by Jennie Lucas
So this was where her mother had found her inspiration for her disparate collection.
‘If you would excuse me,’ Luca said, ‘I have to talk with my cousin. Would you mind waiting here for a few minutes? The glassmakers are about to put on a show. You might enjoy it.’
She raised her eyebrows. They did a show? Bring it on, she thought cynically, but still she welcomed this brief respite from Luca’s presence. She welcomed the chance to breathe in air not tainted by the scent of him in space he didn’t own. So she let herself be led to a small stand of tiered seating where a couple of other family groups were already seated, ready and waiting. There was space in the front row still, and she sat down and almost immediately wished she hadn’t.
A toddler was sitting on the floor to her side, his mother nursing an infant behind him, his father on the other side. The child looked up at Tina as she sat down, all huge eyed, mouth gaping, clearly wondering who she was to be invading their space.
He would be about the right age, she reasoned with a sizzle of recognition, feeling her stomach churn. Their son would have been about the same age as this child.
She looked away, thought about leaving, her palms suddenly damp with sweat before his big dark eyes drew her back like a magnet.
Dark eyes. Long lashes.
She had seen her baby’s eyes open, and they had been dark too, like this child’s. Like his father’s.
The boy looked up at his mother, who was still busy tending the baby, before he looked back at her, blinking.
She smiled thinly, trying to will away the churning feeling in her gut, trying not to hurt herself more by thinking about their son growing up. But it was impossible.
She’d read the books, even before he was born. He would be two now. Full of life. Inquisitive. Driven to explore his new world. Sometimes challenging.
This child was no doubt all of those things and more. He was beautiful as he looked at her, his expression filled with question marks, and so distracted that the toy bear in his hands slipped from his grasp to the floor.
Without thinking, she reached down and scooped it up and for a moment, when he realised, he was all at war, mouth open with brimming outrage, little arms pumping fisted hands.
Until she handed back the toy and he looked almost shocked, before his face lit up with a smile as he clutched the teddy to his chest and squeezed it for all it was worth.
And that smile almost broke her heart.
Somehow she managed a tentative smile back, before she had to wrench her eyes away from the child who reminded her of too much, from the child who was not hers.
From the ache in her womb that would never let her forget.
Tears pricked her eyes as she looked plaintively up at the high ceiling, to where the gaudily coloured chandeliers hung bold and totally shameless, mocking her, and she wished to hell she’d never come.
A collective gasp from the crowd and she turned to see one of the workmen wielding a rod tipped with molten glass dancing at its end. White-hot and fringed with red it glowed, fresh from the fire, stretching down long in its melted state before the artisan used a blunt implement and smacked it short.
The blob seemingly complied, buckling under the commands of a stronger force, melting back into itself.
From then on it was a dance of heat and fire and air, the sand turned molten glass, the rod spun and spun again over rails of steel, cooling the liquid magma until it was cool enough to be tweaked, a tweezer here and there to tug upon the glass and pull a piece outwards, a prod there to push it in, seemingly random.
She watched, but only half-heartedly, determined not to be impressed, finding a welcome distraction when she noticed the craftsman was wearing nothing on his feet. Molten glass and bare feet, she thought with horror, but happy to think of anything that would provide a distraction from the child alongside her, watching now from his father’s knees in open-mouthed fascination.
She clasped her hands together tightly on her empty knees.
And then, as she watched, the bare-footed artisan’s purpose became clear. A leg, she realised. Two legs, fine and slender. A roundness and then two more legs, with a twist to make a neck before the tweaking continued, the artist’s movements now almost frenetic, working the glass before it cooled too much and set before he was finished.
She gasped when she realised. A prancing horse had emerged from the glass, with flowing mane and tail, and mouth open to the air, alive.
With a snap it was free, set down on a table where it stood balanced on its back legs and tail, front hooves proudly held high in the air.
She applauded louder than anyone and, when the glass had cooled, the artisan presented it to her.
‘For the beautiful signorina,’ he said with a bow, and she held the creation still warm in her hands, blinking away tears she hadn’t realised she’d shed.
‘It’s magical,’ she said, turning it in her hands, marvelling at the detail—the tiny eyes, the shaped hooves—the glass glinting in the light. ‘You are a true artist.’
He bowed and moved away, back to the kiln for his next work of art.
She turned to the family alongside, who were all watching with admiration and held it out to the mother. ‘You take it, please,’ she said to the startled woman, pressing it into her hand. ‘For your son, as a memento of this day.’ For the tiny child who could never receive her gift.
The woman smiled and thanked her, the husband beamed and the little boy just blinked up at her with those beautiful dark eyes.
She couldn’t stay. She fled. She strode away, feigning interest in a cabinet filled with numbered jars of coloured sand, with curled samples of glass hanging from a board, her back to the family, arms wound tight around her belly, trying to quell the pain. Trying not to cry.
‘Did you enjoy the demonstration?’ she heard Matteo ask. ‘Did you like your souvenir?’
