Iris had begun enjoying her dinners more once the kind waiter had started slipping her suggestions; not that she had come on her honeymoon to eat, of course. She may not have had much experience, but she did know that the greatest pleasures of the perfect honeymoon were to be enjoyed in the bedroom, not at the table. Iris recalled how she had gasped in delight when Gregorio had led her through the luxurious sea view suite and out onto the balcony, where she had immediately pictured herself each morning, wrapped in her new silk robe, glowing and ravenous from a night of lovemaking, sipping cappuccinos and munching on flaky croissants while admiring the colorful rock formations of the windswept coast, the flowering oleanders of the lush gardens, the sparkling spectrum of blues and greens of the cove below. The fantasy had lasted a few hours shy of a day, when she had discovered while stretching out in the king size bed after their first real night together, that Gregorio’s habit of showering, shaving and dressing before breakfast was as immovable as his disdain of room service.
Walking out onto the balcony of her apartment to shake out her dust cloth, Iris replayed in her mind images of the splendid view from that suite, breathtakingly beautiful by day, heartbreakingly romantic by night. She recalled lying in bed in the moonlight, watching the silver beams dance upon the gently rippling water, listening to the waves softly lap the beach, feeling the sweet breeze caress her skin, while she waited for her husband to emerge from the bathroom. On their third night together (the second having been spent flying across the ocean), he had confessed that he simply couldn’t relax until his teeth were properly brushed and flossed. Iris could relate to that, being a faithful flosser herself, but she thought that perhaps he could have switched his main flossing session (which for some undisclosed reason took close to a quarter of an hour) to the morning, at least for the duration of their honeymoon, though she hadn’t said so to his face. She also hadn’t said anything about his insistence on closing the shutters and windows before joining her in bed, thus locking out the sound of the waves, the glow of the moonlight, and the perfume of the myrtle scented air, together with the mosquitoes he claimed to have heard, which would undoubtedly put their repose at risk.
If on their wedding night Iris had been impressed by Gregorio’s knowledge of female anatomy, during their honeymoon she had come to realize that it was far superior to her own. Even in the dark, he knew exactly where and how to touch her to achieve arousal. Despite the lack of such silly frills as candlelight and champagne, which some people probably needed to set the mood, each time they had relations, Gregorio’s pinging and probing brought Iris to a state of sexual fulfillment in a matter of minutes. Though she had never made inquiries into her husband’s sentimental history, she was inclined to believe his expertise had been acquired through his medical schooling, rather than through previous girlfriends. And as Gregorio taught Iris what to do to return the favor, she had been thankful to have such a knowledgeable and patient partner.
When there was not another particle of dust to be found in the apartment, Iris decided to spend some time out on her own small balcony tending to her plants and admiring the view which would never be a feature of any starter home in Rochester. It took only a fleeting thought of Rochester to lead her to thoughts of Lily who, in a matter of hours, would be married and off to enjoy a honeymoon of her own. Iris wondered whether she and Joe had already had sex, whether he would be as gentle and considerate a partner as Gregorio. Wrapping her arms around herself, she stood there looking off into the distance, thinking, waiting for the late spring sun to chase away a sudden shiver, but its rays reflecting off the surface of the sea were far too bright, far too invasive, far too optimistic for her mood. Forced to look away, she blamed the intensity of the Italian sun for the drops dampening her lashes, trickling down her cheeks.
After trading in her dust cloth for a pair of pruning scissors, she knelt on the worn terrazzo tiles, tucked the hem of her sundress under her knees for padding, and turned her attention to the lineup of geraniums in terracotta pots along the perimeter of the balcony. Pausing to sniff the earthy scent of the wilted flowers she clipped from their stems to make way for the buds ready to bloom into plump clumps of coral, images of Auntie Rosa meticulously dusting the dozens of artificial geraniums bought on sale at SaveMart to beautify the basement guitar studio flashed through her mind. She was struck by the thought that those lifeless, scentless flowers were the last Dolores had seen before falling asleep in that basement forever, then blamed that thought for the fresh tears springing to her eyes.
