That Winter in Venice

by Ciji Ware

  Case closed.

  Well sort of, he mused, taking another sip of his drink. News organizations and a few citizens’ commissions around the state had long focused on figuring out who or what was ultimately responsible for the terrible loss of life and property on August 29th, 2005. Hearings had been held, fingers had been pointed, but thus far, nobody important but the mayor had gone to jail. Now that it was ten years later, probably nobody would.

  Taking a last sip of his drink, he reminded himself, as he had so often this last decade, that he covered the environment and the future of the planet, not petty politicians and bureaucrats whose past sins were too numerous to keep track of.

  Even his editor at the paper was known to shrug and say with amused cynicism, “Hey, it’s Louisiana. What do you expect? We’re a Third World country down here and practically a Failed State.”

  Jack glanced at the sleeping woman whose right elbow nearly touched his left one. Given a number of factors, not the least of which was the implicit deadline Dr. Lauren Hilbert had laid down New Year’s Eve, his gut told him it was probably best to steer clear of the lovely Serena Antonelli... on her way, as was he, to the most romantic city on earth.

  CHAPTER 3

  As soon as the plane rolled to a stop at the gate at JFK, Serena busied herself pulling her wedged-in, fur-trimmed anorak off the floor and her carry-on bag from under the seat. This, in turn, allowed time for Jack to rise from his aisle seat, offer a perfunctory farewell, and be swallowed up by fellow passengers anxious to claim their baggage and be on their way.

  She prayed that the bag the flight attendant had insisted ride in the belly of the plane would turn up at baggage claim, along with her large suitcase filled with clothing and art supplies that she had not been allowed to check straight through to her flight to Europe. She’d packed not only her drawing instruments and special sketching paper, but everything she thought she’d need for her two-month stay as Allegra Benedetti’s visiting assistant during the lead-up to the magnificent Il Ballo di Carnevale, a dinner and ball held every year for wealthy visitors during Venice’s legendary Carnival festival.

  Carnevale!

  Serena could practically hear her grandmother’s Italian inflection of the word. Her late nonna, Serena D’Este Antonelli, was the principal reason her granddaughter had a fairly decent grasp of the language, along with a passion for the art and culture embedded in the northern Italian heritage claimed by her father’s family. Serena had embarked on an incredibly exciting quest, she reminded herself. All she had to do at this point was locate her bags and get herself to the Air France check-in.

  The Delta baggage claim area was packed with people when she came down the escalator. She caught a fleeting glimpse of Jack Durand on the other side of Carousel 5 as she planted herself in a spot where she hoped she could grab her two remaining suitcases on their first go-round and make her way to the International Terminal. She was determined to allow plenty of time to go through even tighter security to get her bulky luggage on her night flight to Paris and then transit to Venice.

  Lost in her thoughts about what lay ahead, she was startled by the raucous buzz that reverberated in the large hall, signaling that the baggage was about to disgorge down a steep chute and slide into the bumper guards that ringed the carousel. Impatiently, she watched suitcase upon suitcase lurch forward and pile on top of others and wondered at the mad scramble and rudeness of her fellow passengers climbing over each other to liberate their luggage.

  Suddenly, she saw her largest bag appear at the top of the chute and then become stuck until a few more suitcases pushed it down the conveyor belt, only to be wedged far from the bumper guard where she could attempt to make a grab for it. She watched helplessly as it rumbled by her, pinned by equally large bags on either side.

  She glanced up and saw Jack Durand easily yank a medium sized wheeled bag from the masses of similar suitcases. Hands on her hips in frustration, she impishly stuck her tongue out at him as he happened to look up, and saw him laugh.

  Just then, the bag that had been taken off the plane and stowed below appeared ten feet from her, but it, too, was wedged in an inaccessible position for her to grab it, or risk being crushed by either anxious travelers, or the luggage itself.

  Basta! she muttered, and resigned herself to waiting until some of the crowds had thinned out and her bags came around again.

