by Lynn Forth
‘Isn’t this wonderful?’ she breathed contentedly.
Jack looked around at a view he obviously took for granted, as if seeing it afresh through Jane’s eyes.
‘I suppose it is rather nice.’ He grinned.
She threw him a mock baleful glare just as the waiter arrived to clear the table. ‘Dessert menu, sir?’
‘Oh yes please,’ Jane said swiftly, as she saw Jack about to refuse.
‘Really?’ he asked, surprised. ‘I thought you were full?’
‘Well, I suppose I am, but I could always have a peek and see if anything tickled my fancy. ‘
He chortled as she scanned the menu, and ordered himself a coffee.
‘So, didn’t your mum or dad, ever stand up to your Nonna?’
Jane licked her spoon of every last vestige of Limoncello cheesecake.
‘For the sake of peace, Mum only fought her on the important things. If you remember, the character in the book, like my Nonna, can throw a wonderfully strategic and very dramatic illness if she’s thwarted.’ Jane clutched her chest dramatically and slumped back in her chair. ’Oh, my ‘art, my ‘art, you are trying to keell me.’
She stopped as a concerned waiter looked sharply across at their table. Smiling, she indicated she was really okay. He had obviously seen a lot of ‘actory’ stuff before, so just shrugged and turned back to the spluttering coffee machine.
Jack was smiling. ‘Yes, I remember. It was a great scene to adapt.’ But then, as if suddenly struck by a thought, he asked, ‘How does she feel about being in your book?’
Jane’s eyes sparkled as she remembered. ‘You may well ask. We were dreading her finding out. So, the last time she came on one of her imperial visitations, the whole family assembled to back me up and, after our evening meal, I apprehensively presented her with a signed copy. She had heard about it, of course, and fulsomely thanked me and assured me she would read it before she went to sleep.’
Jane could still picture the scene.
Milly had said, ‘We’ll know when she gets to one of her bits; it will be like…’
‘Vesuvius?’ offered Annie.
‘No, Krakatoa,’ countered Rosie.
‘Etna?’ volunteered Silvy.
‘Oh don’t,’ Jane had groaned.
The whole family had spent a sleepless night waiting for the eruption.
But a bleary-eyed gathering next morning had noticed no volcanic activity during the night, so waited on tenterhooks for the Contessa’s appearance.
Never an early riser, eventually Nonna glided serenely into view in full make-up and dressed in her best scarlet silk peignoir.
She blew ‘morning’ air kisses to the family as she affixed her ‘breakfast’ – a distinctive black Balkan Sobranie cigarillo – into her elegant cigarette holder.
Jane had been the first one to break the tension.
‘Buon giorno, Nonna. Er, did you like my book?’
‘Si, si, Arabella, cara, it was bene…molto bene. ‘
‘Really?’ Jane had been astonished.
‘Oh yes, carissima. Such a wonderful book.’
‘What did you think to the character of—’
Here, Jane’s father had shot her a warning look and interrupted swiftly. ‘Well, Lucrezia, as you know, the family are very proud of her. I think she has wonderful characterisation and dialogue, don’t you?’
‘But, of course, Roberto darling,’ the Contessa cooed, batting her eyelids furiously. Jane’s father was a good-looking man and, even though he was her son-in-law, Lucrezia was programmed to flirt outrageously with handsome men, young or old. ‘It was magnifico. She is a clever girl…so intelligent…just like you, Roberto caro. Si, the book is molto, molto bene.’
With that, she sailed out into the conservatory for her morning smoke, leaving behind a dumbstruck audience.
‘I don’t understand,’ her mother said, bewildered.
Jane sat down with a relieved thump. ‘She obviously doesn’t recognise herself.’
But her father was chortling with suppressed glee.
‘No. No. Don’t you realise? She won’t admit it, but she hasn’t bothered to read it. She hasn’t read it…and she never will. We’re safe.’
The kitchen vibrated with the roar of relieved hysterical laughter.
