‘Yes.’ Alessandro took a sip of water and cleared his throat. ‘That was always his plan, from when you were a baby.’
‘How . . . uh, do you feel about it?’ Matthew was genuinely curious, but didn’t know how much his father would divulge.
After a pensive pause, which included a long stare somewhere off-screen, Alessandro said, ‘I made my peace with it over the years. It hasn’t been easy being second-best, if I’m completely honest, Matthew.’
‘Why do you say that?’
‘I know you loved Nonno very much, Matthew, but he was a very different father to me, compared to the nonno he was to you.’
Matthew wasn’t in the headspace to hear negative talk about his grandfather, and his jaw tensed. ‘I know you had a strained relationship—’
Alessandro scoffed. ‘Strained relationship? For it to have been anything, it first needed to be a relationship, Matthew. Nonno and I were never particularly close. And when we were, we always butted heads.’
‘Cut from the same cloth, some would say,’ Matthew interjected.
‘Whatever you want to call it.’ He drew in a breath. ‘Nonno tried to right the wrongs in his parenting of me through you. You allowed him a sort of redemption.’
‘God, I hate when you say it like that.’
‘It’s true, though. He was a better father figure to you than he ever was to me.’
And before Matthew could filter his words, before his brain could stop him, his heart asked the question it had held for so long: ‘So, why didn’t you learn from that experience and try to be a better father to me?’
Alessandro appeared wounded on the screen. His eyes had widened and his spine straightened. ‘I did the best I could with the time I had, Matthew.’ His defensive tone was a warning, one which Matthew chose to ignore.
‘Dad, you were hardly ever around when I was growing up. Mum, a little more so. But I had to do a lot of growing up on my own.’
‘Matthew—’
‘No, let me get this out. Please, Dad.’ The tips of his fingers had come to his temples, and his elbows found the table top. ‘All I ever wanted, or needed, was your time. I needed you.’
‘You’re making it sound like I was an absent father.’
‘Dad, youwere.’ His legs felt heavy and his chest tightened. ‘I spent more time with Nonno growing up than I ever did with you.’
‘He kept taking you to Florence, Matthew, for months at a time. What was I supposed to do?’
‘Say no? Or come with us? Or step up and take me somewhere else instead yourself?’
‘You’re oversimplifying this, Matthew.’ Alessandro’s voice suddenly raised, and came through the computer much louder than Matthew could’ve ever expected. ‘You have no idea what it’s like to be a father, because you’ve never been one!’
Matthew’s eyes snapped shut, and he knew he wouldn’t be able to get through to his father. Exhaling an emotional sigh, he said, ‘I don’t know if I will ever be a father, Dad. I can’t predict what life has planned for me. But I’ve learned from both father figures in my life; I know the father I would like to be, and the father I hope never to turn into.’
Alessandro sat back in his chair, exhausted by the decades of to-ing and fro-ing. ‘I’m glad.’ Matthew couldn’t tell if his father was being disingenuous, but compartmentalised the doubt for a moment. ‘You can right the wrongs on behalf ofallthe D’Adamo men who have come before you. Intergenerational trauma. Ask your mother about it.’
‘Don’t think I’m not aware, Dad, that if I were born a girl, at a certain point, it would’ve beenyoustanding to inherit the D’Adamo estate. I can’t help that.’
‘Perhaps then our lives would have been different, with both our respective fathers.’
‘Will it always be like this for us, Dad?’
Alessandro’s chest rose and his eyes hit his leather-topped desk. ‘I hope not.’ Eventually he mustered enough courage to return his son’s eye contact. ‘So, is this why you wanted to speak with me? To berate me about my parenting?’
Matthew’s eyes welled. ‘No, Dad, that’s not why I wanted to speak with you.’ He ran his hands over his face, and squinted through the tension which prickled his shoulders. ‘We close our doors next week. We have three months to ourselves, and then we face the music at the start of March. I’m not sure how to play the next stage of all this. If I receive the inheritance. If we’re successful.’
‘Ifwe’resuccessful?’
He swallowed. ‘Sarah and me.’