  “Can I give you a hand?” She turned and was startled to see Jack grinning at her. “I’m on that eleven-thirty-five Air France night flight to Paris that goes on to Venice, remember? You can relax. We have plenty of time.”

  Serena started to laugh.

  “What?” Jack demanded.

  “It’s very nice of you to offer, but—well—a little bit surprising. At the New Orleans airport and on the flight just now it sure looked as if you definitely preferred to lone wolf it to Italy.”

  Jack gave her a startled look in response to her candor and then grinned at her again.

  “Sorry. I had a lot on my mind... but given what I saw happening to you just now, I thought I should behave like a southern gentleman and help a lady in distress.”

  Serena cast him a doubtful glance but merely murmured, “You have no idea.”

  “And besides, I can never resist a good-looking woman who sticks her tongue out at me,” he added with a straight face.

  “Yep, that’s always been part of my fatal charm.”

  Jack blinked and then grinned at her yet again. In the next instant, he shifted his gaze and pointed to the left end of the curving carousel. “Uh-oh. Isn’t that your bag coming around again? The big ole’ one with the New Orleans Saints luggage tag?”

  “Yeah. That’s it! But watch out! It’s—”

  Jack made a lunge for it, pushing away a large box.

  “Oompft!”

  “I warned you. It weighs a ton. I had to pay extra.”

  Jack somehow managed to get it over the lip of the bumper guards and onto the carpeted floor.

  “They should have charged you as much as your plane ticket for this thing! What the hell do you have in there?”

  “Art supplies. Another heavy coat. A picture portfolio. I’m staying two months, you know.”

  “Working for that Carnival costume designer, Allegra... ?”

  “Benedetti. Allegra Benedetti. You’ve heard of her?” Serena asked, amazed.

  “In fact, I have. When I’m in Venice for this conference this time of year, there are always pictures of her and the ball she sponsors in the local papers. She’s a very attractive blond.”

  “What an excellent memory,” Serena noted dryly. “I’m going to be half her assistant, half student.”

  “Marielle said you had a Masters from Yale in costume design. That doesn’t sound very much like you’re a student anymore.”

  “When it comes to the genius of Venetian costume designers like Allegra, I’m a student,” Serena said firmly. “And hugely lucky to have gotten her to take me on. Oh! Look!” she cried, “There’s my other bag!”

  She successfully nabbed it as it passed and together, she and Jack soon had her luggage piled on top of a cart.

  “Well, thanks,” she said uncertainly as a silence bloomed between them. She turned to go and then hesitated because Jack was gazing at her with almost a puzzled look, as if mulling something over.

  Then he said, “Look, we both have the same three-and-a-half hour layover, so why don’t we make our way to the International Terminal, check in all this stuff you’ve got here, and have a bite of supper together.”

  Serena regarded him soberly.

  “Are you sure? You looked pretty reluctant even to say hello to me when Marielle introduced us, and you kept yourself mighty busy during the flight to JFK. You have no obligation, here.”

  “Well, you kept your eyes closed the whole way,” he countered.

  “I just thought you preferred to keep to yourself—so I complied,” she responded. “And as it happens, that’s fine with me.”
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  Once again, Jack appeared startled by her directness.

  “As I said, I had stuff on my mind, but I apologize if I... I—” He paused, considering the matter carefully. “Actually,” he said, as if surprised by his own conclusion, “I’d prefer to have dinner with you.”

  “Well...” Serena replied, judging silently that it would be much easier to get herself and her luggage onto the Air France flight with a big, strapping man like Jack Durand at her side. “In that case, I accept.”

  She figured they’d easily lose sight of each other on their Boeing 777 once they were onboard. And as for Venice... each of them definitely had other fish to fry.

  Jack had a rather sheepish expression when Serena finally emerged from the regular security line she’d endured a second time after they’d each checked their big baggage through to Venice at the Air France front counter.

