Epilogue II:
A Middle that Lingers Beyond the End
I had expected we’d leave the island right away after the storm, and the attacks, and the letter from Rosaria Caffi that Scarlett had Mac deliver to Rocco, but we didn’t. We allowed the rest of the summer to linger between our bodies, the heat melting us into each other, fusing our lives together even deeper, even stronger.
After we’d been locked inside the small apartment I’d been given to use during my time on the island—where we spent the remainder of our time, squashed together and never happier—for a week, we explored every inch of the island, as we were doing to each other’s bodies, every day and every night discovering something new, but at home in the places we already knew by heart.
As the pressure and mood of the island always changed with an oncoming storm, it seemed to change with the rainbow of peace that had appeared the morning after too.
The music that had played along the streets, that intense war beat from Roman days, turned into old romantic love songs from Dino.
It felt like clouds were at my feet whenever we walked the island—dinners that seemed to linger for hours, well into the night, after the stars came out and we talked and talked and talked. We talked about everything and nothing, just as we hadbefore, but somehow our conversations felt lighter and deeper at the same time. We both grinned, in a love daze, when we realized that we basically went from “first sight” straight to “eternally yours.”
Rocco danced with me in the streets, like he was Fred Astaire and I was Ginger Rogers. And when one of those ancient-Roman-inspired songs did play, he taught me a new dance, and I didn’t ask if it had a name. We moved around each other, our eyes never losing focus, my left hand raised, his right, as we circled to the beat. His shoulders moved in perfect harmony with the pounding of the drums, the flute in the background only adding to how hypnotic it was, and once I got the hang of it, my shoulders started to move too.
Maybe it was because of the intense connection we shared, but we barely made it home that night. Our eyes had been so intense on each other’s. It was like foreplay without even touching. The moment before the kiss—moving closer and closer toward the first touch. We tore at each other’s clothes, our mouths locked in a kiss that neither of us could break. He lost his thin shirt, and I lost my flowing dress to the thieving breeze at the apartment’s door. It had looked like his ghost was chasing mine through the air.
That was the most fitting metaphor of the rest of our time on the island—for the rest of our lives. Beyond the explainable, we would always be together.
The night we were attacked had changed something inside of me. I was more certain than ever that Rocco and I would be together beyond forever.
Speaking of forever…the husband and wife who were the caretakers of the hauntedcastellobrought news that after the situation with Rosaria had been resolved, Belladonna Conti’s spirit had been set free. It was no longer in thecastello, and she was finally reunited with her long-lost lover. The wife had felt I had released her by breaking the window of the haunted mansion. It kind of creeped me out when she said I had attracted the woman’s spirit,and my love was strong enough to set her free, but…I was thankful she and her love were getting a happily ever after.
As my eyes lit up with the pictures on my camera—so many selfies of the two of us together, so many of him, so many of me (taken by him…it seemed like we both tried to catch each other unaware, naturally and spontaneously, no rules, only candid shots…and it made for stunning pictures)—I realized just how much our time on the island meant to us and the beginning of our relationship.
All that had happened during that time set up our life—our future.
There wasn’t a time on the island that didn’t seem to reflect our love like the hour before sunset. It was like, whatever we felt for each other came alive outside of our bodies, and we were given the gift of basking in its glow. What seemed like endless miles and unknown depths of water reflected the unbound and immeasurable depths of the sky. Light purples, dark blues, and stretches of neon pink. My husband seemed to hold me tighter before the sun completely faded, like he was feeling it too.
We’d found light in each other at the darkest times of our lives.
Once the light completely faded, we still had each other in the darkness of life. Whateveritwas that existed between us, it held in the soft light andglowed, though the rest of the world was locked out, still in impenetrable shades.
Rocco looked over at the camera. He blinked at a picture he had taken of me sitting on the beach. I was sitting before the shore, the wind blowing his wedding shirt open, since I’d claimed it as mine, my knees up but relaxed, my toes digging in the sand. He took the camera from me, one he insisted on us getting, since he didn’t trust electronics, and said, “That one will be only for me.”
Grinning, I showed him my phone. It was one of us in the water. My head was over his shoulder, resting there, and his arms were wrapped around mine. My legs were locked around his back,but I’d managed to take a picture of us that made my heart feel like it shivered whenever I looked at it.
The moment was just that all-encompassing and…peaceful.
He grinned and showed me his phone. I’d set the same picture on his lock screen, until I found one he’d taken of me on the beach, his wedding ring encircling me in the photo. He’d taken his band and held it closer to the camera, framing me further in the background. He swiped his phone and then showed it to me: a picture of us from our wedding day. I’d loaded his phone up with them.
“We are beautiful together, ah?”
“Ah.” I rested my head on his shoulder, sighing, before leaving my phone and camera on my purse as he took my hand and led me out of the apartment.
I’d been taking pictures of the rooms in my digs, never wanting to forget a moment of my first time on the island. I’d taken plenty when I’d first arrived, but…it felt right to take them before we left too, like I’d be able to spot changes from beginning to end years from then. Like the aging process of a person, except…it was whatever existed between us.
Pisolino followed us out. Scarlett had asked Mac to bring him back for me. She felt his goodbye to the island wasn’t complete, too. And a fitting ending would be the three of us going back to Italy together.
We were scheduled to leave that afternoon on the private helicopter, and my heart was lagging. Rocco seemed to be feeling it, too, but nowhere near as much as I was. It was only when he stared at me, like he wanted to create a heart memory, that I could feel his hesitance. But my heart was resisting as much as it did after our wedding night, when I didn’t want to leaveCastello Burranea.
Rocco didn’t comment on my mood. He was waiting for me to come to terms with leaving…maybe. There was something he wasn’t sharing with me. During the storm, my heart seemed to connect with his in a way I’d never felt before. It seemed to bring medeeper inside his heart, and I knew when he was in trouble. But it felt like he knew how to hide certain things from me.
I wasn’t sure how I felt about that yet, but I was trying not to obsess over it. I was trying to absorb every bit of magic the island had to offer before we had to part from it. Even the hauntedcastellothat had been the subject of much speculation—was the violent entity a ghost or not?—was just another part of our memories of the island.
Occasionally, I thought about how Abree’s parents had come and got her, her father giving Rocco his word that she wouldn’t be a problem.
“What will the world do without a Caffi voice to carry on our lineage?” her mamma had said to her as she took one arm and her father took another, leading her toward the waiting helicopter. Guido and Vincenzo followed them to make sure she was under control. “We must keep ourselves and our voices safe.”
