by Paige Toon
Meanwhile, Cristina hands out glasses of wine and Stefano gingerly begins to separate the piping hot pizza slices to cool them down and make them easier to eat.
Teresa counts out her money and mutters under her breath. Did Alessandro share some of my tips with her? I hope so.
He speaks sharply and pointedly glances at me before returning his attention to her.
I think that’s a yes.
She glances at me with annoyance then raises her voice at him. Stefano sucks air in through his teeth and Cristina averts her gaze. I’m glad Giulio and the others are still in the kitchen, but I wish I knew what was being said.
Or maybe it’s better that I don’t.
Alessandro throws his polishing cloth down and leans over the counter, staring Teresa directly in the eye. I can feel the tension radiating from him as he says something low and furious to her. Her mouth promptly snaps shut. And then she reaches for one of the pizzas on the bar top – one that hasn’t yet been divided into slices by Stefano – and slams the entire thing against Alessandro’s chest.
We all cry out as boiling hot tomato sauce and strings of molten mozzarella fly everywhere, some landing on the bottles behind the bar. But most of it lands on Alessandro himself and he gasps with pain as he hastily pulls his T-shirt fabric away from his chest. I stare with alarm at the sight of a slab of cheese on his hand. He seems to notice it at the same moment and his eyes are wide with pain as he peels it off, a huge blister bubbling up before our eyes.
Giulio bursts from the kitchen, demanding to know what’s going on as Teresa shoves open the front door and leaves. Alessandro begins to explain and Cristina rushes behind the bar to grab an ice bucket, filling it with ice.
‘No, no,’ I say at once, manoeuvring her out of the way and turning on the cold water tap. I take Alessandro’s hand and hold it under the stream. Surprise makes his explanation to Giulio falter as he turns to stare at me.
Then Giulio kicks off. I don’t know what he’s saying, but he’s raging. He shouts and gesticulates madly and Alessandro’s eyes are downcast as he gently removes my hand from his.
‘It needs to stay under for twenty minutes,’ I tell him quietly as Giulio turns on his heel and storms out the back door.
The music is still playing at top volume, although no one is in a party mood now.
At least, I’m not.
As Cristina goes to turn off the music, Stefano retreats behind the bar to help clean up the mess. Alessandro wearily tells us to leave it.
‘I’ll do it later. Go to your club. Please,’ he adds, reaching for what I now know is Limoncello. ‘Take Angie if she still wants to go.’
One-handed, he lines up a few shot glasses, pulling the cork out of the bottle with his teeth. He fills them and passes them out.
‘Ding-dong, da-da, da da,’ Stefano says, humming the tune to ‘The Witch is Dead’ from The Wizard of Oz. He chinks Alessandro’s glass.
Alessandro is tight-lipped, but he knocks his shot back regardless.
‘Was that Teresa quitting, then?’ I ask uncertainly.
Stefano looks at me and bursts out laughing.
‘What?’ I ask.
‘Yes,’ he replies, giving me a look that implies I’m a bit dim. ‘That was Teresa quitting.’
Chapter 17
The first time Nan burned herself, I panicked. She was baking cookies and she forgot to put gloves on when she retrieved the tray from the oven. Her fingers blistered instantly and her yelps of pain felt like a blow to my solar plexus.
I didn’t think twice about putting ice on the injury, but later I learned that it was the wrong thing to do. You should never use ice or iced water, nor should you use creams or greasy substances like butter when treating burns. My research came in useful again, I’m sad to say.
Alessandro and I are the only people remaining at Serafina’s. I sent Cristina and Stefano on their way, promising that I’d join them when they next asked me on a night out.
I’m still cleaning up despite Alessandro’s protests that he’ll do it.
‘Twenty minutes,’ I repeat firmly and he reluctantly obeys, because whenever he takes his hand out from under the stream of water to help, his features pinch with agony.
The Ibuprofen will kick in soon.
I go to hunt out clingfilm from the kitchen and when I return, he’s knocking back another shot.