The Contessa, even if she heard the whoops of joy, just carried on smoking, impervious to anything outside her own little world.
There were tears of laughter rolling down her cheeks as Jane recounted the story to Jack.
He nodded, clearly enjoying the tale. ‘Of course, of course. That is totally believable, given her character.’ Was that a wistful look in his eyes at the thought of that large, joyous family gathering?
Somehow, having told him one story of her family, Jane found herself revealing more about her life than she had intended. Maybe it was the sun, the wine, or Jack’s deft questioning but, misty-eyed, she told him the story of how her parents met, fell instantly in love, and married within a month of meeting.
‘It was all so terribly romantic,’ she sighed.
Jack chuckled. ‘You sound so very English when you say that. As a romantic novelist, you are bound to have a starry-eyed view of love.’
Jane jumped in immediately, afraid that he would sneer at her parents’ story. ‘Yes, that is true, I suppose, but my mother and father really, really are the embodiment of love at first sight.’
To her surprise, Jack leaned forward as if genuinely eager to hear all about them. She searched his face for any signs of cynicism, but found none. Puzzling at all this interest in her family, Jane slowly sipped more of her wine before embarking on the tale of how her mother, Aurelia – a young, lonely student, escaping from her domineering mother – had left Italy to go on a language course in Cambridge. There, she had fallen instantly in deep love with Robert – an idealistic medical student who had just graduated and was going off to start his career in a primitive hospital in Africa.
‘Mum’s always been impetuous, but very certain of her emotions. She knew she had to decide there and then, because once she returned to Italy her mother would never let her out of her clutches again. She also couldn’t bear the thought of being parted for three years until he returned,’ Jane explained, ‘so she decided to go with him. It was a missionary hospital, and they wouldn’t allow her to accompany him unless they were married. So that’s what they did. Within four weeks of meeting!’
Even after all this time, Jane couldn’t keep the note of wonder out of her voice. ‘Can you imagine knowing so definitely at the age of nineteen that this was the man you wanted to be with for the rest of your life? But Mum was right. They’re still together, still in love even after over forty years and loads of children, and even more grandchildren.’
Jack shook his head, joining in with her incredulity.
‘You’re right. It sounds very romantic.’
‘But romantic doesn’t mean easy,’ Jane said firmly. She was keen to emphasise that her mum wasn’t a wishy-washy, storybook heroine who married and lived happily ever after. ‘As you can imagine, Nonna was horrified. Having seen at first-hand her rages when she doesn’t get her own way, I am amazed at Mum’s bravery in standing her ground.’ Jane shuddered, for a moment reliving some scenes of her Nonna’s legendary and very vicious temper. ‘Oh, and she wasn’t the only one to disapprove. Dad’s parents weren’t happy either.’
Over the years, Jane had gradually pieced together the difficult story behind the romantic one.
‘The reason Nonna was vehemently opposed to the marriage was because she had high hopes of her beautiful daughter enticing a wealthy suitor into an advantageous marriage, as she herself had done. Luckily, at that point, she was just divorcing husband number three. The only thing that stopped her flying to England in a fury to rescue her insufferably foolish daughter was that she was fully occupied in the delicate final stages of entrapping a rather rich widower into her bed and, of course, into marriage.
‘Obviously
,’ Jane continued with a wicked grin, ‘she could hardly confess to having a nineteen-year-old daughter when she herself was barely thirty-five.’
Jack nodded. He seemed to be hanging on her every word. ‘It sounds like the real-life person is as fascinating as the character on the page. But you say your father’s parents weren’t keen either?’
‘Oh, absolutely not. For totally opposite reasons. His mum was a Presbyterian Scot, and was scandalised by the fact that her rather serious only son would do anything so impulsive. She assumed he had been swept off his feet by a fortune-hunting strumpet – and a foreign one at that.’
Jane chuckled. ‘They were right, of course. He had been swept off his feet. But not by a strumpet. In fact, she was far richer than he was, so she definitely wasn’t marrying him for his money.’
