I snatch it from him.
“No one,” I say quickly, standing up, smoothing my hair, and lifting my chin. Leo looks sympathetic. My body still fizzes from his touch, and I hate the uncomfortable pleasure it brings. Am I so desperate for human touch?
“I brought you the manuscript. And I took the liberty of writing a list of the ingredients that are already taken on the front.”
He taps at a scribbled list stuck to the dog-eared, ring-bound manuscript.
“Thanks,” I say, taking it quickly from him and shoving it into my bag.
“What areyourplans today?” I note a towel poking out of his messenger bag and get a vision of Leo in swim trunks, chest bare, like some kind of Beach Ken walking out of the sea, and I have to work hard to push the image away.
“Oh, don’t worry. Just a quick dip,” he says, making his way toward the stairwell. “But then I’ll go and check out a food market, I think.”
“Just give me a few hours,” I call as he disappears down the stairs. “I’ll call you.”
BOTH KATE ANDGinny suggested getting out of Catania and exploring the coast. And so I visit a small car-hire place adjacent to the hotel. What I want is a cheap little thing to zip about in and what they have is a black Fiat 500C convertible.
My instinct is to find something less fancy, but then I remind myself if I was ever going to hire a black convertible, now is the time. As I drive out, the attendant comes running out of the store, I think to wave me off, until I hear him shouting, “Destra! Destra!”
Right. Drive on the right, Olive. I quickly course correct.
I am crawling in traffic for a good hour on the coastal road, listening to an audiobook calledForgiving the Dead, a self-help book given to me by Kate that I reluctantly decided to give a go.
Step one, I’m told, is to audit the behavior and decide how bad itreallywas. Step two is to talk to an empty chair. As the traffic comes to a complete standstill, two nuns in black-and-white habits pull up beside me in an old Lancia with the windows rolled down. We turn and smile at each other, while the booming voice of my audiobook continues.
“Step seven,” says the California therapist loudly. “Open your heart to loving the good parts. If it was your lover, then try to remember a time when you made love. Sink into the feeling of sexual connection and romantic bonding.”
“Shit.” I hit stop very quickly and crouch down as low as I can in the driver’s seat without disappearing altogether, not daring to look over.
“Sorry, God,” I say, looking skyward. And then: “I have given this my best go,” I whisper to an imaginary Kate, quickly turning on some Lou Reed and pretending to stall the automatic until the nuns are well ahead of me.
Taormina sits on a natural platform above the coast, its small streets and tiny staircases climbing to the summit of Mount Tauro, where an ancient Greek theater looks out across the sea. Stunning views aside, its coral-colored stone houses with wrought-iron balconies climb above elegant piazzas lined with cafés and filled with people. Deep green bushes with their bright pink flowers seem to grow everywhere, straight from the baking-hot stone. The town is beautiful, the pearl of the Ionian Sea, recently made famous by the showThe White Lotus.
I pass by a little bookshop and grab a copy ofThe Flavors of Sicily, and then I decide to have a coffee, right on Piazza IX Aprile, the main piazza, with bold checkerboard paving. I glance at the price on the plastic menu.Ten euros!I cannot help but laugh; the price of sitting in this slice of paradise has been firmly baked into the bill.
As I gaze out, drinking my coffee, I have a flash of a memory of waiting with a cardboard cake box, over by the wrought-iron railing that looks over the sea. Mum posing for a photo in a broadbrimmed hat and a floor-length lemon-print sundress. Dad making her redo the pose a hundred times while I waited,bored. Mum, finally throwing her hands up, exasperated.
“Nicky, this is the only face of mine you’re going to get. What should I do different?”
“Nothing,” he’d replied, laughing. “I’m just enjoying the view.”
Mum and her coquettish giggle. Dad and his charming chuckle. A warm embrace. A heartrending memory that makes me immediately miss them.
Miss how theywere.
I glance around. Wasn’t there a cake shop here that served a cake my mother loved? I search the depths of my memory, but it is only her delight and my teenage indifference to it that I can recall, not the cake itself.
“Un momento,” I say, as the waiter approaches, pen aloft, breaking me from my thoughts.
I flick open the menu and scan for something light to eat, and my eyes fall on insalata di finocchi e arance. Fennel salad with oranges. I’m intrigued, but then my eyes scan to the arancini al ragù. A little fried rice ball? Yes, please.
I have to be smart about this. I only have one stomach and I can’t eat everything. But then again, I kind of need to.
“I’ll have the arancini, the seafood with couscous. And...” I tut as I scan the menu. “The spaghetti al pesto alla trapanese. That’s with almonds, right?”
The waiter nods, looking around for another person.
“It’s just me,” I say, grinning. “I’m hungry.”
