Rocco and I had lived lonely lives long enough—what we both needed was each other, the end.
The takeoff seemed to linger inside of me as we headed toward our next stop. I was breathless as we rose higher toward the sky. Rocco leaned over and kissed me, then stood, fixing his suit as he headed toward the bathroom.
A flight attendant stared at him until he shut the door. My eyes narrowed on her until she met my eyes and hurriedly looked away. It made a sick feeling churn in my gut. I wasn’tgetting anything from her during drink and nut time, or whatever they ate on these private planes. I tried to ignore how it grated on me, the way she was staring at him with hope in her eyes. I turned my attention forward, to where Scarlett and Brando were sitting across from us. Dario, Carmen, Romeo, and Juliette were sitting at another table, playing a card game. The same men who had escorted us to the estate were on the plane too, but in single seats: Guido, Vincenzo, and their wives.
Scarlett had her head on Brando’s shoulder, and he was reading a book—my dad’s first thriller, the one about the equivalent of an Italian James Bond. Out of all my dad’s books, that one was always his biggest seller. Sometimes out of the blue, it would start hitting all the big lists again, especially after his death, which was why his wife was able to vacation in exotic, expensive locations for the entire summer. She met more men with money, even though she messed around with cabana men, and…rinse and repeat.
Even though Brando’s attention wasn’t on his wife, it was. He grabbed her hand, and she entangled their fingers. Every so often he would lift her hand to his lips, breathing her in, or kissing the top part of her head as he set the book down to flip the page. Sometimes she would do it for him, even though he hadn’t spoken a word to her.
Watching them gave me a thrill.
It was like watching a different version of Rocco and me.
I’d felt that about my husband too—like he had a separate section of himself where only I lived, and he could continue to keep his eyes on the world while keeping a sense on me. He would read and touch me like that too, and it almost felt like he was entranced by both.
For example, he was reading another one of my dad’s books while we lounged at the beach one day on the island. I was snacking on fresh seafood, and before a mean seagullcould attack me for my lunch, he hit it before it dive-bombed. However, he couldn’t do anything about the mess it left on my head in retaliation after, except wash it out of my hair. He told me it was good luck and that he was proud of me. I wasn’t running around shrieking or gagging.
All I could do was close my eyes, side fanning my face in punctuated motions, and say, “Thiseffingstinks.” And I didn’t have a weak stomach. I was a risky eater, as my friend Thandie had always called me, and not much usually bothered me. Except…that seagull had just eaten a big meal full of fish. It was slimy and it stunk.
Scarlett smiled at me, bringing me out of the memory. “Are you missing any foods from home?”
That was an odd conversation starter, but maybe she was just hungry? I told her I missed the hamburgers and baked potatoes from a local hamburger place, and she said she loved the food there too. One thing led to another, and even after Rocco took his seat, taking my hand again, she and I went on about the house her parents owned in the French Quarter, my Nonna, and again, food. A time or two I noticed Rocco and Brando’s eyes, how they would meet, and they would grin after.
I’d fallen in love with Scarlett the first time I’d ever met her. To a young girl, she was a spinning ballerina in a tinkling music box. She even smelled of roses. The only thing unnerving about her was her feline eyes. They were powerful enough to look straight through someone and hit bone.
Maybe they didn’t bother me as much as they should have because, one, I didn’t have anything underhanded to hide from her, and two, I had a guy tell me that once on a date, how unnerving my eyes were. I knew he had been lying to me about his “great” job as he waved a bunch of ones around, acting like it was much more. And if he was willing to lie about something so stupid,heknewIknew that he would be willing to lie aboutanything. It wasn’t my eyes that had truly unnerved him, but his own bullshit. I’d caught him in it.
Dismissing the liar, my mind went back to all the food talk. I was hungry, but I refused to ask the greedy-eyed stewardess for anything.
“By the time we’re all the way up,” I said, “we’re going to have to come down.”
“We will be up for a while.”
It wasn’t Scarlett who answered, but my husband.
“It takes that long to fly from Maranello to Tuscany?” I asked.
“No.” He fixed his suit. “It takesthatlong to fly from Italy to America.”
My face scrunched. “America?”
“Sì.”
“Where in America, specifically?” A weird feeling churned inside my gut. It was one like I’d never felt before. It was like I was feeling Rocco’s coldness, and it was starting to make the warmth in me anxious.
“New Orleans,” he said.
“Why?” I breathed. “I thought we were going home—to your place in Tuscany?” His place in Tuscany seemed special to him, and I couldn’t wait to see it. But…he’d flipped a switch, and we were heading in an entirely new direction.
Come to think of it…he had never said we were going to Tuscany after we left the island. He said we would be going to his place in Tuscany. I just assumed…
Staring at the hard profile of his face, I knew I had assumed wrong.
“To claim your things,” he said.
“We could have sent someone to claim my things.”
“These things are important to you.”
