by Paula Kay
She turned her attention back to Ms. Carlson. “Sorry. I guess I’m kind of spacing out a little.”
Ms. Carlson laughed. “I don’t know if it’s so much that you’re spacing out or that you just have a lot on your mind, which is completely understandable. I’m really proud of you for how you’re handling all this, by the way.”
“Thank you.” She smiled. “And who knows about my parents? Maybe you’re right. I think I won’t say anything to them just yet about Italy. There’s no reason to until I speak with Douglas. But they don’t even know yet that he’s replied to my e-mail. It only happened a few hours ago while I was at lunch with Thomas.”
Ms. Carlson looked at her watch. “Well then, I’d say it might be a good idea for you to go home and bring them up to speed. I have a feeling that they might be happy for you—now that everything has started. I’m sure that it hasn’t been easy for them either—knowing this information about your birth mother all these years.”
Isabella nodded her head. Yes. Now that they’d gotten through the worst of it, she did feel that her parents were being honest with her in terms of what they did and didn’t know. She’d already forgiven them for keeping the information from her. There would be no moving forward with anything if she kept that hanging over their heads. Nothing was worth that kind of stubbornness, and certainly not the relationship with her parents, who had loved her for her whole life.
Isabella said goodbye, promising Ms. Carlson that she’d let her know how the phone call with Douglas went the next day.
Chapter 14
Even though Isabella had been watching the clock all day, she jumped when her phone rang promptly at two o’clock. She was in her room sitting on her bed and she knew that her parents would be downstairs waiting when she was finished. When she’d filled them in about Douglas’s reply to her e-mail and the scheduled phone conversation, they’d certainly seemed pleased for her. She thought they were handling everything very well and were being quite supportive, now that they all had the same knowledge about Isabella’s birth mother. Isabella could imagine that her knowing about her mother’s death had probably lifted a burden from them of the secret that they’d been keeping from her.
She suddenly needed to use the restroom for the third time in the past thirty minutes, but there was no time for that. One ring, then two, three…
Just be yourself, Isabella.
“Hello?”
“Isabella?”
The voice was clear and deep and if she had to guess, she could picture the man smiling widely on the other end.
“Douglas?” She laughed and to her own ear it gave away her nervousness. God, she really was nervous.
“Yes. It’s so good to hear your voice. You have no idea how much I—how much we—have been waiting for this day.”
“I’ve been really excited too. Ever since I got your e-mail. So, you are in Italy right now?”
“Yes, my wife, Gigi—who’s dying to talk to you, by the way—and I are here visiting Lia and Antonio—your grandparents—for a few weeks. They live here in Tuscany.” He laughed. “There’s so much to say, isn’t there, but we want to hear about you. Isabella, do you mind if I put you on speakerphone? It’s my wife, Gigi, and your grandparents here with me.”
“Sure.” She laughed a little bit. “Hello, everyone.”
It was quiet on the other end of the line for a few seconds.
“Douglas?”
“Sorry. Both Gigi and Lia are a little emotional right now.” He laughed, but Isabella felt tears stinging her own eyes for the impact this phone call was already having on her.
Finally she could hear a woman’s voice in her ear, soft and lovely. “Isabella? It’s your grandmother.” Her voice caught and then a man’s voice cut in. “And your grandfather.”
‘We’ve waited so long to hear your voice—to see you.” It was the woman again.
“You have?”
“Oh, yes. From the moment I learned about you, I couldn’t wait to meet you. I couldn’t believe that I had a lovely granddaughter out there somewhere.”
Isabella’s mind was spinning. She had so many questions—far too many for a first phone call.
“Will you send some pictures? Maybe you can send them to Douglas’s e-mail.”
“Sure.”
And she wanted to see her grandparents—and her mother. She couldn’t wait to see what her mother had looked like. For all these years she’d wondered if she looked like her—if she had her mother’s eyes, her hair, her coloring.
Her grandmother was talking again. “Isabella, there’s someone else here who’s waited to talk to you for a very long time. She knew your mother the longest out of all of us. I—I don’t know how much you know about your mother’s and my relationship, but I think it’s all too much to talk about over the phone. But I want to talk to you about everything one day soon. I hope that we can arrange for that.”
Isabella was nodding her head, forgetting to speak as she tried to take it all in.
“Isabella, this is Gigi. She took care of your mother for most of her life. Are you there? Oh, I hope we’re not overwhelming you too much,” her grandmother said.
“No. No, I’m here. I’m just trying to take it all in—hearing all of you speak and the words about my mother. It’s all a lot—but it’s all good. Please go on.”
“Hi. Isabella?”
“Yes. Hi. Gigi, is it?”
“Hi, lovely girl. I just can’t believe that I’m talking to you right now and I can’t wait to see you.” The woman’s voice was a bit shaky, like she was trying very hard to keep it together.
“I can’t wait to meet you all too.” Isabella’s voice was quiet, and as she said the words out loud, she knew that it was true. She wanted to meet them as soon as possible. She could tell that already just from the brief words that had been spoken. She could feel so much love for her coming from these people whom she’d never met, yet felt oddly connected to.
