“So you were there and all you did was cook?” asked Kayla incredulously that night at dinner. They were at the Japanese restaurant near Amalia’s house, where they sought refuge from time to time. The place was nice but still not very well known, so they were in no danger of bumping into any of the usual crowd.
“I’d like to point out that we actually managed to prepare food without stabbing each other. Don’t I deserve a medal for not having stuck a knife in that withered, dried up little heart of his?” asked Amalia, holding up a succulent piece of seared tuna. “I did cut myself, it’s true, but I did it all by myself. Mea culpa.”
“You know, I actually spent all morning on tenterhooks thinking I was going to get a phone call telling me that you’d done something awful,” said Kayla, almost seriously. “I mean, after our last little chat I was rather concerned…”
“What do you mean?” asked Amalia, pretending not to understand her.
“Don’t try to fool me, my dear girl. The pair of you are both deceiving yourselves if you think you’ve turned over a new leaf and that you’ve changed or some other crap like that. As far as I can see, the situation is still right there on the table, exactly where you left it years ago. Not that I can’t see the guy is spectacular – I mean, god! I’d have him for breakfast, lunch and dinner. To be honest, for him I’d even break the rules and have snacks, and you know I never do that.”
Amalia preferred not to deny what Kayla was saying, it would be too hypocritical. “You know what the worst thing of all is? I think he likes me. Physically, I mean. So in part, you were right.”
Kayla was fiddling with a particularly large piece of salmon. “Of course he likes you. Is there any man who doesn’t like you?” she asked sarcastically. “You are, it goes without saying, a very beautiful woman. And I’m sure Ryan O’Moore has good eyesight…”
“But he doesn’t want to like me,” said Amalia, sadly.
“What can you do – men are creatures trapped in a primordial state of emotional evolution,” complained Kayla, who was never particularly kind when it came to the male sex. “He likes you, but you’re more successful and you have more money than him, so he tries to convince himself that he doesn’t like you.”
“When did you get so wise? Anyway, it’s true about the money being some kind of weird big problem for him.”
Her friend smiled. “Don’t you think there’s a certain amount of irony in all of this? I mean, they brought you up teaching you to keep all those who are penniless and interested in you only for your money at arm’s length, and then it turns out that a man you actually do care about doesn’t dare to get close to you for exactly the same reason.”
“I don’t care about him…” Amalia began, stopping when she saw Kayla arch a solitary eyebrow. “Anyway, it’s not just a question of money,” she continued. “There are millions of reasons. Can you imagine my family welcoming a Catholic with open arms – and Irish to boot?”
“A last minute conversion is out of the question, I suppose?” Kayla suggested optimistically.
Amalia looked at her seriously. “Yes, I think we can count that out. For both of us,” she said categorically.
Kayla leaned forward. “You know what makes me so angry about this whole story? I’m sure that deep down neither of you really gives a hoot about religion. No offence, but your family isn’t exactly a model of religious devotion, and I am pretty sure that Mr District Attorney doesn’t rush off to mass on Sunday mornings. So why make it such a big issue, when it isn’t a problem for either of you?”
Not that Kayla wasn’t right, but there were other problems too.
“There is some truth in what you say, but there are other things to be considered too: the fact of belonging to a certain group of people makes us what we are. Maybe my family isn’t a good example… But how can you be with someone that’s so different from you?”
“Easy, all you need to do is celebrate all the different faiths: Jewish, Catholic, Protestant and even Buddhist. You know I’m always up for a good party!” said Kayla, winking at her.
“Stop trying to turn everything into a joke!” moaned Amalia. “There are differences that are just too big to overcome. Anyway, I don’t even know why we’re talking about it at all – Ryan would rather cut off his own arm than go out with me, and that isn’t an exaggeration…”
“You know that you could get him on side if you actually wanted to.”
Amalia looked at her in disbelief. “Err, I don’t think I could, Kayla – if you want to seduce someone you have to at least go out with them first.”
“Not necessarily,” Kayla replied immediately. “You two are forced to be together during those hours of community service. So use them to your advantage.”