Reflectively downing the last of her wine, Jane smiled. ‘I think they discovered this when they met her. And, from what I can make out, they too were beguiled by her lyrical use of broken English, her youth, her charm, her beauty, her very suitable background…and her absolute certainty that she had met the only man she would ever love.’
Jane remembered how her upright grandmother’s eyes softened whenever she talked of how they had given the marriage their blessing. And on the couple’s return from Africa three years later, with one toddler and another baby on the way, she had insisted the little family lived with them in Robert’s old home until he obtained a post in the local hospital.
As she thought of her parents, her family life all seemed so far away from the bright, brittle world of Hollywood that Jane had to stifle a moment of homesickness for the soft greens of the Yorkshire countryside. Still lost in her world, she turned to a rapt Jack and smiled shyly.
‘As you can see, Mum really believes in love at first sight. And all my sisters seem to follow the same pattern.’
Then she blushed, deeply embarrassed that she had revealed so much about her life and background to a man she barely knew.
‘But not you?’ Jack quizzed gently.
Jane’s heart thudded as she remembered her first sight of Jack’s tall, brooding form framed in the entrance to the security booth. She had instantly responded to his rugged good looks, and especially the way his saturnine face had lit up with a broad, engaging grin when he realised she was English.
She remembered hotly the instantaneous and overwhelming physical attraction that had swept through her.
But was it love? Love at first sight?
She doubted it.
Although she was enjoying the lunch and the bantering conversation, there was no way this sophisticated and cynical Hollywood player was going to get under her guard. Although he seemed to be a world away from the oily charms of Darren, Jack was good-looking, and that made him dangerous. He must be used to the admiration of women and flirty relationships. She suspected he had broken many a heart in the past – and hers was not going to be one of them.
But nevertheless, sitting there in the warm Californian sun, gazing at this man with his shrewd brown eyes, she knew she would have to deflect this line of questioning as it was becoming far too personal.
‘Oh, they all despair of me. All happily married, dozens of kids.’ Her face clouded for a moment. ‘Well, my youngest sister Milly has had a rocky time, but she’s got a lovely baby. But here am I, a grand old maid at twenty-seven.’
‘A happy old maid?’ Jack’s look was quizzical.
Jane looked at him sharply. Was that a smile of derision hovering round his lips?
Nettled, she replied, ‘Yes, damn it. Why shouldn’t I be? I have my independence, at last, and my novels. I’ve had a bit of success, so of course I’m happy.’ There was the omnipresent worry of her mountainous debts, but if Scott could only get someone to read her book, she was sure they would love it and, hey presto, she could be securely back into the black without anyone ever knowing. She fixed a smile to her lips. Was she protesting too much?
But no, she was happy…happy in her job. She had always dreamed of being a writer – and she was.
‘I’m so lucky. I really love what I do. Ironically, it’s hard to find the words to express how much my writing absorbs me. I live my characters, they speak to me. I laugh and cry with them. I…’
She stopped, appalled that her passion had spilled over at the feet of such a hard-bitten hack who would have no compunction in eviscerating these characters to fit his Hollywood film agenda.
Turning away to hide her emotions, she forced herself into a flat self-deprecating laugh.
‘I’m so sorry. How boring for you. I can’t believe I’ve maundered on for so long. Why didn’t you stop me? Why didn’t you at least yawn or something?’
How had he got under her skin? She had never revealed her personal thoughts and passions so freely to a virtual stranger before. Perhaps he was just a good listener, and the wine had loosened her tongue.
‘Actually, Jane, it has been most interesting. Not just the subject matter, but you have a really engaging style. You’re a natural storyteller.’
Jane blushed. It had, in fact, been said before; she was always the one pressed by her numerous nieces and nephews to tell them a bedtime story. But that was family. Here was a professional writer complimenting her. That was praise indeed.
But it had the effect of silencing her. She looked down, confused by all her conflicting feelings.
