“Do you want to sit?” Bernardo asked Francesca, but she shook her head, saying it’d be better to remain standing in case Bianca and Matteo joined us.
“I invited Teo to come, too,” she said, looking at me.
“He’s in town?”
“I know,” she said. “I was surprised.”
The procession began, and the three of us watched as the clergy and the portatori plodded past, carrying crucifixes, thuribles of incense, and at least a half-dozen banners bearing Mary Magdalene’s likeness. When the statue of Mary Magdalene floated past us, I was pleased to see she had long red hair not unlike my own. She held a jar of ointment, as was custom, and someone had rigged up battery-powered fluorescent lighting behind her so that she appeared to glow.
As she was carried up the church steps, the crowd filled in behind her, and a bell rang. The parish priest, Father Guglielmo, indicated that all should rise, and everyone made the sign of the cross, as they would have at the Church of the Nativity back at home. “Preghiamo,” said Father Guglielmo, and I knew without having to ask Francesca that he had saidLet us pray.
Teo arrived in the middle of the gospel reading. He didn’t say a word, just took his place next to me. Immediately, I felt more alert, as if someone had run their fingernails along my arm.
We watched as eight or nine women carried baskets of bread and wine, part of the presentation of gifts, up the steps and laid them in front of the altar. Father Guglielmo said the Eucharistic Prayer, and then everyone recited the Lord’s Prayer, which sounded so much prettier in Italian. “La pace sia con te,” said Father Guglielmo, and the crowd said, “E con il tuo spirito.”
The sign of peace was awkward because the islanders apparently preferred a kiss over the handshake I’d grown up with. Francesca turned to kiss Bernardo, which left me with no one to kiss but Teo. We leaned in, both of us a little apprehensive to make the first move, but it was fine. His lips landed on the corner of my mouth, and the kiss was so light I barely feltit. “Pace,” he whispered into my ear, and I repeated the word back to him, although I couldn’t look him in the eyes while I said it.
When it was time to receive communion, not one of us moved. “You won’t take communion?” I asked Teo, and he shook his head.
Francesca whispered, “Italian men don’t like taking communion because it’s like publicly admitting that they haven’t been with a woman since their last confession.”
“Oh,” I said, surprised and slightly mortified.
“Much better,” said Francesca, “to remain back here and let everyone think you just came from a beautiful girl’s bed.”
Had Teo just come from a beautiful girl’s bed? I hadn’t considered the fact that Teo might have a girlfriend, but now that Francesca had planted the idea in my head, I found I couldn’t stop thinking about it. Teo hadn’t talked about anyone, and neither had Francesca, although I reasoned that, as his aunt, she might be the last to know whom he was or wasn’t seeing.
76.
AFTER THE MASS WAS OVERand the sky had turned an inky black, the procession reversed itself, and we stood by as Mary Magdalene, the portatori, the clergy, and a man carrying a portable PA system filed past us. “Where are they going?” I asked Francesca, and she nodded in the direction of the harbor.
“Cala Gavetta,” she said. “Come on.”
We followed Mary Magdalene and her entourage to the waterfront, and as we walked, we listened to the prayers chanted by the clergy over the loudspeakers. They were doing some sort of call-and-response that involved everyone in the crowd saying Mary Magdalene’s name again and again.Santa Maria Maddalena, Santa Maria Maddalena, Santa Maria Maddalena.Teo and I joined in, but when I looked around for Francesca and Bernardo, I realized we’d lost them.
Cala Gavetta was packed, so we had no hope of finding them there, but I was so distracted it didn’t make a difference. All the sailboats and even some of the fishing boats had been decorated with twinkling lights, and the orbs of color dotting the water reminded me of bioluminescent jellyfish. I regretted not bringing my camera, even though I knew that any photos I took were unlikely to turn out in such low light.
We watched as Mary Magdalene was carried onto the largest sailboat and set down on the deck, facing the open sea. The chanting grew louder, and when the boat bearing Mary Magdalene set sail, everyone went nuts—shouting and clapping and talking excitedly among themselves.
“They’re going to follow it,” said Teo, nodding at the other boats. Sure enough, the rest of the boats fell into formation, and together they made for the channel.
The flotilla was easy to see, even in the dark, because of all the twinkling lights, but nothing shone brighter than Mary Magdalene, whose fluorescent frame glowed like a bright white orb. The experience of watchingit disappear into the night wasn’t religious, exactly, but it did feel oddly spiritual.
When she was gone, Teo and I turned to face each other, unsure how to proceed. For the last half hour or so, we’d had something to focus on. Now it was just us.
“Do you want to get a drink?” he asked, but when I hesitated, he course-corrected: “Or a gelato?”
“A gelato would be good,” I said, and we wandered in the direction of Piazza Comando, where there was a popular gelateria that always had a long line on summer nights.
“I read your article. About theMirfield,” I told him as we walked.
“You did?”
“With a dictionary. And a little assistance from Francesca.”
He smiled.
“Okay, a lot of assistance from her.”
