Racing the Sun

by Karina Halle

  He leans down and kisses me. His lips are warm and soothing and so wonderfully familiar now. I crave them like I crave his voice, his touch, his energy.

  He pulls away slowly, leaving my lips begging for more. “Come back to bed with me. Let me make love to you,” he murmurs. A long time ago I would have laughed if someone said that to me. But from Derio’s lips, it’s not funny. It’s honest and it’s real. I immediately turn to putty in his hands, my body responding to his voice like Pavlov’s dog.

  He leads me back into the blue dark depths of the room, back to bed, where we make love until the horizon glows pink.

  * * *

  The children are playing in their game room, Derio is riding on his motorbike, and I’m trying to come up with something fun for today’s English lesson when my cell phone rings. It hasn’t rung for a very long time and the sound of it immediately fills my body with dread. I know who it is even before I look.

  Yup. My parents.

  I sigh, loudly. Actually, I almost vomit. This isn’t going to go over well. I’ve been ignoring their e-mails for weeks now, trying to push them, push reality, out of my life, but I guess they’ve reached their breaking point and actually need to speak with me.

  I ready myself and then answer the phone.

  “Hey,” I say brightly. Maybe too brightly.

  “Amber,” my mother cries out on the other end. She sounds so far away—which, technically, she is.

  “Hi, Mom, how are you?”

  “Amber!” her voice is shrill now. “Where are you? Why haven’t you written to us? We have been worried sick about you! Why haven’t you called?”

  “Why haven’t you called before now?” I retort.

  “Don’t you start with me, young lady,” she says, and I have flashbacks to a million teenage moments. “Even your friend Angela says she hasn’t heard from you.”

  “Again,” I say, losing my patience already, “she hasn’t contacted me. And since when do you start harassing my friends for information?”

  “I was not harassing her,” she says, “though it’s nice to know you’re just as dramatic as ever.”

  “Whatever.”

  “Where are you?” she repeats.

  “I’m in Capri,” I tell her. “I said that in my last e-mail.”

  “You’re still there?”

  “Yes.”

  “I thought you would have moved on by now. I had a cousin who went there once and she said it was just a rock in the middle of the ocean. She got food poisoning. Don’t eat the fish there.”

  I roll my eyes. I don’t even know where to begin. “I really love this place, actually. And I got a job that pays really well.”

  “A job?” she repeats incredulously. “Doing what?”

  “I’m a nanny.”

  There’s a pause and then she bursts into patronizing laughter. “Are you kidding? A nanny? You? You’re always threatening to burn your uterus to deny us any grandchildren. Not that you’ve ever come close to that with anyone.” She adds that last part under her breath.

  I’m used to it and shrug it off. “Well, I happen to like these kids, very much.”

  “Well, who are they, what are their names?”

  “Alfonso and Annabella.”

  “How typical.”

  “Well, they are Italian, you know.”

  “How old are they?”

  “Seven.”

  “I just don’t believe it. Wait till I tell your father when he gets home. He’s going to have a heart attack.”

  “Why is this so funny? I’m doing it. I’ve been doing it for over a month now.”

  “Right. Which brings me to the question: When are you coming home?”

  My throat closes up, making it hard to swallow. “I don’t know.”

  “Well, you have to know, Amber. When is your flight?”

  “I haven’t booked it yet.”

  “Why not?” she screeches. “You’re supposed to have a return flight.”

  “Well, I was waiting to save up money. I kind of ran out of it for a while, when you guys cut me off.”

  “That’s when you were supposed to make your plans to come home. You shouldn’t be wasting your time working there when you could be working here and actually building toward something. Your future, perhaps? Remember that?”

  “I remember,” I say through clenched teeth.

  “So get your ticket right away. You can’t stay in Europe longer than three months or you’ll be deported. How long has it been now?”

  Since she can’t quite remember, I’m tempted to lie. “I have time,” I say.

  “Do you have enough money for your flight?”