‘This will help too,’ he says drily as I pull up a stool opposite him. With his non-injured right hand, he grabs the open bottle of red wine from earlier and pours a couple of glasses.
‘I’m sorry to have spoiled your night.’ His voice already sounds thicker with alcohol.
The shots have also gone to my head and he’s had even more of them than I have.
‘It’s all right. I’m sure I can go some other night. Will Susanna come back?’
He stares into his glass, swirling the russet liquid around as he replies. ‘I don’t think so.’
‘What will you do?’
‘Edgardo comes in tomorrow, but he’s only part-time. Jacopo or Valentina might also be available to help. Saturdays are busy.’
Jacopo and Valentina are my cousins who still live with my aunt Eliana in Tivoli.
‘Do you have many English-speaking customers?’ I ask, pulling out a length of plastic.
‘Almost always. Why?’
‘I’d be happy to help out again.’
‘You would?’
‘Yes, I enjoyed it.’
He opens the cash register. ‘I forgot to pay you.’
Pulling out a few notes, he also retrieves my tips from under the bar top. I wasn’t sure I’d get paid – I was happy to do it as a favour – but I know it would insult him if I turned down the money and, anyway, it wouldn’t hurt to have a few extra euros to play with.
‘Time’s up. Give me your hand,’ I prompt.
He shuts off the tap and brings out his injured hand from under the benchtop, wincing as the pain kicks in.
‘Have you thought about having a joint tip tin to share out between everyone at the end of the night?’ I ask as I carefully lay the plastic over his injury. ‘I know tips are an incentive, but no amount of money is going to encourage Cristina to smile at the customers. I’m sure you wouldn’t want her to be false, in any case, but she and Stefano work as hard as each other.’
He nods as I fold the ends of the plastic under his hand so they stick together. ‘This is true.’
‘And I noticed the kitchen staff don’t get tips. Shouldn’t they be rewarded for the food they prepare? People don’t only tip for good service – if the food is awful, they tip less, if at all.’
‘This is also true. I will speak to Giulio. He will like that you have made a suggestion.’
He looks down at his hand and then up at me with surprise. ‘It hardly hurts at all.’
‘It will if you take the plastic off – I think the air makes it more painful – so leave it on as long as possible. Have you never had a burn?’
‘Of course, but I just deal with it. How did you learn how to treat them?’
‘My nan had a couple of accidents.’
‘Ah.’ His gaze drops. He needs no further explanation, but that doesn’t stop me from feeling a terrible pang of guilt for the part I played in one of her mishaps. I left the kitchen door unlocked and she went upstairs to make herself a cup of tea, as she had every day for most of her life. But on this occasion she poured boiling water straight into the teabag tin, and when she realised her mistake, she panicked and knocked it over. The boiling water scalded her arms and hands.
But it could have been worse. Much worse. Forgetting to light the hob once the gas has been turned on is a fairly common occurrence for people with dementia – and the consequences can be catastrophic.
I had a gas sensor installed after that. We all make mistakes and it wasn’t worth the risk.
‘Right,’ I say with a sigh. ‘I guess I’d better go home.’
His jaw drops. ‘I’ve had too much to drink!’
‘I know,’ I reply with a laugh.
‘I can’t drive you!’
‘I’m happy to walk.’
‘I’ll walk with you.’
‘You don’t need to.’
He tsks at me in a manner that I’m becoming accustomed to and comes out from behind the bar, stumbling slightly as he bumps into it with his hip. I think he might be drunk.
I’m pretty tipsy too, I realise as I wait outside in the fresh air. Alessandro has locked up the restaurant and is getting a clean T-shirt from his van. When he reappears, he’s wearing a black leather jacket. With his hair tied back, he has a bit of a rock star thing going on. Susanna and Teresa clearly thought as much too.
We come to a big intersection with a series of pedestrian crossings. Alessandro leans against the traffic light to steady himself and puts his hand out to make sure I wait until the pedestrian signal turns green. He’s definitely not thinking clearly – there’s no way I’d walk out into traffic.