Iris was feeling dizzy; it must be the sun. Shifting her weight from the balls of her feet to her heels, she placed her hands on the balustrade and pulled herself to a standing position. She dragged a hand over her damp brow and moist eyes, commingling perspiration with tears. She was home alone, as she often was, and there was no reason why she couldn’t admit to feeling sad, no reason why she couldn’t indulge in a little private cry. No reason whatsoever, except that she was afraid it wouldn’t be so easy to stop once she got started. With one hand on the small of her back, the other on the balustrade, she stood still until she regained her balance, and the black veil clouding her vision lifted. Blocking the sun with a hand, she took her eyes for a tour of the craggy Ligurian coastline, allowed them to explore the indigo sea of the Golfo Paradiso, coaxed them into patiently following the course of a dinghy as it tacked east toward the promontory of Portofino. Iris exhaled with a puff reminiscent of her mother’s sighs, then breathed in deep, through her nostrils. The air coaxed up the hillside by the gentle breeze was sweet, laden with iodine and the aromas of sage and rosemary and jasmine it picked up along the way.
Squinting her eyes against the combined brilliance of sun and sea to the west, she could make out the shape of the lanterna, the lighthouse that marked the entrance to the port of Genoa. It made her think of the bent little fellow with the ruddy cheeks and blunt nose crisscrossed by a network of spidery purple capillaries, whom she had met in the old town center of Santa Ida the first morning she had walked down on her own to shop for groceries. She had set off full of enthusiasm, appreciating the privilege of actually being able to go somewhere without a car, not that she had any choice in the matter for the time being. Gregorio needed his car to go to work, and was reluctant to buy one for Iris, until he was confident she had mastered driving a vehicle with manual transmission on the hilly coastal roads. Once inside the shop recommended by Isabella, Iris had found herself the object of scrutiny of the local housewives and old ladies who spoke a language of suspicious glances and incomprehensible dialect as they systematically cut in front of her. Resigned to the fact that she would get bumped to the end of the line until they all finished, Iris stood timidly to the side, listening to the questions and answers being exchanged, going over her notes as if she were cramming for a quiz. The little man was the only person remaining by the time she could utter “Buongiorno” to the shopkeeper, limbering up her tongue to pronounce the items on the list she had compiled with the help of an English-Italian dictionary and a calculator to figure out how many grams were in a quarter of a pound.
“Good morning, miss!” the grinning man blurted out when he heard her voice, casting his words into the silence left by the shopkeeper, a tight-faced woman who ignored Iris, apparently deeming the task of wiping the blade of a long and undoubtedly very sharp knife on her spotted white apron more worthy of her attention. The smile was a welcome sight to Iris, who was having difficulty adjusting to the Ligurians’ aversion to parting their lips for any reason that was not strictly necessary.
“You American, miss? I live in Brooklyn for fourteen years!” he said. “But now I come back. This brings me back,” he continued, pointing out the door to the sea. Iris returned the smile, which was instantly snatched from her lips by the shopkeeper, who suddenly wanted to get down to business. Iris stammered through their negotiations, caught unprepared for the barrage of questions shot back at her in response to her request for one hectogram of prosciutto. “Cotto
o crudo? San Daniele o Parma?”
A stream of perspiration was trickling down her back and making her armpits sticky by the time Iris had managed to secure a packet of crudo (she had to say “basta!” to the lady three times before she would stop slicing); a sliver of Asiago cheese (she had to keep saying “più” or “meno,” whose meanings she kept mixing up, and gesture with her hands, to direct the angle of the woman’s knife on the cheese wheel in hopes of obtaining a wedge of the desired size); a tub of goat milk ricotta (at least she thought she guessed the right animal when the lady asked, “Vacca, pecora o capra?”); a chunk of Parmigiano (Reggiano, that was easy); some canned tomatoes (pelati, polpa o passato?); a half-kilo packet of penne, one of spaghettini, and two liters of milk (intero o scremato? fresco o a lunga conservazione?); and, at last, counted out the right number of thousands of lira in multicolored banknotes of various dimensions.