‘You’re lucky to have such a close family,’ he said.
Was that sadness in his tone? Jane looked up, but he was gazing at the sea and his face revealed nothing.
Jane hastily explained, ‘Yes. It‘s a lovely family. I’m very lucky. But they’re so noisy, so dramatic…so…so…Italian. It can be a little difficult being half-Italian when inside you feel so very English.’
Something in Jack’s face made her stop. There was almost a nod of recognition, then the shutters came down again.
‘But you’ve managed to escape, you said?’ he asked, his tone neutral.
‘Well, yes and no. I partially escaped when I went to university, but then – I’m ashamed to admit – when I couldn’t seem to get a job, I went home to live with my parents again. All I wanted to do was write this book that had been burning in my brain for as long as I could remember. My father knew that, so…’ Jane choked a little at the memory of that late summer’s day when she had been dreaming under a tree in the garden and her father had come to sit beside her.
He had gently made her the generous offer that enabled her to write her first novel, unworried by the financial and time constraints of finding a job.
‘…so, he offered to fund my board and lodgings at home for a year, on condition that I wrote my book.’ Jane’s eyes welled with love for this man who had always worked so hard and unselfishly for the family he quietly and calmly cared for. And loved.
‘At first, I refused. With all the kids and grandkids, he isn’t a wealthy man. But he said he’d paid for the weddings of all his other daughters, so he was willing to pay the same for me not to get married.
‘However, I had to promise that if I ever did want to tie the knot, I would have to elope. And, in that event, he would buy me a ladder. In vain, I did tell him that nobody eloped any more. He thought it was a shame, as eloping was such a romantic…and cheap thing to do, and so I promised when the time came, I would see what I could do.’ Her lips quivered into a fond smile.
Facing Jack, she said simply, ‘So that’s what I did. I went up into the proverbial attic room and wrote my heart out. Miraculously, after six dispiriting rejections, it was eventually accepted, was published, and started to sell.
‘Dad insisted on us all going to buy the first copy together. This poor book shop was suddenly invaded by this noisy horde of my voluble family, with assorted children of all ages. Dad found it on the bookshelf and we all stared at it reverently. He picked it up and stroked it, then passed it round for everyone to touch.’
Jane was giggling and blushing in equal measure, recounting the tale.
<
br /> ‘There was utter silence as he strode to the counter and bought it. Then he triumphantly waved it aloft, and all my lot cheered and whooped…and…’ Jane couldn’t go on; she was laughing so much at the memory. To her surprise, Jack seemed caught up by the story and was grinning broadly.
Feeling emboldened by his reaction, she was happy to continue.
‘Amazingly, it sort of became a word-of-mouth success. Not anything like J. K. Rowling, of course, but enough so that I could pay back my student loans and even give Mum and Dad some rent. Then when the movie deal came along, I was at last able to move out and buy my own tiny flat in London.’
‘Don’t you miss them all when you are in London?’
Jane nodded shamefaced. ‘Oh yes, hugely. It’s amazing. I couldn’t wait for my own place and to have some peace in which to write my major oeuvre. And yet, whenever I get really stuck, I sneak back home to my little attic bedroom and somehow all the chaos helps me compose. What a confession.’
Her eyes danced with merriment as she laughed at herself and caught Jack’s answering smile.
‘So, to return to your question about whether I’ve escaped. The answer is yes and no. I’m not sure anyone ever really escapes their family.’
A bitter smile twisted Jack’s lips. ‘You could be right. No matter how hard we try…’ He didn’t finish the sentence. Was that sadness in his voice? She waited, but nothing more was forthcoming.
This was her chance. Surely, after she had revealed so much about her family, it would be churlish of him not to reciprocate with at least something about his background. Nevertheless, she made her tone light, inviting.
‘Anyway, enough about me, as they say. What about you?’
‘My life is not half as fascinating as yours,’ he said brusquely. Then he turned abruptly and deflected any more questions by gesturing to the waiter for the bill.