I WANT TO ASK YOU something.”
“After what you just did? You can ask me anything.” I smiled into his chest, breathing in the scent of satisfied Marcello. We were cuddled in one of the chaise lounges, a pillow behind him, and him behind me. I nuzzled into his skin, the little bit of hair on his chest tickling my nose.
“How about what you just did, tesoro.” He groaned. “Your mouth . . .”
I kissed his mouth, which was just as wicked, then snuggled back into his side. “What did you want to ask me?”
He played with the ends of my hair, dragging it up and around and making little patterns on my bare back. “Do you have plans next weekend?”
“I do.”
“You do?”
“Sure,” I said primly. “Whatever you’ve got planned for me, I’m doing.”
“Avery,” he whispered into my hair, making each syllable count, just the way I loved. “I want you to come home with me.”
“I’m here right now.” I sighed, feeling dreamy and smiley and boneless.
“I mean my home. To Pienza.”
Not so boneless. “Where you grew up?”
“Mmm-hmm.”
“Where your family lives?”
“Mmm-hmm.” He kissed my shoulder. “There is a festival next weekend, the Gioco del Cacio al Fuso. Everyone comes into town for it every summer. It’s the one time other than Christmas that we all get together. I never miss it.”
“Sounds major,” I murmured, nibbling absently on my fingernail.
“Major? I do not take your meaning?”
I sat up, turning to face him. His eyes went immediately to my breasts, of course, but then tried to stay on my face.
“Come home with you, meet the family? Like, all the family?”
“Yes,” he said simply. Did he know that in the States, the meeting of the parents was a very big deal?
His face was glowing, and not just from the thing I did with my mouth. He looked . . . peaceful. Hopeful. Very content. And a little bit . . . excited.
He did know what a big deal this was, and he wanted to bring me home to Mamma. Was I ready for that?
“Yes.”
“IT’S HUGE.”
“Right? I mean, how do I? What do I?”
“Huge.”
“Stop saying that! It’s making me more nervous,” I said, pacing around the bedroom, rejecting outfit after outfit. “I should just go shopping.”
Daisy reclined on the bed. “Tell me exactly how he asked. The when, the where, the how.”
“I’m not sure if you want all of those details.”
“Yes. I do. I’m living vicariously through you and your magnificent life here in Rome.” Daisy tossed a lacy white sundress into the fray. “That is a must-have, by the way.”
I nodded, hanging it on the closet door with the others I was definitely packing. “This is a seriously amazing summer!” I gushed, spinning around like a teenager who’d just been asked to the prom.
“You kill it in foreign countries, girl!” She high-fived me, then sat near the window. “Okay, I’m ready. I want the details.”
I prepared to dish. “We were in bed. You know, afterward.”
“Uh-huh.” She leaned forward. “And?”
“And he asked what I was doing next weekend, and laid it out there. There’s a festival going on that all the family comes in town for every year. All of the family.” I raised my eyebrow. “I know how these Italians are. It’s not just 2.5 kids. It’s kids, extra plural. Then those kids’ kids, and grandkids and great grandkids and nieces and nephews and neighbors that are ‘family,’ and what am I going to do? I don’t know what to expect. He keeps telling me not to worry, that they’ll love me, but really?” I pointed a finger at myself. “Divorced, American, non-Catholic. Fornicator!” I threw myself onto the cardigans that were strewn across my bed.
When we first started scouring my closet earlier for appropriate “Meet the Family” wear, Daisy had pulled them all from my closet in a huff. She thought they should be tossed since they screamed Boston Avery.
Though Marcello did like the pearls.
With some heels.
And nothing else . . .
Regardless, the cardis and the pearls wouldn’t be coming with me to Pienza—I wanted to dress to impress. Please like me clothing to help me prove that I was head over heels for their son, brother, nephew, whatever.
“You’re crazy. This is a man who looks at you and makes you melt.” She stood to rummage through my closet. “Not to mention that whenever you look at him, he beams. I’ve known him a long time, and he doesn’t light up like that for anyone.”
He did get that hazy, glossed-over look in his eyes whenever he stared at me. Which was often. And when he did, I got the full-blown belly flutters. Those feelings were what I needed to focus on for this event. Not the nerves.
“It’s normal to be nervous about meeting the family, Avery,” Daisy consoled, pulling out a few more pieces from my closet. “Besides, he’s nervous, too—don’t let that suave Roman thing he’s got going fool you. Just remember: he’s bringing you there. That means something.”
Daniel’s family had been wary of me from the get-go. I couldn’t have been a more perfect match for their son, yet Bitsy was always standoffish. I was never able to win her over.
