“Anyway,” he says, “I’m pretty sure this is one of our guys. Do you want me to just, like, show you, or…?”
“Yes! Show!” I say, circling a finger for him to flip the screen around.
West does as directed and hits a button to turn the brightness up so I can see it despite my Shame Shades.
“T.C. from your mom’s journal, a.k.a. Anthony Campbell from Dr. Constantini’s list,” West explains, “a.k.a. Neapolitan chef and pizzeria owner Tony Campbell-Costa.”
My stomach flips with excitement at what feels like another huge step toward knowing my dad’s identity. It could also be some lingering limoncello roiling around in there. But my mind feels suddenly alert, clear, ready to absorb everything I can about the man pictured on his restaurant’s website, light brown hair peeking out from under a chef’s cap and a friendly, dimpled smile on his face that has aged well from when it was smushed alongside my mother’s in Polaroids twenty years ago. It’s so clear that it’s him, the T.C. from Mom’s journal.
“But how did he get from whatever he did with the university archaeological program to becoming a chef and owning a pizzeria? And Costa, is that a married name?”
West shrugs, giving me an encouraging smile. “Those sound like good questions for Tony Campbell-Costa when we meet him. Now, do you want the good news or the bad news?”
“Oh god,” I groan. I don’t like where this is going. “I don’t care. Both. Whatever order. Just quickly.”
West says, “The good news is his job is well-suited to tracking Tony down for a chat. The bad news”—he grimaces—“is the pizzeria isn’t open again until Tuesday.”
I blow out a relieved breath. “Okay, all things considered, I was expecting worse. That’s nothing.” I take another bite of toast while West eyes me dubiously. “And in bonus good news—I can go back to bed today.”
On Tuesday, West and I are both bright-eyed and bushy-tailed and back on a train to Naples.
We arrive at Antonio’s in plenty of time for its 11:00 a.m. opening. The pizzeria sits on a lovely street on the waterfront, which is mostly a pedestrian thoroughfare and clearly heavy with tourists. There are historic hotels side by side with their modern glass-and-chrome counterparts, most of the ground floors filled with restaurants that boast huge outdoor patios. Spaces that are already starting to fill with folks hoping to enjoy their midday meal with one of the best views in town.
West follows my lead as we approach the patio filled withumbrellas bearing the same Antonio’s logo from the website. At the hostess stand, a young woman tucks away stacks of menus and shoots an apologetic smile our way when she notices us.
“Sorry, we don’t open until eleven,” she says before immediately turning back to her work.
“Oh,” I say in my best polite-young-lady voice. “That’s fine. I just have a question when you have a second.”
She turns around again, face expectant, so I clasp my hands together atop the hostess stand and go on. “I’m wondering if Tony is around today. He’s an old friend of my family and I wanted to see about speaking with him.”
It’s unimpressive, as cover stories go. Fortunately, Tony’s not some important government official or celebrity with an intense security detail, and his hostess doesn’t seem to care about protecting his privacy from strange Americans.
“Sorry, Tony isn’t in this morning,” she says. “He’s teaching the workshop tonight.” My ears perk up at that. Even better than a surprise one-on-one ambush in which I have to fabricate some connection he has to my family.
“Oh, a workshop?” I ask, not trying to hide my excitement. The woman riffles around under her stand and pulls out a brochure that she hands to me.Scuola di Cucina con Antonio, the cover reads, straight out of Unit 1 on LingoLegend Italian.
“You can go to that website and see if there is still space available.”
With a sincere thank-you for her help, West and I turn back toward the boulevard.
“If Tony is my dad,” I tell him as I try to simultaneously walkin a straight line and type the tediously long link from the brochure into my phone’s browser, “I’m gonna have to help him bring his marketing materials into this decade. QR codes are your friend, bro.”
“Nah, I think Tony knows exactly what he’s doing,” West says. “QR codes have made us lazy. This way, only the students who are serious about learning to cook will make it to his website. They have to be willing to put in the effort.”
I roll my eyes. “Well, I guess I’m not a dedicated amateur cook, because in any other case, I would not be taking the time to type all this.”
I hit go and wait a moment while my phone thinks about taking me to the website, only for an error message to pop up, informing me that I don’t have internet service.
“Ugh,” I groan. “No service. It seems we have no choice but to find a gelateria with Wi-Fi.”
“And it’s rude to use their Wi-Fi without buying something,” West reasons.
Fortunately, these lovely little vendors of frozen heaven are on practically every block, and it doesn’t take us long to find one proudly touting its free, fast Wi-Fi. I grab a table while West goes to order his gelato. I’m planning to check out the workshop website and hopefully get us signed up before I have my own treat, but to my surprise, West returns with two cups in hand. One holds his favorite, pistachio, and the other is strawberry. I don’t even think I’ve told him this is my favorite, and I’m weirdly touched that he noticed.
“You didn’t have to do that,” I say a little sheepishly.
West’s shrug looks careless, but his self-conscious grin tells the real story. “You can get the next round. I have no doubt there’ll be one.”