She had to take a deep breath before she could turn and face anyone, let alone them. She plastered a smile on her face that she hoped looked halfway to convincing.
‘She gave it to the boy,’ called the artist before she could say anything, gesturing with a grin towards the family, who were all still gathered around admiring it.
Luca laughed and slapped his cousin on the back. ‘I told you she doesn’t like glass.’
His cousin shrugged as a woman came running from another room, a large bunch of flowers in her arms that Matteo took from her, thanking her for remembering.
‘Thank you for delivering these,’ he said, handing Luca the flowers. ‘Tell her I will come and see her soon.’
They left then, Matteo kissing her cheeks again as he bade them farewell, before the boat set off, the flowers lying inside on one of the long loungers.
‘Who are they for?’ she asked, curious, when Luca hadn’t spoken for a while.
He looked straight ahead, his jaw grimly set. ‘Matteo’s mother. It’s her birthday today but he has to take his daughter to the hospital for an appointment. He won’t have time to visit her.’
‘Where does she live?’
‘There,’ he said, pointing to a walled island she belatedly realised they were heading towards.
She shuddered. ‘But surely that’s...’
‘Yes,’ he said grimly. ‘Isola di San Michele. The Isle of the Dead.’
CHAPTER TEN
THE brick walls loomed larger the closer they got, dark walls with white detail in which was set a Gothic gateway framing three iron gates.
Behind the walls the heavy green stands of cypress and pine did nothing to dispel the sense of gloom and foreboding.
She shivered.
‘You must have been here before,’ he said as the boat pulled alongside the landing.
She shook her head. ‘No. Never.’
He frown
ed. ‘I remember now. You didn’t come to Eduardo’s funeral.’
She sensed the note of accusation in his voice. ‘I didn’t make it in time. My flight had engine trouble and was turned back to Sydney. By the time I arrived, the funeral had already been held and Lily was barely holding herself together. There was no chance to pay my respects.’
He studied her, as if trying to assess if she was speaking the truth. Then he nodded. ‘So you can pay your respects now, if you wish. Or you can stay with the boat if you prefer. Some people are not fond of cemeteries.’
‘No,’ she said, thinking nothing could be more forbidding than those imposing gates. Nothing could be worse than waiting to the accompaniment of the endless slap of water against the boat. ‘I want to come, if you don’t mind. I liked Eduardo. I’d like to pay my respects.’
Once again he paused, as if testing her words against what he knew of her. Then he gave a careless shrug. ‘Your choice.’
Inside the imposing walls she was surprised to find the gloom fall away, replaced by a serenity that came with being in a well-tended garden. The sounds of motors and the chug of passing vaporettos seemed not to permeate the thick walls. Only birdsong and the crunch of gravel underfoot punctuated the silence. Here and there people tended graves, or just sat under the shade of the cypress trees in quiet reflection.
Luca led the way, past rows of neat graves adorned with marble cherubs and angels and freshly cut flowers. Everywhere she looked seemed to be bursting with the colour of fresh flowers.
He carried the bunch in his arms almost reverently. Flowers might soften a man, she thought, but not Luca. They only served to accentuate his overwhelming masculinity. Big hands, she thought, and yet so tender, the way they cradled the flowers.
Like he might cradle a child.
What would have happened had their child lived? If he had not been born too prematurely to be saved? Luca would not have welcomed the news that their one night of passion had ended with more than a face slap and that he was a father, but would he have wanted to meet his child? Would he have cradled him in those big hands as gently as he cradled those flowers and smiled down at him? Could he have loved him?
She dragged in air, shaking her head to escape the thoughts. There was no point in thinking what-ifs. Nothing to be gained but pain layered on pain.
Through different garden rooms they walked, and around them the closely packed lines of graves went on.
‘It’s quite beautiful,’ she said softly, so as not to interrupt the pervasive sense of calm. ‘So peaceful and well maintained. More like a garden than a cemetery.’
‘Their families look after the graves,’ he said, turning down a side path. ‘They are all recently deceased. Space is limited, they can only stay here a few years before they are moved on.’
She remembered reading something of the sort. Probably around the time Eduardo had died. It seemed strange in one way, to disturb the dead and move their remains, but then again, who wouldn’t want a chance to rest, at least a while, in such a beautiful setting, with the view of Venice just over the sea through the large iron gates?
‘Matteo’s mother died recently then?’
‘Yes, two years ago, although space is not an issue for my family,’ he continued, leading her towards a collection of small neoclassical buildings. ‘The Barbarigo family has had a crypt here since Napoleonic times when the cemetery was created.’
Of marble the colour of pristine white sheep’s wool, the crypt stood amongst others, but apart, more the size of a tiny chapel, she felt, no doubt demonstrating the power and wealth of his family through the centuries. Two praying angels, serene and unblinking, overlooked the gated entry, as if watching over those in their care, guarding who went in and who came out. Tiny pencil pines grew either side of the door, softening the look of the solid stone.
