emilia and my unfortunate timing left her believing the same thing she believed last time. Though I was more insistent that time and told her how much I loved her and wanted to be with her, whether there was a baby or not, she refused to believe it and said to do it again when I feltready, which I did, about a month later.
And got rejected a third time.
She said I was forcing it and that she wanted us to get to know one another first before I proposed. A year was too soon, and that having a kid now would be a true test of our relationship, but we were unshakable.
Our confidence was a different story.
I wanted to marry Natalia more than I wanted air or food. I wanted to be able to call her my wife, but thanks to my slip-ups, it left me anxious and her unsure. All I had to do was find a way to prove to Natalia that I wanted to marry her because I wanted to marry her. Hopefully, a good moment would present itself at some point.
“Signore,” a voice broke into the living room, “dinner will be ready in about thirty minutes.”
“Thank you, Celia,” Romeo replied, “and please, just call me Mr. Cavetti.”
“Yes Mr. Cavetti,” she responded, before disappearing again.
Celia was one of the Cavetti estates’ newest employees and Romeo and Lucia’s attendant. Once Lucia finally got her bearings after coming out of her coma, she revealed to Romeo that it had been their handmaiden, Philippa, who had actually pushed Lucia down the stairs. The Cavettis went in search of her, but she and all her belongings had been removed from the home, apart from a love letter between Philippa and Gianni. Philippa had been Gianni’s spy on the inside, and I imagined wherever Gianni ended up, Philippa ended up there as well. Natalia begged me not to tell her brothers Gianni was alive, afraid that they’d go hunting for him, so it was a secret we held between the few of us. One of the only secrets any Cavetti was keeping from another, as Angelo’s death had brought them all closer together, and now they were thick as thieves.
Still, Philippa still haunted the estate in the form of the staff who used the formal, Italian ‘Signore’ or ‘Signorina’ to refer to Romeo or Lucia. It was a signature of Philippas and sent a chill down our spines when we heard it. We were all working to break the staff of the habit, but with there being so many of them, it was hard to tick all the boxes.
“Okay!” Lucia said. “The kids are fed, dinner will be ready soon. Should we open presents?” I smiled at how much she looked like my mother glowing in the light of the tree.
“Yes please,” Chiara said.
All of the Cavettis seemedslightlyuncomfortable with the Bonifacio’s warmth surrounding the holiday. Theirs was a family tortured and torn apart, so they didn’t necessarily gather around and sing Christmas carols every year. Me and my sisters would be working on that coldness slowly over the course of the next few years, but it left the holiday season a bit awkward.
Alessandra and Savio passed around the piles of gifts they sorted to each individual, and everyone ended up with around ten presents. As we had, the others exchanged gifts with their significant others from the comfort of their own homes, so the presents we opened as a group were from one another. Among the incredibly thoughtful gifts I got from my sisters were stock Christmas gifts like a tie and socks from the Cavettis. Although, Romeo did get me a couple of really nice suits to add to the collection I was developing.
After we finished opening our presents, Lucia and Natalia put Dante and Emilia down for naps in safe spots in the living room, then the adults adjourned to the dining room table for dinner. Ham, turkey, and chicken were served alongside a medley of sides and aged red wine, which of course was quickly swapped out with water for Chiara.
“Okay,” Lucia started with a deep breath. “I know this is going to be a little uncomfortable, not to mention difficult with the past year we’ve all had, but something we used to do every year before Christmas dinner was to say something good about the past year. I was hoping we could do that.”
“Um,” Romeo started, but Lucia cut in.
“I know, I know you guys are a very, ‘talk about yourselves,’ kind of brood, but I think it would be good for us. Despite everything we went through, good things happened to all of us, and please, don’t take the easy way out and say your spouse. We all know that and it happened to all of us. It’s unoriginal.” She set her hand on Romeo’s. “I’ll start, and I guess I’m cheating a little, but I had my wonderful son. He looks just like my husband and I couldn’t be happier.” Then she looked at Romeo and nodded.
“Uh,” Romeo stammered. “We finally ended Angelo.”
“Dammit,” Natalia hissed.