  “Man, I’ve got to apply for that Global Pass-thingy you have so I’ll get pre check-in status like you!” she declared, grabbing her carry-on bag off the conveyer belt and looking over her shoulder to make sure she had all her possessions, including her boots. “Give me a sec,” she added, dumping everything on the floor while she pulled on her Wellingtons.

  “All set?” Jack asked when she’d reorganized herself.

  “I think so,” she replied, counting her pieces of hand luggage.

  “C’mon. I know a fairly decent place, as airport restaurants go, over on our concourse.”

  “I can tell you’ve traveled this route a few times before,” she said, her long strides keeping up with his.

  “This will be my fifth conference in Venice,” he said, pointing to a restaurant sign about fifty yards ahead. “I love that city.”

  “I love it already, too, and I’ve never even been there before,” she said, laughing.

  Jack took a sharp right and Serena followed.

  “Oh, great!” she said with a laugh. “Italian food! That should get us in the mood.”

  The two found a table in a relatively quiet corner and swiftly ordered a glass, each, of a chianti that Serena picked out from the menu, along with plates of pasta Bolognese.

  “Best to keep it simple until we get there,” Serena suggested. “Even airport chefs can probably manage a Bolognese.”

  Soon Jack was answering her questions about Marielle and the intervening years since the two women had been school friends.

  “During the storm, Marielle was amazing,” related Jack. “She hadn’t gotten the grades to get into vet school, but the first thing she thought of was people’s pets and how to help the ones that had been abandoned.”

  “So that’s how she met Philip Claiborne? The veterinarian she married?”

  “He’d taken care of her dog, so I found out for her that he’d also evacuated to Baton Rouge, where our family ended up for a while. Together, they headed back to New Orleans as soon as they could and launched an effort to save as many stranded pets as possible in the wake of Katrina. Now, in addition to his practice, they also run a non-profit animal rescue foundation, finding homes for ailing, abandoned or elderly pets.”

  “Do they have any kids?”

  Jack shook his head.

  “Sadly, no, though they want them badly. But they sure have got a lot of animals wandering around their place. My dad refuses to go there. Says it’s a petting zoo.”

  Serena ran the pad of her forefinger around the rim of her wine glass and said conversationally, “Marielle mentioned that she and Philip have a place in Lakeview, now.”

  She instantly felt the intensity of Jack’s gaze closely observing her from across the table.

  “Yes, they bought one of those empty lots there through the Road Home program. Built a house a couple of years ago.”

  Serena inhaled a deep breath.

  At length, she said, “Well, I’m glad for them. Lakeview was... is a wonderful place. Good for them for doing that.”

  Jack remained silent and took a sip of his wine. Serena broke the hush that had fallen between them.

  “You know, Jack, it’s so great that Marielle’s found this unique path of hers, given what happened when we first both got to Tulane.”

  “What was that?” he said, setting down his glass.

  “About a week into our freshman year, we discovered we were both feeding the same stray cat who hung around the dorms. Your sister had already bought a carton of cat food, so I bequeathed the kitty to her care, which was a wise move, since I got home from rehearsals in the wee hours and the poor thing would probably have starved.”

  Jack threw back his head and laughed, and Serena observed that his entire demeanor changed in an instant.

  “That’s Marielle,” he said, nodding. “She’s even got our youngest sister, Sylvia, working for her pet rescue operation sometimes.”

  “How is Sylvia? I only remember her as a little kid that Marielle showed around campus once.”

  Jack hesitated and grew somber once again.

  “Actually, she’s not doing too well. She was in high school when Katrina hit. She’s the ‘tail-ender’ as my father calls her and no great student, so she didn’t get into Sacred Heart and went to public school instead. She lost a lot of friends in the storm... black and white. Since then, she just can’t seem to get her life together. Went to rehab for drugs at one point. She’s nearly twenty-eight, now, but she still lives at home.”

  Serena reached across the table and gave Jack’s hand a brief squeeze.