Eventually, we find ourselves on a long, straight stretch of road, although you wouldn’t know it’s straight from the way we keep gently colliding. I’m feeling very light-headed.
‘Tell me about Susanna and Teresa,’ I say. ‘How did you get yourself into that mess?’
He shoots me a look of alarm. A moment later, his features blacken and he rolls his eyes. ‘Stefano has been gossiping in the stockroom again.’
‘I might not be able to understand Italian, but I know a scorned woman when I see one. Don’t you know it’s a terrible idea to mix business with pleasure?’
Alcohol is definitely at play. I wouldn’t normally be this direct.
He sighs dejectedly. ‘Yes, I know. Sometimes I do too much of this and not enough of this.’ He mimics drinking a bottle of alcohol and then taps his temple with his index finger.
‘It happens,’ I say.
‘Do you have a boyfriend at home?’ he asks.
‘No.’
‘Maybe we will find a nice Italian man for you to marry after all. Such as Stefano,’ he adds with a cheeky grin.
This makes me laugh slightly hysterically. ‘He is very good looking, but I question his sexual orientation.’
Alessandro chuckles. ‘I do too, sometimes, but I assure you, he likes women. You might be too young for him, though, with his penchant for older ladies.’
‘Seriously?’
‘You didn’t see him flirting with Table 15 earlier?’
I shake my head. I was too run off my feet to pay attention to anything other than the customers I was serving.
‘How did you learn to speak English so well?’ I’m thinking of his use of words like penchant and tumultuous and insufferable.
‘I’ve spent a lot of time in English-speaking countries.’
‘Which ones?’
‘America and Canada, mostly.’
‘What were you doing there?’
‘Travelling around.’
‘I’m envious,’ I say wistfully.
What a life.
I glance at him and catch an oddly melancholic expression on his face, but then he smiles and lifts one shoulder.
‘I’m lucky,’ he says.
After a while, we pass the bistro that we went to on my first night in Rome. I go to cross the road, but Alessandro grabs my arm, stopping me.
‘No. This way.’ He nods ahead to a dark residential street.
I look right, down the other street. I’m sure that was the route I took on my way to work this morning. He pointed it out as one of the short cuts I could take on foot.
‘Isn’t it down there?’ I’m convinced he’s making us go the long way round.
‘It’s this way,’ he replies sharply, adding in a gentler tone: ‘I prefer the view from up here.’
We walk in silence for a few minutes and then, out of the blue, he says, ‘Does it bother you that you have the same name as your mother?’
‘Er… No… Not really,’ I stutter. ‘Maybe it used to, on and off, over the years.’ I glance at him. ‘You said earlier that you remember her?’
He nods. ‘She started work at Serafina’s a few weeks before my eighth birthday. We had a party at the restaurant and she gave me a pack of cards as a present. Uno. We would often play during down times at the restaurant. I liked her a lot.’
This blows me away. It’s been hard to comprehend, but at that moment it hits me: he really did know my mother. He was here, in Rome, on the other side of the world to where I’ve spent my whole life, and he knew her. He knew her well enough for her to buy him a birthday present.
‘What else do you remember about her?’
‘She had long dark hair that she usually wore in a braid, and bright blue eyes. She was pretty, especially when she laughed, which she did a lot. She made Giulio laugh too. I remember her teasing him. At first I didn’t think he liked it – he would cast his eyes heavenwards and tut – but I was only a boy, I didn’t understand flirting,’ he says with a small smile. ‘When she left, there was no more laughter, not for a long time. Back then, I felt as though I was as miserable as Giulio, but now, of course, I realise that his sorrow was greater.’
I still can’t believe how understanding he seems of my parents’ affair.
He comes to a stop outside Cristina’s apartment. We could have been walking around the streets of Pompeii and I wouldn’t have noticed.
‘Do you want to come in?’ I ask hopefully, not ready for him to stop talking yet.
‘I need to use the bathroom,’ he replies apologetically.