“I can see in your face that you’re freaking out again,” she said, pulling me up from my bed and setting her hands on my shoulders. “Snap out of it.”
“I know, I know,” I said, hugging her. “I need something else to focus on, or it’s going to drive me insane.”
“Let’s take a quick shopping trip before we get Fiona from the airport,” Daisy suggested, eyeing the white sundress again.
“What?”
“I’m thinking if we get you more of these,” she said, touching the delicate lace of the bodice, “Mamma, Papa, and Marcello will all be declaring their love for you next weekend.”
“HOW THE HELL HAS IT been so long since we’ve all been together?” I asked, looking across the table and seeing Daisy and Fiona.
“Because you’ve had a stick in your ass and never wanted to leave Boston?” Fiona chirped, stealing a glance at Daisy, who nodded her head vigorously.
“Oh. Right,” I said, sipping my Campari and soda. “That.”
“And the fact that we’re never in the same place at the same time,” Daisy added, waving the waiter over and ordering another round of drinks.
“There’s also that,” Fiona agreed, leaning across the table toward me, resting her chin in her hands. “I was kidding about the stick in your ass. Mostly.”
“Your Botox looks really good, I can barely notice it.” I smiled prettily at her as she cracked up.
“Good goddamn have I missed you, Bardot!” She pointed at Daisy. “Not this one, though, this one I see too often.”
“You see me maybe three times a year,” Daisy replied, shaking her head.
“That’s too often,” Fiona said, as Daisy mouthed it. The three of us had pledged the same sorority freshman year at Boston College, and became instantly joined at the hip. Fiona was a different sort of gal, and without being a legacy in the sorority (two older sisters, her mother, and her grandmother, not to mention her cousin, who was president when we were rushing), she likely would have become just a face in the crowd. Independent, free spirited, extremely political, she was brash and loud and we loved it.
There was something about the three of us that clicked, and we’d remained fast friends throughout the years. Though I was in more regular contact with Daisy, Fiona was one of those friends you didn’t have to talk to very often, didn’t need to check in with more than a few times a year . . . but you knew she’d drop everything and be there the second you needed anything.
“Speaking of three times a year, I heard Daniel’s putting it to his secretary instead of you; what the hell is up with that?”
“Dear God,” I moaned, apologizing to the people at the nearby table who’d suddenly become way more interested in our conversation than their own. “Also, Daisy? I could kill you.”
“What, you think I wouldn’t find out on my own? My mother told me all about it; you’re the talk of the needlepoint circuit, kiddo,” Fiona responded, crunching a breadstick between her teeth. “And for the record, I’m glad you dumped his sorry ass. Daniel was too pretty. You just know that guy wasn’t ever going to be up for some serious fucking.”
“Dear. God,” I said again, this time a bit more quietly. I reached for my glass. An afternoon with Fiona was like a crash course in all things obvious. She called it like she saw it, never held anything back, and at times offered information that no one had even asked for. “For the record, he was up for some serious fucking. I saw him doing it, just not to me.”
“Just be glad you’re getting out while you’ve still got all those great sex years ahead,” she said, nodding wisely. “You should never waste good sex years with a weenie. And no offense, but Daniel is a weenie.”
“Agreed, now can we change the subject?” I begged. “Where are you off to now?”
Lately everyone I knew was coming back from or running off to a grand adventure, and Fiona was no exception. She actually got paid to go on grand adventures. A field producer for the Travel Channel, she literally went around the world and back to seek out and uncover the most interesting places in the world . . . and then make her television audience want to book a trip immediately. She spent more than nine months on the road each year, was rarely home, and gladly suffered an extreme case of wanderlust.
She was a road warrior, and she wouldn’t have it any other way.
“I’m off to Ireland, a little place called Dingle, can you imagine? I can’t tell you how many bad jokes I’m already writing in my head about a place called Dingle. I was just location scouting down in Sicily, so I had to stop by and see my girl here, and how great that you’re here, too!”
“How long are you in town?” Daisy asked.
“Leaving tonight, can you believe it?”
“What?” I sputtered. “You just got here!”
“I know, I know, but Dingle is calling. I’ll try and get back here in a few months, or will you be back in Boston by then, Miss Thing?” She looked at me expectantly, no doubt thinking I’d be back home any day now.
Daisy also looked at me, full of the same questions.
“A few months, huh?” I shrugged my shoulders. “I’ll still be here.”
Fiona thumped her fist on the table. “Fuck yes!”
“Dear God,” I said, slinking down in my seat.
“Do you think they sing ‘Dingle Bells’ at Christmas?” Daisy asked.