The Proud Italian

by Alison Roberts

  ‘“Presenting symptoms,”’ she read aloud, ‘“pale skin, unexplained fever, refusing feeds, crying a lot, irritable…”’ Her voice caught. ‘“Query persistent pain.”’

  ‘She was only a few weeks old. Life is so unfair sometimes.’

  Abbie was looking at the first sheaf of blood-test results that had come back on Ella. At notes from the new specialists that had been called in. At the plans for chemotherapy, steroid treatment and blood transfusions. The words blurred in front of her.

  ‘It was unbelievable, wasn’t it?’

  ‘I thought it was my fault.’ Rafael’s soft words were shocking.

  ‘What?’ Abbie’s jaw dropped. ‘How could you possibly think that?’

  ‘Because of Freddie.’

  ‘Who’s Freddie?’ Abbie was bewildered. She’d said that they didn’t really know each other but it had never smacked her in the face quite like this. She could see now that Rafael distanced himself as a form of protection but was it so effective she’d never even guessed at something so dark?

  Rafael thought that Ella’s illness was his fault?

  ‘Freddie was a little boy who had ALL.’ Rafael was still stroking Ella’s head as he spoke softly. A slow, gentle movement of his hand that was probably comforting him as much as Ella, if she was aware of it. ‘I got involved in his case just before I left oncology. He was the grandson of some of my parents’ closest friends and they insisted that they brought Freddie to me. That, if anyone could save him, I could.’ He glanced up at Abbie, one corner of his mouth lifting in a lopsided smile. And then he moved away from Ella, coming to perch one hip on the arm of the chair Abbie was sitting in. ‘He was such a sunny child. His parents adored him and would have gone to the ends of the earth to save him.’

  As they themselves would have for Ella. As they still would. Abbie swallowed hard.

  ‘The initial treatment went well. He was a good candidate for bone-marrow transplant and, being Italian, of course there were any number of family members who were desperate to get tested. Unfortunately the only match was his little sister, who was only two and she couldn’t understand why people wanted to hurt her. It was very tough on the whole family.’

  There was more to this story. The absolute faith everybody had in him must have created an unprecedented pressure on Rafael to save this child. Abbie touched Rafael’s hand to encourage him to continue.

  ‘The early results after the transplant looked good but Freddie developed graft-versus-host disease. We tried everything we could. I pushed for us to try anything new that had even the slightest hope of success. I persuaded his parents to sign consent forms and told them that the extra suffering would be worth it when we succeeded. I was so determined to save him. And they were desperate to believe in me. I think we all believed that it would work in the end but he was admitted to Intensive Care a few weeks later. He was in there for four weeks. One by one, his vital organs gave up the struggle until there was nothing keeping him alive except for the machines, so there was a meeting and…and they decided it was time to stop. To turn the machines off.’

  Abbie felt an icy chill run down her spine. ‘You were there?’

  ‘No. I was in my office later that day when Freddie’s father came to see me. He was distraught. They’d all been through so much. He couldn’t believe it hadn’t worked. He kept asking me, “Why…?” And he was crying. I’ve never seen a man cry like that. And the way he was looking at me. They had believed in me. They had put their precious little boy through so much pain and suffering because I had persuaded them. And I’d let them down. Failed them all. It ripped me to pieces.’

  Abbie squeezed his hand. ‘Of course it did.’

  ‘And that was when I decided I couldn’t stay in oncology. That it would destroy me in the end. I was a coward and that was why I thought that maybe it was my fault that Ella became ill with cancer. A fitting punishment for my cowardice.’

  For a man as proud as Rafael the admission was so huge it took Abbie’s breath away.

  ‘I wish you’d told me.’

  ‘And shown my weakness? At a point when you needed me to be strong? What difference could it have made?’

  ‘All the difference in the world,’ Abbie whispered. ‘That’s what I meant by not understanding each other. If I’d known, I would have understood why you were so against the treatment in New York. That you couldn’t bear to see Ella continuing to suffer. You’d been through it all before, with Freddie. You knew that the extra pain and suffering might be just that. Extra pain that Ella didn’t have to endure. That it wasn’t because you didn’t care enough.’