  “My sister Flavia is a bit like that. She’s a few years younger than Sylvia, and no drugs, as far as I know, but she still has nightmares about the storm and has no ambitions, really. She’s content just sewing on feathers and beads at the shop and going to concerts on the weekends with her equally unambitious friends. There’s a lot I could teach her, but she’s just not interested or motivated to learn new skills. I think the storm has left a very deep mark on the younger ones. They learned early that the world might not be a very safe place.”

  Jack looked at her somberly.

  “Well, it’s not. Safe, I mean. The storm left its mark on everyone who went through it. And the hell of it is, the world is going to get even less safe if you live where you and I do.”

  Serena felt a sudden stab of apprehension as she often did when people spoke of rising waters. Flooding made her think of her brother Coz and that made her imagine what it must be like to drown in your own house.

  Serena gazed at her half-eaten plate of pasta, distracting her thoughts about what happened in Lakeview on August 29th by noting that the Bolognese needed some additional red wine and a lot more minced rosemary.

  Finally, she volunteered, “I was in grad school in New Haven during Katrina, so I guess I’m better at putting the reality of what could face us about this climate change stuff out of my mind... most of the time.” She lifted her gaze. “It must be hard, knowing as much as you do about all this.”

  Jack gave a slight grimace.

  “Yeah... actually it is.”

  “Are your parents doing okay, now?”

  “‘Okay’ about covers it. My mother left before the storm hit. My dad’s a hydrologist, retired now. During Katrina, he supervised a lot of the pumping stations in the French Quarter. As you probably know, the Quarter’s on high ground and physically came through everything in relatively good shape... but ... everyone has their scars.”

  “No kidding,” Serena agreed mildly, and took a sip of her wine, gazing at him over the rim of her glass.

  “What?” Jack said, staring at her intently. “You’re saying something in your head that you’re not saying to me.”

  “I was just thinking that there are many levels of Post Traumatic Stress Disorder, you know? By the time I finished my Masters and got back to New Orleans ten months later and I started working with my brother, Nick, to get our family business back on track, my mother was a complete mess. She drank plenty before Katrina, but she was much worse, after. Self-medicating, I guess. I finally insisted we have a fami
ly intervention—much to the initial horror of my siblings and father—but it actually worked and so far, Sarah Kingsbury Antonelli has been clean and sober for six years now,” she announced proudly.

  “That’s wonderful,” Jack said and Serena knew he was sincere.

  “It is,” she agreed, “but she still shows several PTSD symptoms, and—”

  “Don’t we all?” He grinned faintly. “Well, maybe not you since you were lucky enough to miss the big show.”

  “But I sure didn’t miss the immediate aftermath... which had its own set of horrors,” she replied.

  Jack raised a finger. “Hey! Did you say your mother was a Kingsbury? Is she any relation to Kingsbury Duvallon, whose mother is also a Kingsbury?

  Serena adopted her very best New Orleans accent.

  “Second or third cousins, I ‘spect... a couple of times removed maybe. I only know King by his amazing reputation as an historic preservationist—and the fact he’s married to that terrific reporter, Corlis McCullough at WJAZ. Do you know her, too?”

  “They’re both very good friends of mine.”

  “Wow, really? I’m a huge admirer of both of them.”

  Jack explained how Kingsbury Duvallon and he had known each other since their days at Holy Cross elementary and high school, and later at Tulane. King’s wife, Corlis McCullough, was a journalistic colleague working now as an anchorwoman. The couple seemed to be the only island of sanity in Jack’s increasingly complicated life and the only friends he felt like spending time with lately.

  “King’s gotten to be pretty much the leading voice for the preservation of New Orleans’ oldest buildings,” he explained to Serena. “After Katrina, he spearheaded a unique housing program where adventurous owners gain tax incentives by restoring historical properties that had fallen into decay or had been damaged by the storm.”

  He described how the two of them had reconnected when Jack abandoned a career like his father in hydraulic engineering two years out of college for a job as a newspaper reporter, specializing in water issues in Louisiana, “a state basically founded in a swamp,” he concluded with a frown.