  “Yes, don’t worry about it.” And that’s not a lie. Since I took on the nanny position, Derio pays me a thousand euros a month. We both find it kind of weird but he insists he keep paying me so there are no misunderstandings. Besides, the job is hard and deserves to be rewarded. I take the money because everything he says is true. Plus, I do eventually need to go home.

  Or do I? I can’t go an hour now without asking myself that. It’s just too bad I can never come up with an answer.

  “You know your father is going to ask me these things and when I can’t give him a straight answer, he’s going to call you.”

  “So let him call,” I say and make a mental note to never pick up the phone again.

  “How is your weight?” she asks.

  I sigh. “Fine.”

  “You know Italy is a fattening country. All that bread and pasta and dessert.” She sounds so suspicious that it pisses me off.

  “I’ve gained ten glorious pounds since I’ve come here!” I nearly yell through the phone. I’ve actually lost about five, but she doesn’t need to know that.

  She nearly gasps. “Amber, that’s terrible.”

  “It isn’t,” I say. “The men here loooove it.”

  “Don’t tell me you’ve fallen in love with an Italian boy. They’re unfaithful lovers. Don’t let anyone tell you otherwise.”

  I can’t listen to this anymore. “I’m going to go now, Mom.”

  “Amber, you better be careful. Are you using protection?”

  “Bye, Mom, I love you.”

  “Amber.”

  “Arrivederci!” I cry out and then hang up the phone. I wish it were a good old-fashioned rotary so I could really slam down the receiver.

  I look over to the fridge and see Annabella standing there, eyes wide.

  “Who were you talking to?” she asks.

  “My mother,” I grumble, sitting back down on the stool and going through my makeshift lesson planner.

  “Is she not very nice?”

  I shrug. “She can be. But she can also be very annoying.” I look over at her, suddenly wary about talking about mothers.

  She climbs onto the seat next to me. “Sometimes my mama and I would fight.”

  “It’s very normal for girls and boys to fight with their parents,” I tell her.

  She nods, suddenly looking very small. “Yes.”

  “What did you fight about?”

  She sits there and her bottom lip starts to quiver. I freeze, unsure of what to do. Then she cries out, “I don’t remember.” Big fat tears spill down her face and she looks at me. “I don’t remember what we fought about. Sometimes I don’t remember my mama.” She sobs. “I’m afraid I’ll forget her.”

  “Oh, sweetie,” I say to her and pull her into me, hugging her tightly. Tears well up in my own eyes. “You’ll never forget your mother. I promise you, you won’t.”

  She wails something in Italian and I hold her closer. “It’s okay, you can cry,” I tell her over and over and it works. She cries. She cries for a long time, until the front of my T-shirt is soaked with tears.

  Eventually, though, her tears dry up. I clean her face, kiss her forehead, and then give her a nice bowl of homemade pistachio gelato.

  After that she seems almost lighter, like a weight has been lifted off her shoulders. She has a few bites t
hen asks if she can put a few licks outside for Nero. I let her.

  Meanwhile, my own heart feels heavier.

  * * *

  Derio gets back from his motorbike ride around noon but says he wants to do some work in the study. He has a very impassioned look in his eye and twitchy fingers and I know there is some kind of creative urge flowing through him that I shouldn’t stand in the way of.

  I decide to take Alfonso and Annabella into town. Annabella is more subdued but Alfonso is getting a bit hyperactive from being in the house, so I promise to take them to ride the funicular, which isn’t much fun as an adult but apparently a lot of fun for a child.

  I immediately regret my decision. Since it’s mid-August now, the island is at capacity and everyone from the tourists to the locals are sweaty and irritable. We are shoved along the overcrowded streets of Capri town, pushed through the Piazzetta, and crammed into the funicular with a bunch of angry, smelly people.

  When the car eventually unloads, the throngs of people make it hard to keep hold of the kids. Eventually, I have to let go of Alfonso and Annabella, though I keep them in my line of sight.

