“Hardly feels like work,” he says. A reminder, I think, that at some point we’ll need to do just that. “I have to say, for all the excitement and bustle of Catania, I’m going to love it here for a while.”
“Same here,” I say, stretching out, wiggling my travel-weary toes. “Now,thisis paradise.”
Leo says nothing for a moment, but I can feel his smile in my direction.
“What?” I ask, tipping my sunglasses to get a better look at his face.
“It’s good to see your hard opinion won,” comes the reply, with a wry smile. “Verysatisfying”
I feel my skin tingle all over when he says the wordsatisfying.
“Leo. This is a real treat, and I’m glad to be here. Thank you. I can see why Dad loved it here. And your aunt is charming... in her way.”
Leo laughs at this. “In her wayis the quintessential caveat to an Olive compliment,” he says when his laugh subsides.
We both lie there, faces to the sun, sunglasses on, for what feels like hours, interrupted only by the intermittent chorus of cicadas and the periodic clash of pans coming from the kitchen. Very occasionally, the sound of a car on gravel far in the distance.
“The almost silence,” I say after a while, drowsy from falling in and out of sleep. “Your aunt, will she be visiting us a lot while we’re here?”
“I don’t know,” he says, turning his face to me. “Probably. Why?”
“I feel like she has something to say to me.”
“Oh, don’t worry about it,” he says, reaching for a jug of ice-cold water that appeared while we were dozing. “She has something to say to almost everyone.”
“I almost don’t want to think about it, but any food ideas for this route? Tuscany is tomatoes and bean stews and wild boar, isn’t it?” I ask, raising myself onto my elbow, turning on my lounger to him, ready to enjoy a moment of uncomplicated food talk. “I’d love to keep up our pace from Catania and really get on top of it so we can also chill.”
“Well, I’ve already got ideas...,” he says slowly. “Zia is going to show us her wild boar ragù tomorrow.” He laughs, turning his head back to the sky. “Can you imagine? In this heat?”
I smile, lying back. “Hmm.”
“She has an old heritage-tomato farm, and,only if it works, I’d love to include something from there.”
“Sure,” I say. “Absolutely.”
“That’s it? No fight?”
“Leo, it’s got to betomatoes. Dad hasn’t done tomatoes yet, and it’s a book on regional Italian cooking. I really believe he meant to do tomatoes in Tuscany, come on!”
“You’re probably right,” he says.
“I’m right,” I say. “I just know it. And what kind of fool doesn’t like tomatoes?”
“That was too easy,” he says, laughing suspiciously.
“As long as you’re not going to turn them into a tomato candy floss for the book, I’m all in,” I say, laughing.
“Let’s get it done. Then we can enjoy heaven with no deadline,” he says.
“Yes, just the sun, this pool, cold fruit from the icebox, you, and me,” I say mindlessly, my thoughts juddering to a halt as soon as the last part tumbles out.Leo makes no response. And, in the silence that follows, I feel a slight tingling down the back of my neck.
Leo removes his sunglasses and there’s a question in his eyes, but I look to the sky.
“I’m going to make a coffee, and then I have to check my emails,” he says wearily, sliding his sunglasses back on.
“Emails?” I say, with a comedy gasp.
“Yes, Olive,emails,” he says. “I have a Zoom call tomorrow too.”