“Well, let’s see about making that happen, shall we?” It was Gigi’s voice still.
“Isabella, it’s Antonio. Lia—your grandmother—and I would love to have you come stay with us. Stay as long as you like. We have plenty of room and we’d love the chance to get to know you.”
Isabella liked the sound of her grandfather’s strong Italian accent. He sounded kind and like someone out of one of the foreign films she’d watched with Thomas.
“Yes, please say you’ll come.” It was Lia speaking again. “I’m guessing Gigi and Douglas will extend their stay and Jemma’s here waiting to meet you. Oh, you probably don’t know about Jemma—she’s your age, actually. Her mom, Blu, was Arianna’s—your mother’s—best friend. So they’ve just left to take care of some things back in California, but she says they’ll return the minute they find out that you’re coming.”
Isabella was laughing on the other end of the line. She loved the excitement that she heard in their voices over meeting her. And she was feeling that same excitement. She wanted to go, but could she be sure that she’d be able to make the trip without having a nervous breakdown?
“I hope we’re not overwhelming you.” It was Douglas again. “I just want to be sure that you know that we’ll take care of the ticket—of everything—so there’s no need to worry about any of the expense. Well, we have the matter of your trust also. I think you’re going to be quite surprised when you find out what Arianna—what your mother had set up for you. We can talk about that soon at another time, but let’s just say that you won’t need to be concerning yourself with any worry or thoughts as they relate to your financial situation for a very long time.”
“Well, thank you—for making me feel so—I don’t know what the right word is—”
“Loved.” It was Gigi’s voice interrupting her, and Isabella felt tears stinging her eyes instantly. “We’ve all loved you for a very long time, Isabella. And we loved your mother very much.”
“We’d really like the opportunity to, not only get to know you
, but also to tell you all about Arianna…and how much she loved you too,” said Lia.
Isabella could hear gentle sobbing in the background as she tried to collect her own words before trusting herself to speak.
“I do feel loved. Incredibly so—so thank you for that. And I think I would like to come visit, sooner rather than later, but I do have some things to think about here. Some stuff going on this summer that I might need to move around and—and just a few other things.”
She wouldn’t dump all of her anxiety and stupid fear of flying on them now. She’d just have to see what kind of headway she could make with it in the next few days, and if she really couldn’t muster up the courage to do it—she’d tell them. She wouldn’t want them to think for a moment that her not coming had anything to do with not wanting to meet them.
“Douglas?”
“Yes. I’m here.”
“Can we talk again in a couple days? I should have an answer by then. I mean, that’s assuming you all are serious, I guess, about me coming right away?”
“Oh, yes. We’re serious.” Douglas laughed. “But you take all the time you need.”
“If you can call me at this same time the day after tomorrow, I think that should be enough time. And I do want to make it happen. You all have no idea what this has meant to me, and the idea of finding out about my birth mother…”
It was Isabella’s turn to cry quietly into the phone.
“We will, Isabella—make this happen.” It was Lia’s voice.
“And we love you, bella—so much,” said Gigi.
Isabella said goodbye before she burst into the tears that threatened to take over any words that she had yet to speak.
She called me bella. Maybe I am a Bella.
She grinned. And even though she hadn’t even met them yet, there was a rightness to it all—meeting these people who loved her mother—and in her heart she knew that she’d love them all too.
Chapter 15
The slight sound of her feet hitting the pavement created a rhythm that Isabella found relaxing. She’d started running long-distance on the track team during her freshman year of high school, and quite soon after realized that it seemed to have a very calming effect on her when she was feeling particularly stressed out or having a bad day. Today, she wasn’t feeling anxious as much as she was trying to make sense of all the swirling thoughts and emotions that she’d been feeling ever since she’d hung up the phone with Douglas and the others.
She felt a quick pang of guilt as she thought about how she’d raced out of the house, stopping in the living room only for a moment to tell her parents that the call had gone great and that she just needed a little time to herself to think about everything. They’d hugged her and seemed fine about it, but now she was feeling like she should have spent more time with them—that she wasn’t being fair leaving them in the dark.
She sighed. It was okay for her to think about herself right now. She needed to do that. And her parents would be fine. She needed to keep telling herself that.
She let her thoughts return to the earlier phone conversation, feeling herself smile as she remembered how excited everyone had been to speak to her. There wasn’t a question in her mind whether she wanted to meet her grandparents—and Gigi and Douglas and the others that they’d mentioned—it was more of a question of how to work it all out. And the real question being: would be she able to get on the plane?
Isabella rounded the corner of the path that she’d run day after day, for the past four years, setting off for the first of several ten-second sprints that she’d do over the course of her run. Thomas teased her endlessly about being such a creature of habit, and Isabella did think it peculiar at times that the two of them hit it off so well, despite their obvious differences. As much as Isabella craved routine, Thomas was the most spontaneous person that she knew. She smiled when she thought about the fact that he knew—and fully supported—her secret dreams that she’d not told to anyone else. Dreams that would have her living a life as non-routine as anything she could do. Maybe Italy could be the start of that? She let herself have the fleeting thought as she pushed right past it to the logic of what would need to happen in order for her to make this trip to Tuscany.