  “Annabella, Alfonso, stay close,” I tell them.

  But there is a new crowd coming in and soon I find myself out by the marina and the kids are nowhere in sight.

  Oh shit.

  Shit.

  Shit.

  “Annabella!” I yell. “Alfonso!” I whirl around wildly, scanning the crowd to find them. I don’t see them anywhere. I just see person after person, faceless, nameless people, and none of them are the twins.

  Oh my God. Oh my God, oh my God.

  I can’t lose them like this. They have to be somewhere.

  I quickly run through the crowd, trying to push people aside. I make my way to the marina’s edge as more people pile off the ferries, dragging suitcases. I move along the edge and cross the road to the Bar Grotta Azzurra and take the stairs that lead up to a higher part of the road. I stop halfway and use the vantage point to look everywhere.

  There are no children. Alfonso was wearing a blue shirt and Annabella was in a red-and-yellow dress. They would stand out in this sea of people but they aren’t there at all.

  I yell for them again, not caring if people are looking at me like I’m crazy. I am crazy. I’m losing my mind. How can they just disappear? Where could they go? Don’t they know to stay in one place, to look for me?

  Oh my God—the thought strikes my heart like lightning— what if someone took them? Can you kidnap people on Capri? Maybe if the next ferry is leaving soon.

  I jog down the stairs and start sprinting to the crowd and onto the concrete jetty that leads to the ferries. I make no apologies for nearly bowling over couples and the elderly alike. I run to the ferry ramps and try to ask the attendants if they’ve seen two children. I hope I describe them well enough, switching between Italian and English.

  They tell me they haven’t. They’re very understanding, trying to calm me down, but can’t help me as they take the tickets. They tell me that they will help me look for them after the ferry pulls away. I’m grateful to them but I can’t sit around and wait as person after person comes to board the ship.

  I take off back down the jetty, looking everywhere. By now my heart feels like it’s on its last legs and I can barely even breathe. The pins and needles of a panic attack are sneaking up on me. I have no choice but to call Derio, but he’s going to kill me for losing them.

  “Derio,” I cry out into the phone. “Please, I’m at Marina Grande. I lost the twins, I can’t find them.”

  “I’ll leave now,” he says. That’s it. I stagger back over to the steps where I was earlier, which I figure is the best spot to see them or him, and try and catch my breath. The world pulses around me, gray fringing the corner of my vision. I’m panicking, trying to keep myself together, but I can barely keep my heart in my rib cage, my lungs in my chest.

  I lost them. Did I lose them?

  They’re gone. Are they gone?

  I’m an idiot. I’m not cut out for this. No one could lose two seven-year-olds on Capri but me. My mother was right to laugh. This is ridiculous. What have I been doing all this time, playing house? I can’t take care of kids. I can’t even take care of myself half the time.

  I lost them. Oh God, what if something happens to them?

  Derio is going to kill me. I’ve let him down. I’ve let the twins down. I’ve let myself down.

  Why did I ever fool myself into thinking I could do this?

  The questions, the words, spin around in my head over and over again until I realize I’m not even looking for them anymore. I’m lost in self-pity and I hate myself even more for it.

  Suddenly, Derio appears at the bottom of the stairs, looking frazzled, and I can’t help bursting into tears at the sight of him. He quickly runs up to me and pulls me to him.

  “Shhh,” he says, patting my head. “It’s okay. It’s going to be fine. Tell me what happened.” He pulls away and holds me at arm’s length, stooping over to peer at me.

  I can’t even wipe the snot from my nose. “There were so many people,” I say, trying to breathe, “we got off the train and, and, I lost them. I let go of their hands, there were too many people, and I lost them.”

  “Okay,” he says, keeping calm although his voice is shaking slightly. “That helps. They can’t be far.”

  I shake my head. “Yes. No. I don’t know. I checked the ferries and they hadn’t seen them. I thought maybe someone kidnapped them.”