She took the flowers for him while he found the key and turned the lock. The door creaked open and cool air rushed out to meet them. He lit a candle either side of the door that flickered and spun golden light into the dark interior and took the flowers from her. And then he bowed his head for a moment before stepping inside.
She waited outside while he said some words in Italian, low and fast, she heard Matteo’s name and she knew he was talking to his mother, passing on his cousin’s message.
So true to his word.
So honourable.
So...unexpected.
She didn’t want to hear any more. She breathed in deep and moved away, faintly disturbed that it should bother her.
It was peaceful and quiet in the gardens, dappled sunlight filtering through the trees, leaves whispering on the light breeze—so serene and unpopulated when compared to the crowded Centro, and she thought what an amazing place Venice was, to have so many unexpected facets, so many hidden treasures in such a tiny area.
She found another treasure amongst the trees—a gravestone she’d happened upon with a sculpture of a child climbing a stairway to heaven, fresh flowers tied onto his hand, an offering to the angel smiling down on him, waiting patiently for him at the top. She knelt down and touched the cool stone, feeling tears welling in her eyes for yet another lost child.
‘Would you like to pay your respects now?’
She blinked and turned, wiping a stray tear from her cheek, avoiding the questions in his eyes. ‘Of course.’
She followed him into the tiny room, the walls filled with plaques and prayers to those buried here over the years.
‘So many,’ she said, struck by the number of name plates. Flowers adorned a stone on one side—Matteo’s mother, she reasoned.
‘Eduardo is here,’ he said, pointing to a stone on the other wall. ‘His first wife, Agnetha, alongside.’
She moved closer in the tiny space, Luca using up so much of it, and wishing she had stopped to buy a posy of flowers to leave in the holder attached to the stone.
‘I’ll leave you to it,’ he said, and moved to go past her. She stepped closer to the wall to let him, and it was then she noticed the names on the wall alongside. ‘Your grandparents?’ she asked and he stopped.
‘My parents,’ he said, stony-faced, pointing to a spot lower down on the wall. ‘My grandparents are in the row below.’
He turned and left her standing there watching his retreating back. His parents? She looked again at the plaques, saw the dates and realised they’d died on the same day as each other nearly thirty years before.
Luca must have been no more than a few years old...
He was cold and distant when she emerged a few minutes later, his sunglasses firmly on, hiding his eyes. ‘Ready to go?’ he said, already shutting the door behind her, key to the lock.
‘Luca,’ she said, putting a hand to his arm, feeling his corded strength beneath the fine fabric of his shirt. ‘I’m sorry, I had no idea that you’d lost both your parents.’
‘It’s not your fault,’ he snapped.
‘But you must have been so young. I feel your grief.’
He pulled his arm away. ‘You feel my what? What do you know of my grief?’
The pain of loss sliced through her, sharp and deep as he walked away. ‘I know loss. I know how it feels to lose someone you love.’
More than you will ever know.
‘Good for you,’ he said, and headed back towards the boat.
* * *
She found a box waiting for her on their return, on the table next to the bed. ‘What’s this?’ she asked. ‘I didn’t order anything.’
‘Open it up and find out,’ he snapped, before disappearing into the bathroom, the first words he’d spoken since the cemetery. His silence hadn’t bothered her during the journey home. Instead she’d welcomed it. It restored him to the role of villain. It balanced any glimpse of tenderness he might have shown—the reverent way he’d carried the flowers f
or his aunt—the quiet respect he’d shown when he’d entered the crypt.
It helped her forget how good he could make her feel in those moments where she could put aside thoughts that this was all a pretence, all a hoax.
And she didn’t need to find things to like about him. She liked him being cold and hard and unapproachable and totally unforgivable.
It was better that way, she reasoned, as she tackled the box, looking for a way in.
Easier.
Necessary.
She found the end of one tape, ripping it from the seam of the box. Found another and swiped it off, opening a flap and then another layer of packing.
No!
Luca returned, his tie removed, his shirt half unbuttoned, exposing a glimpse of perfect chest. She tried not to look and failed miserably as he kicked off his shoes. And then she remembered the box.
‘Where did this come from?’
He shrugged, and pulled his shirt off over his shoulders. ‘You needed a new computer.’
‘My computer is fine!’
‘Your computer is a dinosaur.’
‘You’re a dinosaur!’
He paused, halfway to tugging off his trousers, and in spite of herself, she couldn’t help but feel a primitive surge of lust sweep through her as she considered all the reasons he might be undressing, her mind lingering longingly on one particular reason... ‘And there was me thinking you considered me a caveman.’
‘Dinosaur. Caveman,’ she said, trying not to notice the bulge in his underwear, trying to hide the faltering sound of her voice, ‘It’s all the same to me. All prehistoric.’
‘Surely not the same,’ he said with a careless shrug of his shoulders that showed off the skin over the toned muscle of his chest to perfection as he turned towards her. ‘I would have thought a dinosaur would be lumbering and slow, and awkward of movement. Whereas a caveman could have more fun, don’t you think, clubbing women over the head to drag them back to his cave to have his wicked way with them.’