She’d have to fly—or more specifically, tackle this silly fear that she had of flying. Putting that aside, she’d need to contact the firm that she was doing the internship for. She’d at least find out if there were any possibility of pushing her start date out by a few weeks. That might take care of answering some of the other questions for her, because she doubted that she’d give up the internship—no matter how anxious she was to meet everyone. She still had her future to think about—Harvard to think about.
And then there was the issue of her parents. She was going to assume, based on how they’d been handling everything so far, that they’d be supportive of her desire to make the trip, so she’d try not to let that concern enter into her decision at this stage.
Isabella let her pace slow as she came out of her final sprint, just then spotting Thomas in the distance. She’d texted him to meet her in the park—in their usual spot closer to his house—in a half hour. Thomas was in good shape but he wasn’t much of a runner, so often he’d walk with her after she’d had a good run. It was a little ritual they’d started this past track season when Isabella had been keeping to a very rigorous training schedule—a ritual that she was going to miss greatly when she and her best friend parted ways this summer. She couldn’t think about that now—how badly she was going to miss having Thomas there every day.
“Hey, speedy.” Thomas jogged to meet her on the path, giving her a hug and falling into step beside her as they continued walking back toward where she’d started.
“Hey yourself. Thanks for meeting me.”
“You know I can’t wait to hear everything. How was the phone call? Spill it.”
Isabella recounted the conversation to him and by the end of it, Thomas had stopped, pulling her off the path to sit on a nearby bench. He was grinning at her like a madman.
“What? What’s that look for?” She laughed. She never could tell what mischievous thought was going to come out of Thomas’s mouth. He was always surprising her in that way and she loved it about him—about their friendship.
He was staring intently at her now, still smiling.
“It’s you. Iz, you look the happiest I’ve seen you—maybe ever. And I must say, given the things that are still up in the air, you seem surprisingly calm about stuff—much calmer than your typical frantic self.” He laughed and Isabella punched him lightly in the arm.
“You think so?” She didn’t wait for him to answer. “It’s funny that you say that, because something about talking to them has made me feel calm—relaxed about it all. Like I don’t have to worry about it or anything. I know that if I don’t see them this summer, it will happen. I’m sure of that and I think they are too—that they want to meet me as much as I want to meet them.”
“Wait. Who are you and what have you done with my best friend?”
Isabella laughed at the mock-serious look on his face. “I know. I’m not sure that I know myself these days.”
There was a certain irony to the statement that she took in, even as the words left her lips. Maybe that was exactly what was happening—she was finally getting to a place of knowing herself, where she came from, and answers to so many of the questions that she’d had for most of her life.
“So, what’s the next step?”
“I was just thinking about that. I need to call about the internship.”
“Okay. Do you have the number with you?”
Isabella bit her bottom lip. She did feel a little apprehensive about it. “Yeah, it’s in my phone.”
“Call them now. Let’s find out.”
She looked at Thomas and nodded. She might as well get it over with.
“Okay. I’ll do it.”
She brought the number up on her phone, and within seconds she was speak
ing with the person in charge of the internship program. She got up to take a few steps away from where Thomas was sitting on the bench because she wanted to sound as professional as possible, and Thomas’s listening to her was making her feel slightly nervous.
Isabella finished the call and walked back to where Thomas sat, feeling more confused than ever.
“So what’s the verdict? You don’t look exactly pleased, so I’m guessing it wasn’t as easy as just postponing your start date.”
Isabella shook her head. “Nope. Not so easy. They won’t do it. If I can’t start next week, the number two person on their list for the position will be called. I guess it’s only fair. It’s a very coveted position, you know.”
Thomas winked. “So you’ve said.”
“Yep…”
“But?”
“Well, I guess that’s that then. There’s always the couple of weeks I have at the end of the summer, I suppose—before school starts. I mean, I don’t know how you would feel about that? If I went to Tuscany instead of meeting up with you? Or maybe you’d meet me there?”
“Sure. You know I’d understand that, and I’d say there’s a good possibility that I could meet you—but Iz…”
“Yeah?”
“You seem really disappointed.”
“I guess I am. I guess I’d gotten my hopes up that somehow this could work and I’d be meeting my grandparents in Italy next week.” She laughed. “It’s silly really—that I expected things to happen so fast.”
“Well, you could just decide not to do it—the internship. I mean, is it really going to make that much of a difference in the big scheme of things? Knowing you, your resume will still look great by the time you’re ready to start applying to law school.”
It wasn’t as if the thought hadn’t entered Isabella’s mind, but hearing Thomas ask the question somehow brought it all into perspective. Could she just not do it? The idea that she was sitting there considering it shocked her a bit. She’d been so pleased when she’d landed the position. But so much had happened since that day—things that were now more important.