The little man, who had witnessed the transaction in silence, amusement upturning the corners of his white moustache, stooped to pick up one of her bags and accompanied Iris out the door, without purchasing anything himself. “E dove vai, Americano?” the shopkeeper called after him.
Instead of replying, the little man said to Iris, in a secretive tone, “That’s what they call me here, l’Americano. Now you here, so there’s an Americana, too!”
“I’m Iris. Piacere,” she said, tilting her head in lieu of extending her hand, which was occupied by a shopping bag.
“Piacere, Miss Iris,” he replied, touching the brim of his cap. “In New York, we have the Statue of Liberty. Here, we have the lanterna. You see?” he said. Her eyes followed the crooked index finger pointing toward Genoa, then returned to his face when he spoke. “Is different. But beautiful. Both, they tell you to come home. When you have two homes, you have none. You feel nostalgia always.” The flicker of faraway memories swam through the man’s eyes, now two rheumy pools of sentiment. He handed her the grocery bag.
Iris tried to imagine herself here, in this little seaside town, a wobbly old lady tossing leftover scraps of pasta to the stray cats, the townsfolk still calling her “l’Americana,” entire decades later. Her throat tightened uncomfortably. “Grazie,” she said to l’Americano, who reminded her a bit of her Grandpa Capotosti. Impulsively, she planted a kiss on each of his scratchy cheeks; he blushed, and tipped his cap to her again as she turned to start her walk back up the hill, the handles of the plastic bags cutting off the circulation in her fingers.
Whenever she walked down the hill to town, she found l’Americano strolling along the banks of the dry riverbed that in the rainy season delivered runoff from the mountains behind the town to the sea. He walked leisurely, but not aimlessly, his hands clasped behind his bent back, his round little paunch leading the way. She never spotted him lounging on benches, or playing cards at the café with the other men. Each time he saw her, he stopped and tipped his hat.
“Good morning, Miss!” he would greet her in English.
“Buongiorno, Signor Americano!” Iris would reply in Italian, and they would smile at each other and walk on.
Each time she gazed at the lanterna from her balcony, she recalled the words of l’Americano. Months later, she had come to understand what he meant about two homes being like no home. She thought of the folk song she used to strum on the guitar, back when she had one, about being five hundred miles away from home. It had seemed like a staggering distance for anyone to wander. Now she found herself ten times that distance from her birthplace; from her parents, or rather from her mother and father (referring to them as a single entity united by anything but endless litigation no longer sounded right); from Auntie Rosa and Uncle Alfred; from friends like Rita Esposito and Frances Jejune who could tease her about her past, and recite the names of everyone in her family in their proper order. And then there was Lily. How did she end up so far away from her Lily of the Valley? She should be with her today; she would go right now, if she could. But even if she had money of her own to buy a ticket, even if Gregorio had noticed how much it meant for her to be with Lily on her wedding day and insisted she go, even if she dropped what she was doing, grabbed her passport, and went straight to the airport just as she was, in her sweaty sundress, she would get there too late to tell Lily that there really was such a thing as fairytales. All you had to do was believe in them.
Iris gazed beyond the lanterna, to the west, covered her face to shut out the sun, the sea, the beauty, and sobbed into the scent of dead flowers clinging to her sticky fingers.
2. Lily
“I thought we’d get more money,” said Lily. She tore open an envelope, pulled out a fifty dollar bill and placed it with the pile of cash on the back seat of Joe’s car. “I didn’t realize that the food bill was going to be so much. I was hoping our credit card would come this week.”
“At least we’ll have enough for a nice long weekend in Toronto,” said Joe. “I’ve heard it’s the cleanest city in the world. And our hotel is only thirty miles from Woodbine Racetrack - it’s supposed to be one of the nicest tracks in the country.”
Lily liked the idea of having her honeymoon across the border. Canada wasn’t as far Italy but at least it was a foreign country. At least it felt sort of exotic.