  Rafael swore softly in Italian. ‘How could you ever have thought that I didn’t care enough?’ The words were fierce enough to sound angry.

  ‘You thought your mother didn’t care,’ she reminded him quietly. ‘She didn’t let you in, did she? She couldn’t show you how she felt after your father’s heart attack. Maybe she was blaming herself. Maybe she was remembering all the arguments they’d ever had and decided that was what had caused it all.’

  Rafael was silent. Was he seeing the connection? Understanding something of how she had felt when he hadn’t been able to listen to how she’d felt about Ella’s treatment?

  Her breath escaped in a half sob. ‘You know what the funny thing is?’

  ‘Funny?’

  ‘Funny sad, I mean. Because there was something I didn’t tell you then either.’ Maybe the inability to share the important things wasn’t completely one-sided. Perhaps she had been trying to protect herself as well by holding back. She couldn’t do it any more. She shouldn’t have done it at all.

  ‘What?’

  ‘That I thought it was my fault.’

  ‘Che cosa? Why?’

  Abbie’s voice was choked. ‘I’ve always felt guilty, you know? That I survived when Sophie didn’t. My parents loved her so much.’

  ‘I’m sure they loved you too.’

  ‘But it was Sophie who was hurting. Her pain that they couldn’t bear. I don’t think they even saw my pain. I was alive, wasn’t I? I was the lucky one.’

  ‘Oh…cara…’ Somehow Rafael had gathered her into his arms and he was holding her.

  ‘I felt like they couldn’t stand seeing me still alive because it reminded them of what they’d lost. And I hated it. I must have made life so much harder for them and I wondered later if that was why they broke up. And…and I thought, maybe Ella getting sick was my punishment…to show me how hard it had been for them.’

  Rafael held her shoulders firmly, pushing her back far enough to see his face clearly.

  ‘It was not your fault that Ella got sick.’

  Abbie held his intense gaze. ‘It wasn’t your fault either. Don’t ever think that.’

  ‘I couldn’t care more. For Ella or you. I would give my life to keep either of you safe.’

  ‘I know that now.’ There was a new pain in Abbie’s chest. Her heart felt like it might break again but for a different reason this time. Because it felt so full of love it was in danger of bursting at the seams. Maybe the pain came from stretching rather than breaking. Hearts could do that, couldn’t they?

  Maybe there was even room in there for her own parents, too. Maybe, with her new depth of understanding, she would be able to forgive and old wounds could begin to heal. For all of them.

  The beeping of the machinery surrounding Ella was the only sound in the room for a long moment. Somebody from the team caring for their daughter would no doubt be coming into the room at any time to check on things but just for now, they were in a little bubble of time that was just for them.

  A moment that had brought them closer than ever.

  A louder beeping was issuing some kind of warning. A dropping level of oxygen saturation, perhaps, or an indication that blood pressure was getting too low.

  It made Abbie flinch.

  ‘I can’t do this, Rafe,’ she whispered fiercely. ‘Ella might die and I don’t think I can live with that.’ />
  ‘Yes, you can. If you have to, you can… You must.’ The words sounded oddly strangled. Abbie raised her gaze to see tears on Rafael’s face. Tears that chased each other in rapid succession to trickle down the sides of that proud nose and follow the deep grooves to collect at the corners of lips that were trembling.

  Tears. From the man who never cried. From the man she’d thought was keeping a safe emotional distance from what was happening to their daughter. A safe distance from her.

  Tears from the man she loved so much.

  ‘You can feel that pain and you can survive,’ Rafael told her brokenly. ‘And you know how?’

  Abbie shook her head.

  ‘Because you’re loved. I’m not like your parents, Abbie. I see your pain. I understand. And…and I love you.’

  ‘I love you, too.’