“But I don’t want to seduce anyone!” Amalia tried to tell her. Without success.
“Not even just to see if you could? You didn’t use to be the kind of person who ran away from certain challenges. I mean, you’ve liked this guy for a long time – and you do like him, don’t try to deny it. After all, even if you don’t want to admit it, you ask yourself how that could be possible, and since the gentleman is likely to be remaining in New York for quite a while, why don’t you take this damn doubt of yours and see what you can do with it? If it doesn’t work out? So much the better, onto the next one. But at least you’ll get it out of your system once and for all. I don’t know if you’ve realized, but you haven’t even looked at another guy since Ryan re-appeared on the scene,” concluded Kayla.
Amalia grew thoughtful. “I hate it when you’re right, you know that don’t you?”
Her friend smiled innocently. “You know that you love me really…”
*
He had almost forgotten how chaotic Sunday lunches at the O’Moore house could be when all the family were there.
“So Ryan, do you like your apartment in Brooklyn?” his mother asked him after they had all taken their seats around the large oval wooden table.
“Yeah, it’s not bad. Although I don’t really spend much time there. I’m usually stuck in the office until pretty late in the evening,” he had to confess. Well, she would have realized that anyway – his mother could read minds, he was convinced of it.
“Was it really necessary to go all the way to Brooklyn when you could have just stayed with us?” his father asked him.
Go back to living with his parents again? No way, he thought in dismay. He adored his parents but they were way too intrusive for him to be able to live comfortably with them. Even Niel had run away a few years earlier so as not to have them always breathing down his neck. Finn and Kieran were still there, but soon even the youngest member of the family would be taking flight. Despite being just twenty-eight, Finn was in fact officially engaged and would soon be getting married. Kieran, however, loved the easy life.
“I really like Brooklyn,” said Ryan, hoping not to have to talk about it for much longer. So far he had seen nothing of his new district. When he went out in the morning everything was still closed, and it was the same when he returned at night. With the exception, of course, of those weird little shops run by Koreans that are open all night.
“Anyway, how do you hope to meet a nice girl if you’re cooped up inside the office all the time?” his mother scolded. She had started picking out girls for him to date practically the moment he set foot back in New York.
“I’ve only just got back! I have a lot of work to do, and I can categorically exclude finding the time to devote myself to looking for a girl in the next few months,” he said, trying to cut the conversation short.
Across the table Niel chuckled allusively.
“Do you know something we don’t?” Finn, who had the nose of a bloodhound, asked him.
“I’m not allowed say anything,” he said, intriguing everyone sitting round the table. “At least, not without Ryan’s permission,” he added, choosing his words carefully so as to achieve the desired effect.
Mrs O’Moore instantly lit up like a Christmas tree.
“Don’t be stupid, of course Ryan gives you his permission! Come on, what do you know?”
Niel looked at his older brother with an exaggerated expression of pain, as if to say ‘see? they’re forcing me to do this, it’s not because I want to’.
“Ryan bumped into an old friend of his from university in a bar. A veeery cute one, if I may say so.”
Perfect, exactly what he needed, thought Ryan desolately, seeing hope dancing in his mother’s eyes.
“So, who is this friend, Ryan?” She asked quickly.
“Don’t listen to Niel, it was only Amalia Berger,” he said, trying to play down the situation. “It wasn’t the first time that I’ve seen her, I must have seen her a thousand times: she is a lawyer in a large Manhattan practice, so we often bump into each other.”
Literally, but he preferred not to add that to the conversation.
“Berger?” Asked his father.
This would at least dispel any speculation. “Exactly, Berger. Those Bergers, to be precise.”
A collective “Ooooohhh” rose from the table, followed by a minute of rare silence. All eyes were fixed on Ryan.
“Can we eat now?” He asked irritably.
“Shame, though,” said Niel. “I mean, apart from all the millions, she is really pretty.”
Yeah, a real shame, Ryan thought, but he feigned indifference and began to serve the potatoes.