32. FIRST DISCOVERY
GIOELE
“I’ll show you where I met you.”
“You’re being silly. The first time you saw me was in Los Angeles. Zia Carola brought you to visit Mom and me in the hospital right after I was born.” Silvina’s eyes glitter with humor, the way I like them best.
“Yes, but I really met you here. You were older.”
“I was old when you met me?” Tiny sun freckles shift with her humor when she scrunches up her nose. I tap it with a finger.
“You like to twist my words, don’t you, Ina mia? Always twisting words.” The last sentence I add in the sloped chant of a Venetian accent. It makes her chuckle.
Once at the field, I pull her close to me. I take both of her hands and place them around my waist. When she acquiesces, letting me pull her against my body, I wait until our breaths sync. Then, I lean my chin on top of her head. “Funny how you’re not allergic to me anymore.”
“Because I gave in to you.”
“See, you should have listened to me from the start.”
The scent of her, lemon shampoo and flowery soap. The alkaline waft of lake water that softens the air around us. This moment. If every moment was like this, Earth wouldn’t be Earth. It wouldn’t be Hell on Earth or even Heaven on Earth. No, it would simply be Heaven.
“So you ‘met me’ here?” the girl who plumps her lips for my kisses asks.
I hmm, dipping my nose into her hair. “I asked Ma about the specifics, and you were thirteen months old. We came here that summer, and Zia Carola and Ma took us down here to see the sheep. There were lambs, see, and they thought we would enjoy petting them. But instead, we discovered each other.”
“I didn’t discover you.”
“Yes, you did.”
“But I was a baby!” She arches a brow at me, and I wink in response, enjoying her amusement.
“Come. Let me show you.” I let go of my hold on her and entwine our fingers. Walking ahead of her, our clasped hands stretch between us while she fakes suspicion before following me. It makes me grin.
“I’m afraid of sheep,” she jokes.
“Right. Also, the sheep aren’t here anymore. Come, let’s see if I can make you remember.”
“So-o-o, you want me to remember something that happened when I was thirteen months old?” She’s wearing a ponytail today. It’s long and shiny, and it shakes wildly with her disbelief.
“Worth a try, right? Lay down.”
She runs her stare from my face to the grass. Iridescent in its lushness, it flutters in the breeze. “Here?”
“No, actually, on the other side of the fence.”
“You want us on separate sides of the fence?”
“Just this once, then never again.” I can’t help but stroke her cheek each chance I get. I do it now, and for a second, her eyes shut. “Go now, before I make love to you instead.”
“And that’s supposed to make me leave?” she purrs.
“Shh. Basta.”
She lifts her hands in lazy surrender while she backs toward the fence. Once there, she climbs it while I play-peer at the rim of her skirt. It makes her bite her lip at me.
“Now, lay down.”
“All the way down?”
I tap my chin. “Probably lay on your stomach facing the fence. Then, you have to lift yourself up on your elbows so you’re as tall as a toddler.”
“Oh, my god. He wants me to be an acrobat,” she mutters to no one beside her.
I walk up to the fence, clutch it with my hands while I watch her work.
“You know you’re being ridiculous, right?” she asks me, “all the while making me look ridiculous?”
“You just look hot.”
“’Kay. I’m doing it. Now what?”
I slide down along the fence. It’s made of flat, white, wooden boards aligned horizontally. They shine in the sunlight, and below them, grass flutters in the breeze. It appears in lustrous stripes between the boards too, but when my fingers clutch the third lowest plank, I see her, not the grass.
“Ciao,” I greet my woman, voice softer than I thought it would be.
“Ciao, cuore mio.”
“Two decades ago, I saw you like this. I didn’t know how to put it into words, and I didn’t know what it would mean to our lives. But you had toffee-colored eyes that siphoned light at me, and in the moment you smiled, you became my always-girl.”
Her hands find mine through the fence. Pink fingertips curve over my nails, joining us, apart but together. Her gaze is as light as it was long ago, but it’s wiser, and gravity brings her eyes to my lips.
I kiss her at the cusp of a summer that seems endless. Tongues wet, we dance until our hands clutch through the wooden barrier.
“You remember now?” I don’t hamper the slow invasion of my smile.
“No.” Silvina’s lashes sink until toffee love gleams through glistening shutters. “But I’ll never forget this.”
THE END
Before Gioele and Silvina, came Isaias and Tatiana. Read while your mind is still with the Nascimbeni heirs. Click .