And yesterday.
LEO:We can just arrive and try to figure it out, but that sounds like the least sensible option.
Dad’s unfinished manuscript and the urn carrying his ashes are sitting on my bedside table. I only just collected them yesterday, a job I’d put off until the very last minute. I haven’t read the manuscript yet—another reason I wasn’t ready to see Leo. The mere thought of it feels like tearing open a crusty wound. I want to feel calm when I read it, in control. I will feel much more mentally prepared once I’ve touched down and checked in and have a glass of wine in my hand. Or maybe I’ll never feel ready.
“It feels wrong to put Dad in the luggage hold,” I call out, lifting the polished silver urn, which is surprisingly heavy. “I can’t put him in the hold, can I?”
“Carry-on for sure,” Ginny calls back.
“Carry-on for sure,” I repeat, placing the urn in my tote. I frown seeing the bulk of it; there won’t be room for much else.
I hesitate, then put the manuscript in my check-in suitcase, along with a beach towel, a red bikini, a green one-piece, a pair of espadrilles, several T-shirts, my running shoes, and then a couple of fancy going-out dresses.
“Just in case,” I say quietly, imagining Leo and me sitting down to dinner together. Not an entirely unpleasant vision, so long as we don’t talk much.
“In case of what?” Ginny asks, shooting a damp tea towel into the laundry basket in the corner as she enters my room.
“A couple of going-out dresses,” I say, grimacing. “In case I go out, I suppose.”
Ginny looks at me with a mixture of love and pity.
“You’re going to be fine, Olive,” she says, glancing at her watch. “Don’t let this guy unsettle you. Focus on the job. You really don’t have to spend twenty-four seven in each other’s laps.” Ginny looks at me and grimaces. “Although it’s a very attractive lap—”
“Ginny!” I shake my head, tapping her gently on the arm. “He’s not justsome guy, though, is he? He’s spent over a decade with Dad. God knows what Dad’s said about me.She never calls. She abandoned me. She’s an awful person.”
“You had your reasons. He could have calledyoumore. And besides”—she waves at the keys to the restaurant sitting on my dresser—“he obviously still cared, Olive.”
I look at the bikini in my suitcase and then back to Ginny. I throw my arms around her. “Iwillbe fine,” I say. “Thanks for being here.”
Earlier, Kate and Ginny pep-talked me over lunch, which I’d prepared for them as a distraction from the stress of tomorrow. I’d needed my friends; also, the meditative nature of cooking for other people has always been my happy place.
Ginny requested “something vegetarian” and I had delightedly obliged.
“You know where you can be vegetarian and still eat like a king?” I’d asked.
“Italy,” they’d replied, eye-rolling back at me in unison.
Cringe. My dad used to say that all the time, and now, apparently, so did I.
I’d prepared burrata with a sweet onion and cherry tomato salad, my signature overnight focaccia, and a risotto with wild mushrooms and in-season wild garlic, and finished it all off with lemon, almond, and ricotta cake for dessert.
Kate called it “three courses of delicious responsibility avoidance” before she hugged me good-bye, scolded me for not speaking to Leo yet, and headed back to work.
“At least you’ll know people in Sicily,” Ginny replies, pulling back so she’s holding both my shoulders.
I nod. I’ll know my dad’s old mentor, Rocco; his wife, Isabella; maybe even their grandson Luca if he’s still around. I’ll know their restaurant. Their family home. And as awkward as it feels to be “the estranged daughter,” at least they’ve invited me for lunch. I feel a wave of anxiety at the thought of seeing them.It will be fine. Who knows what memories will be roused by the smells, the tastes, and the views of that beautiful southeastern coastline.
“I want to do a great job,” I say, biting on my lower lip.
“Dude,” Ginny says, frowning. “You’re going to be writing about food. It’s what you do.”
My phone buzzes and I glance at it as it vibrates against the pale floral bedsheets.Mum.
“I better take this. She’s jittery as hell about everything,” I say apologetically.
“I have to go, anyway,” Ginny says, grabbing her handbag from the floor as I reach for my phone. “Call me. Anytime. Any. Time.”
“I love you,” I say, as I take Mum’s call and Ginny disappears into the hall and out the front door.
