In Italy for Love

Chapter 30

30

She noticed Alex moving around in the night, but only through the haze of brief wakefulness. When her eyes popped open to see the blades of sunlight around the edges of the shutters, she glanced warily across the pillow to find him deeply, solidly asleep, his cheek squashed against the cotton. He snuffled lightly, his breathing as even as the beat of a slow song, his bare shoulders looking impossibly broad when he lay on his side.

He hadn’t slept through the night – she knew that and she hadn’t expected to solve a deep problem he was wading through himself. But seeing him asleep next to her was its own tiny miracle, no less astounding for its fleeting nature.

Hearing a miaow loud enough to wake him, she slipped out of bed as quickly and quietly as she could and fetched Attila from the table, where he was staring disdainfully down at Arco. The cat didn’t seem impressed with the fact that Arco appeared to have adopted him into his pack after the heightened emotions of the night before. Attila was breathing normally and when she set his food bowl in front of him on the windowsill in the kitchen, he ate immediately, which made her smile.

She took Arco out briefly and then she couldn’t resist, she opened Alex’s bedroom a crack, hoping to catch another glimpse of him gloriously asleep. But he rolled over at the sound of the door opening.

‘Come back to bed, Jules,’ he mumbled, lifting a hand briefly before it flopped back on to the sheets.

‘That’s a request I can’t refuse,’ she said with a chuckle. ‘Did you sleep sort of okay? Did I bother you?’

‘No,’ he said immediately. He cracked one eye open. ‘Did I bother you?’

She shook her head, turning back the covers and slipping underneath. ‘I slept fine. I really didn’t want to go back up to my room. Attila’s eaten already, by the way. He seems better.’

‘Good,’ Alex said, rolling onto his back as though the action took all his strength. He peered at her. ‘Thank you,’ he said.

‘You don’t need to?—’

‘I don’t know how else to express it. You just came here and got to work and made everything a little bit better.’

She blinked, refusing the tears that threatened. ‘How very Friulian of me, to come here and get to work,’ she joked, hoping he was too sleepy to notice her loopy, scrunched expression as she tried not to cry.

‘I mean it.’ He poked her for emphasis, so she tickled him back, remembering that first night when they’d been different people – or perhaps been more themselves – and created magic. ‘Ah, stop! You have evil fingers!’ he cried, swatting her hands away and then capturing them in his.

Clasping their hands together between them, he studied her knuckles intently, stroking in circles with his thumb.

‘I don’t sleep as badly as I used to, you know,’ he admitted. ‘Sometimes I don’t want to see the improvement, but… self-preservation. I have to sleep. I have to relax about sleep. It has got a little better. But last night…’

She held her breath, all her banter deserting her as she waited for the next thing he’d say to break her heart.

‘I wanted to be in bed. Even when I wasn’t asleep, I didn’t want to get up and do something else to stay calm. I just watched you.’ He grimaced and glanced over at her. ‘Is that creepy?’

‘A little,’ she replied with a grin. ‘But since you protected me from the zombies, I forgive you.’

He gave a huff. ‘Why it’s not you with sleeping problems, I have no idea! Ghosts, zombies…’

‘Berengario with a scythe,’ she joked.

He grinned, snaking his arms around her waist and hauling her to him with a kiss on her mouth. ‘Sleep here, in my room, until you go,’ he said softly.

There was only one answer she could give him. Studying him warily, she whispered, ‘Okay.’

Attila recovered quickly and was itching to go out again well before Dr Orsino confirmed he could. The nights had grown chilly, although sunshine during the day still warmed up the clay roofs of Cividale by the afternoon. It was a little too easy for Jules to forget about her passport predicament between the tranquil days with Maddalena, snipping slowly at the vines and preserving green tomato slices in fresh oil and vinegar, and the cosy nights by the stove or curled up in Alex’s bed.

Jules was happy to accept a day off on Wednesday to spend with Alex. Leaving Arco home alone, he showed her a few beginners’ mountain-biking trails in the forest, stopping to pick a small crop of ‘drumstick’ mushrooms – another pastime Jules suspected could become addictive if she had time alone in the forest with a harvesting knife.

But without an income now for over a month, she was getting nervous that her card would be declined and knew she would have to ask her mum for an exorbitant sum for a flight home. On the rare occasions that thoughts of Luca intruded on her autumn idyll, it was no longer with hurt and mortification but worry about what could be behind his long silence. She hadn’t expected texts about the weather, but she had hoped to hear something about the sale – at the very least that the property had been advertised.

She should care more about her investment, but she was quite happy sticking her head in the sand, even though part of her knew ignoring reality had got her into trouble before. Just a few more days …

The few more days turned into the weekend and on Sunday, after their usual ramble in the forest and reheated soup for lunch, there was a knock at the door. Jules was annoyed about the tingles along her hairline – fear that it was Luca, come to intrude on her peace. But she assured herself as she had a handful of times already that he didn’t even know where she was.