  Rafael nodded. ‘I know this. And that’s how I know I would survive, too. But only if I have you. You only feel afraid if you’re not safe and…and maybe I’ve never been brave enough to let myself feel it, but—’

  ‘We can love each other,’ Abbie finished for him. ‘We can keep each other safe.’

  And, with Rafael’s arms tightly around her, Abbie buried her face against his shoulder for a moment, to gather her strength as people rushed into the room to find out what had tripped the alarm they’d seen from the central station.

  ‘She’s fighting the ventilation,’ one of them decided. ‘Trying to breathe for herself.’

  ‘Maybe it’s time we lightened the sedation. How’s everything else looking?’

  Abbie stood there in the circle of Rafael’s arms as the medical team did a thorough assessment on Ella and debated the juggling of her medications and interventions.

  She was a fighter, all right, their little daughter.

  And they would be here, together. By her side for every minute of this fight.

  And whether it ended in victory or not, they would still be together. Abbie knew that now with absolute certainty.

  Their marriage had been put through a trial by fire because of Ella’s illness. The battle for their little girl’s survival wasn’t over yet but the reason they’d been pushed apart was.

  There was nothing they couldn’t survive from now on.

  As long as they were together.

  Loving each other.

  Keeping each other safe.

  EPILOGUE

  Six months later…

  IT WAS EARLY autumn but it still felt like summer here on the Amalfi Coast.

  Abbie thought the small Italian town of Amalfi was every bit as beautiful as Rafael had hoped she would.

  The perfect place for a wedding.

  A place that filled such a special part of his heart. The ancient, sun-baked buildings in soft pastels and terracotta that clung to the foothills of the dramatic cliffs and jostled for space all the way down to the shoreline, where the beach umbrellas took over. The somnolent serenity of the lemon groves high on the hillsides that surrounded his family estate. Rafael was enjoying the view of the lemon groves at the moment, leaning on the warm stone balustrade of the terrace. Taking a moment from a busy day to count his blessings.

  Like the warmth and generosity of his family as they were finally able to welcome Abbie and Ella into their midst.

  They had been puzzled by the news that Abbie’s parents weren’t coming to the wedding.

  ‘But why not?’

  ‘It was too far for them to come.’

  Abbie hadn’t been talking about physical distance. The emotional gap was still too big to bridge but at least the invitation had been offered. Contact had been reestablished and the door was open again. Abbie was quietly confident that, one day, those old wounds would be healed.

  ‘We’re going to visit them when we get back to England. They want to see all the photographs.’

  The planned visit might have been tentatively suggested and warily accepted but it would be a huge step forward and, in the meantime, Rafael’s family was more than prepared to step forward.

  ‘We are your family now, too,’ Rafael’s father, Georgio, declared, ‘and if you will permit me the honour, I will be the one to give this beautiful bride’s hand in marriage to my son.’

  ‘It’s me who would be honoured,’ Abbie had responded. ‘Grazie mille, Papa.’

  Oh, they’d loved hearing her not only try out her Italian but take her place in the family. Rafael could understand the tears of joy in his father’s eyes because he’d had that reaction himself the first time Ella had called him Papa.

  She could do more than that now. She could say, ‘Ti amo, Papy.’

  I love you, Daddy.

  There had been many tears of joy being shed in this part of Salerno over these last few days. His mother and his sister, Marcella, who was going to be Abbie’s bridesmaid, were probably encountering a fair few of them today as they took Abbie and Ella out for some last-minute, pre-wedding shopping and probably a gelato down at the beach.

  Everyone they met would know the de Luca family and would have heard their story. They would know instantly who the beautiful little toddler was and Mama would no doubt be only too happy to stop and let them marvel.

  ‘Isn’t she the bambina who has been so terribly ill?’

  ‘But she looks so sana now. So healthy…so happy…’

  ‘It’s surely un miracolo.’

  It was indeed un miracolo.