“We have tickets to see Camelot tomorrow night, don’t forget.”
“I didn’t forget.” Joe kissed Lily and without making note of the signature on the card in his hand, he pulled a check for one hundred dollars out of an envelope and placed into the check pile.
“And I’ve heard there’s really good shopping on Yonge Street. I’d like to walk around there, too.”
“We’ll do all of that,” said Joe. “We’re gonna have a fantastic time. I say we hit that track, make a killing, and come home with a bundle of money. Then we’ll take a trip to the mall and spend the day buying whatever you need for the house.”
“Sounds like a great plan!” She handed Joe a stack of cash. “Here you go - the band is inside waiting for this. And when you get back,” said Lily. “I will be in the front seat waiting for you, ready to start our new life together.”
“Absolutely,” said Joe. “Fasten your seat belt!”
They’d made plans to stay in town for their wedding night and then leave for Toronto the next morning. By the time they pulled into the porte cochère of their hotel half an hour later, Lily’s feet were throbbing, and she was exhausted. Joe placed their bags onto a luggage cart, removed his tuxedo jacket, and laid it on top. The bellman whisked the cart away, tucking his two-dollar tip into his vest pocket. As they approached the front entrance, Joe swept Lily up into his arms. She let out a yelp as he carried her in through the set of brass revolving doors.
Lily squealed and Joe laughed as he positioned them into one of the compartments and spun them round and round. After several revolutions, the door came to a sudden halt, as the train of Lily’s dress became lodged in the floor bearing. The door jammed, trapping them inside.
“Oh, my God!” cried Lily. “My dress is stuck - we’re trapped!”
Joe laughed. “I have to put you down for a second so I can untangle you."
“Ow!” Lily cried, as Joe attempted to set her feet on the floor.
“What’s the matter?”
“The dress is choking me - it’s pulled too tight - I need a little slack.”
Joe tugged at the train of the dress. “Boy, it’s really jammed in there. There isn’t enough give to set you down!”
“You have GOT to be kidding me!”
They stared at each other momentarily and then burst out laughing.
“Now you’re stuck with me,” said Joe, laughing at his joke.
“Hey,” said Lily. “I’m just glad you stopped giving me the run-around.”
“Good one!” Joe laughed.
“This could be a really bad sign,” said Lily.
“It’s a great sign!” said Joe. “If we can find our way out of this, we can do anything.”
The concierge walked toward them.
“May I offer assistance?”
“We’re trapped!” said Lily, laughing so hard that she could barely get the words out. “My dress is stuck in the door.”
“You’re getting really heavy,” said Joe.
“Sir,” said the concierge, “I suggest you set your wife down and then attempt to loosen the dress from the mechanism.”
“He can’t,” said Lily, wiping the tears from her face. “There’s not enough give in the dress and when he sets me down it chokes me and the dress is going to tear. It’s borrowed - I can’t give it back all ripped.”
“Can you remove it?” said the concierge.
“Remove what?” asked Lily. “The dress? I’m not going to take my wedding dress off in this revolving door!”
“Uh... Lil,” said Joe. “Seriously, you’re getting really heavy. I can’t hold you up much longer. I can reach your buttons in the back. Maybe if I just undid a few of them, the dress would loosen up a little and I could set you down.”
“OK,” said Lily. “If you can get to them, just unbutton a few.”
Joe contorted his body to bring his left hand behind Lily’s head while holding her body up with his right, bolstered by his left knee. With a grimace, he unfastened the first ten buttons.
“It’s not really helping,” he said.
“Maybe if you loosen a few more,” said the concierge. “Then your wife could pull her arms out of the dress and slide it down a bit.”
A man and a woman passed through the set of doors directly next to Lily and Joe. “Congratulations!” they called, waving.
“Thank you!” said Lily, waving back.
“How’s married life so far?” said the man. The couple laughed and passed into the lobby.
Lily looked at the concierge. “I am not going to take my arms out of this dress with people walking in and out of here.”
[Iris and Lily 01.0 - 03.0] The Complete Series Page 62