It takes me ages to find my keys, but finally I pull them out of my bag and unlock the courtyard gate. The inner door to the apartment has a tricky double bolt system so that takes me even longer.
‘Sorry,’ I mutter, managing it at last. ‘You can use the toilet through there.’ I nod at my bedroom door. ‘Do you want a drink?’ I call.
‘Um… Maybe a beer,’ Alessandro replies over his shoulder.
The toilet flushes and I hear the bathroom door open, but he doesn’t reappear immediately. I wander down the hall to my doorway. He’s staring at the stacks of postcards piled up on the shelves.
‘Here you go,’ I say.
‘What are these?’ he replies curiously, taking the bottle.
‘Postcards,’ I reply.
‘I can see that. There are hundreds. Do you collect them?’
‘They were sent to me.’
‘Can I take a look?’
‘Sure.’
He puts down his beer and rifles through the pictures, turning one over to study the name at the bottom. He turns over another, and another. ‘Who are all these people?’
‘Friends… People I used to know… People come to Coober Pedy from all over the world. Some stay, others leave – whenever anyone used to return home or go on holiday, they’d send me a postcard. Everyone knew that I wanted to travel.’
He lifts his head and stares at me for a long moment. The light from the bathroom is behind him so I can’t see his expression very well, but I’m guessing it’s pity.
I step forward to collect the postcards and, as his hands brush against mine, I register the alien presence of plastic.
‘How’s your hand feeling?’ I ask.
‘Fine,’ he replies. ‘I think I could take this off now.’
‘Let me check.’ I carefully peel away the clingfilm. ‘Does it hurt?’ It’s so quiet that I find myself speaking in a whisper.
‘No,’ he replies, matching my low tone.
I glance up to find his green eyes glittering back at me. We’re so close that I can make out freckles on his nose.
Our stance feels overbearingly intimate, but I fight the urge to step away because I’m not done checking his injury.
I’m grateful that now it’s my face that is cast in shadow.
‘Angel,’ he whispers, prompting me to glance up at him again. He’s wearing an odd expression. ‘Angel,’ he says again.
‘What are you talking about?’ I ask unea
sily.
‘You look like an angel again. The light is behind you, but you’ve lost your halo.’
How drunk is he?
‘Your hair,’ he explains, his face breaking into a sweet smile. ‘When you came out of the airport doors, the sunlight was streaming in from the window behind you and your curly hair was all lit up. It looked like a halo.’
‘How drunk are you?’ I ask the question out loud and I can’t help but sound amused.
‘Not very,’ he replies, then waggles his head from side to side. ‘Maybe a little. Okay, maybe a lot, but it’s true what I’m saying. I’m going to call you Angel from now on.’
I start laughing and pat his stomach, about to say that he’d better stop drinking, but his face contorts with pain.
‘What’s wrong?’ I ask.
He shakes his head, but I reach down, concern making me unthinkingly push aside his leather jacket and lift up his black T-shirt.
‘Alessandro!’ I’m dismayed at the sight of an angry red mark defacing his skin, another burn from where the pizza first landed. ‘Why didn’t you say anything?’
His stomach is toned, flat and tanned, a trail of dark hair leading from his navel downwards. Before he can pull his T-shirt down, I glimpse a long, jagged scar stretching from his waist down to his hip-bone.
‘How did you do that?’ I ask with horror.
‘Accident.’ He steps away.
‘Wait! What about your burn?’
‘You can’t wrap me all up. I’ll be fine.’
‘At least take some Paracetamol,’ I insist, disappearing into the bathroom.
When I come out, he’s in the hallway.
‘I should go.’ He accepts the painkillers and knocks them back with a few glugs of beer.
I wish he’d stay and tell me more about my mum, but it’s late.
‘Thanks for walking me home,’ I say.
‘Shall I come and get you tomorrow?’
‘No, I’ll walk. What time do you need me?’
‘You really want to work at Serafina’s?’
‘Absolutely,’ I reply.
‘I’ll see you at eleven thirty then.’
He gives me one last smile and opens the door, heading off into the night.
Chapter 18