  The road hadn’t been easy but Ella had kept fighting after the life support of the ventilator had been deemed unnecessary and she had gone from strength to strength since then. They’d had another visit back to the hospital when she’d been due for another bone-marrow biopsy at the six-month mark after her ground-breaking treatment and that had gone without any complications. And they’d been rewarded with the same astonishingly good news that they’d had after her last biopsy.

  There was no sign of the cancer that had threatened to take this joy from their lives and the new cells were still there, ready to fight any attempted recurrence. It wasn’t just the exuberant Italians who were labelling it a miracle. Ella’s case was being written up in many journals. Being held up as an example of why all the time and effort and money spent on medical research was worthwhile.

  She’d been able to go home the same day that time. Back to their home that was finally a real home. One that had a sparkly pink bedroom that Ella adored. He and Abbie had finally managed to paint the silver stars on the ceiling. They’d even managed to stick the glitter on so that they sparkled as much as dancing bear’s tutu did. Seeing those stars for the first time had been when they’d heard something they’d never thought they’d hear again.

  Ella gurgling with happiness as she’d stretched her arms and tried to reach the new sparkles in her life.

  He and Abbie had looked at each other. They’d both opened their mouths to say it…

  Ella’s being a plughole…

  But neither of them had been able to utter a word because the moment had been so choked by joy.

  Just the memory of that moment, the echo of the sound of childish delight, would always melt his heart.

  And beneath those stars Ella had a real bed now. There was room for dancing bear and Ears and all sorts of other beloved toys to share her sleeping space.

  Her hair had grown back into a soft cluster of dark curls. She was still a little too thin for her age, which made her eyes look even bigger, but she was, without doubt, the most beautiful child that had ever existed.

  Being healthy was what really mattered, though.

  And his father, busy at the moment searching for the tie that matched his best suit, was also healthy again. Healthier than he had been for many years.

  The heart attack had been a blessing in disguise.

  Not just because his father had had his damaged arteries repaired and had now modified his lifestyle to exclude smoking and include exercise and would probably live to be Ella’s nonno for many years to come.

  No. The blessing had also come fr
om how shocking his mother’s apparent lack of concern had been. How he could see so clearly the damage that emotional distance could inflict on others.

  He would never be like that again. Or if it happened even a little before he noticed it, Abbie would remind him. She would only need to look at him with that special look she had for him alone and he would remember how safe he was.

  How safe he would always be.

  Because Abbie loved him so much.

  Rafael de Luca took a deep, deep breath of the warm, lemon-scented air and then straightened and turned to go back inside. Not that he really needed to help with the preparations for the big day tomorrow because it seemed like the whole town had been given a part to play, but he wanted to be part of it. He wanted to revel in every single moment of this special trip home.

  He paused for just a heartbeat longer, however, as he let his breath out in a long, contented sigh.

  He really was the luckiest man on earth.

  Abbie took a deep, deep breath as she got out of the car.

  This was it. The long-awaited dream wedding that had been put on hold for so long.

  She had known it would be special, coming to Rafael’s home town to pledge their commitment to each other in public, but she’d had no idea that she would be so unquestioningly adopted by an entire family.

  By a whole town, it seemed.

  There were people clapping and cheering already, as Georgio de Luca came to open the door of the car, even though they had a short walk before they got anywhere near the intimidating flight of stone steps that led up to Amalfi’s famous ninth-century cathedral. Cars couldn’t get into the narrow streets that led to the piazzo.

  The soft fabric of her wedding dress rippled around her as she got out of the car into the warmth of an endless Italian summer afternoon. Abbie had wanted traditional but not over the top and her classic lace dress had a fitted, beaded bodice, a tiny waist and a deliciously swirly, feminine skirt that brushed the ground and had just a small train.

  She’d chosen a natural style for her hair, too, because she knew Rafael loved it best when it was loose and flowing. The hairdresser had tamed the waves into shapely, soft curls, clipped some of the hair back to keep it out of her face and then cleverly looped some of the tresses to create a casually elegant look that was perfect for the tiny white flowers that would be her only accessories. It had seemed too much to hope for that lemon blossoms would be available so early in the season but somehow it had been made possible.