  “This isn’t America,” he says. “That rarely happens here. They are here somewhere and it’s our job now to find them. Have you contacted the police?”

  I shake my head, the tears spilling to the ground. “No, I just called you.”

  “You did the right thing,” he says and straightens up, looking around. “We will go and find them together. We will search the marina and the beach and the shops and we will find them. If we don’t we will contact the police and get the island searching for them. They won’t get far.”

  I nod and let Derio lead me away from the stairs and down the road that curves back down to the marina. Instead of heading back to where I had been before, he steers us toward the beach where we’ve gone a few times. Like always, it’s packed with people and makes looking for the twins almost as challenging as before. The two of us scour the beach, occasionally calling out their names.

  “Not here,” Derio says, taking my hand and holding it tight. “Let’s look the other way now.”

  He’s so calm and collected, trying to comfort me of all people, the one who lost his brother and sister, when he’s the one who deserves all the comfort.

  We walk past taxis and tourists and cafés and head toward the other part of the marina and the other port where the car and commercial ferries dock.

  It’s there that we see two familiar faces.

  Alfonso is staring at the cars being loaded onto the ferry, obviously intrigued, but Annabella is scanning the area around us. When she sees us, her face lights up and she starts waving wildly, pulling on Alfonso’s sleeve until he sees us, too.

  They run toward us and we run toward them, Annabella running to hug me and Alfonso hugging Derio.

  “Oh my God,” I cry, holding on to her and feeling relief overtake my shame, “I am so happy to see you!”

  “We were lost!” Alfonso cries out as Derio ruffles his hair with a big grin on his face.

  “We thought we saw you,” Annabella says, eyes wide and excited. “But it wasn’t you. I guess I was . . . confused. She had your hair.” She points at my curls. “But it wasn’t you. Then we couldn’t find you.” She looks at Alfonso. “We were going to ask someone for help but Alfonso wanted to look at the ships.”

  “I want to be a captain,” Alfonso announces, thankfully oblivious to the horror I just went through.

  “I am glad you came,” Annabella says, grabbing on to my hand. “We have no money for the train and I did not want to walk up that hill back ho
me.”

  Oh. Well, I guess that should make me feel a little bit better, knowing they could have found their way home anyway.

  When we get back to the funicular, Derio has to take his bike since he rode it here. I assure him I’ll be fine with the kids going home—they certainly don’t seem any worse for wear. But as I walk with them through Capri town, grasping them harder than ever, I know I’m not fine at all. Something has changed in me. Whatever confidence I had earned—falsely—over this job has now been shot dead.

  Later on in bed, Derio tells me over and over again that it could happen to anyone. That I did a good job and that I shouldn’t beat myself up over it. He tells me that here, people don’t worry so much and that the twins are more capable than I might think. He reminds me that this is Italy, not America, and Capri is a very safe place.

  But for all that, I don’t feel it. And when he tries to initiate sex later, for the first time I pull away from him, uninterested. All I can hear in my head as I lie there in the dark is my mother’s laughter over the phone, my dad’s words echoing that I’m useless, helpless. I can’t seem to shake the guilt, nor can I shake that feeling of hanging on the edge. Something could have gone horribly wrong today and it was only by luck that it didn’t. I walked a tightrope with people’s lives and I didn’t even know it.

  I dream again that I am falling.

  CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

  True to my mother’s words, my father does call me. Again and again. I don’t pick up, though. I can’t afford to hear his voice now, not after what happened a few days ago, when I lost the twins.

  You’d think I’d just get over it. So I lost them. It ended well. It’s not a big deal. Time to move on.

  But I can’t move on. I can’t get it out of my head. To be honest, I think it’s making me a little bit mental. When I go out with the twins into the town, I freeze up. I either make sure Derio comes with me or I keep a crazy grip on their hands, barking at them like a freaked-out seal if they even stray an inch away from me. The twins are starting to think I’m a bit overbearing and overprotective but I feel like I can’t afford not to be anymore.