It wasn’t her ex behind the door, it was Si?r Mauri from the other building. After a gruff conversation with Alex, he left again and Jules wondered for a moment if they’d been told off for… she didn’t want to know what. But when she peered out of the window to see the elderly neighbour hobbling across the courtyard with a wooden ladder, she gathered he’d stopped by to tell them something.

Jules watched as all of the neighbours – Siore Cudrig, Elena and Berengario, the wizened owner of the tattoo parlour and other familiar faces she hadn’t put names to yet – emerged from their buildings with baskets and crates and cardboard boxes and they all stood around the persimmon tree.

At first, they only talked – and laughed and measured unscientifically with hands and one eye closed. Then came the arguments that appeared more habitual and obligatory than truly rancorous. And then Si?r Mauri held the ladder and up Berengario climbed.

Alex returned to the kitchen, slipping his arms around her waist and leaning his chin on her shoulder. For someone who’d told her in no uncertain terms that he was too damaged to fall in love, he did a good job of convincing her that’s what they had. In combination with her willingness to ignore warnings – and reality – her rational mind knew she was setting herself up for a rather potent explosion of grief when she left.

But she wasn’t leaving today. It appeared that today was the persimmon harvest. Turning to catch Alex’s eye, she asked, ‘Are we going to help?’

‘It’s your day off,’ he pointed out, pressing a kiss to the side of her neck, but there was a sudden knock on the window and then Berengario’s pinched face appeared, his hand raised to block out the light as he peered in.

Jules expected Alex to jerk away from her, but he just sighed and rested his forehead against her as he chuckled. It made her happy to have her height when he rested on her shoulders. She rather liked being the strong woman who helped Maddalena run a farm and held up Alessandro Mattelig when he was weak.

‘I think that’s our summons,’ she said, extricating herself gently. Grasping his hand, she dragged him into the hallway to fetch their shoes. The day was mild for November and she knew how warm she got when she worked, so she pulled on only her thick, rainbow cardigan with her boots before heading into the courtyard, Arco at her heels.

‘So, what do we do?’ she asked Berengario, studying the tree. She was struck by the memory of when she’d first arrived and the pale fruit had been sheltered by leaves. Now the tree was bare and the fruit a vivid orange. A few short weeks had made such drastic changes in its appearance.

When Berengario opened his mouth, she smiled and wondered if she should fetch a chair from inside for the duration of the monologue to come. ‘Ah, the cachi is a very fragile fruit, especially now we allowed it to ripen on the tree. The first frost is over, so the sweetness has developed, but we need to take care when harvesting or they will bruise and spoil before they are really sweet to eat. Here, take the scissors,’ he said, handing her a pair of pruning shears, a tool she was now intimately acquainted with from her work at Due Pini. ‘Hold the fruit gently and cut all of the calice, the flower part here, and then place the fruit in the box in a single layer. They shouldn’t touch. This way they keep for the rest of winter until we bring them into the warmth to ripen fully. Do not let the fruit touch!’ he repeated.

‘All right. I got it,’ she reassured him indulgently.

He waved his shears for emphasis and said, ‘If I thought you would still be here to eat them yourself, you would have more motivation to store them well.’

Jules froze, her fears clogging in her throat again. Berengario approached the tree and studied it, either unaware of how his words had affected her or allowing time for the barb to sink into her flesh. He couldn’t expect that she would stay – could he? Her bank balance was crashing and, as hard as she’d tried to be useful, she was still dependent on the goodwill of these friends and neighbours – and whatever Alex was to her.

Despite all the devastating affection and new-found intimacy with him, nothing had changed from that first night: he’d only opened up to her because she was leaving. He didn’t want to let go of Laura and she would never ask him to.

She almost forgot to add that she would have to be a foolish nitwit to choose to stay in Italy for love twice . Even if she did love him…

Ouch. Shaking herself as she approached the tree and gripped a smooth, plump persimmon, Jules struggled to tear her thoughts away from the dawning of truth creeping over her skin like sunshine from behind a cloud. She didn’t love him. She’d only known him a few weeks – a shorter time than she’d known Luca before she’d torn up her life for him, and look where that had got her.

The swell of rebellion inside her, however, ripped off the Band-Aid. It was too late. She did love him. It was a different kind of love from what she’d felt for Luca: quieter, softer – hotter. Deeper. Oh dear…

She stole a glance at Alex and it all flashed through her. He was speaking companionably to Siore Cudrig as he snipped the fruit, a faint smile on his lips. She loved how he still mourned his wife, even though it hurt – even though it meant she couldn’t stay here for him.

She couldn’t stay – but she wanted to.

Her desire to escape had never been about leaving Italy. She’d been running from her mistakes. Staying with Luca had no longer been possible, but here… She glanced around the courtyard, blinking wildly against the prick of tears.

Feeling a pinch at her back, she turned to find Alex peering at her, his hand settling at her waist. ‘Are you okay?’ He dipped his head to study her.

She was now. ‘Yeah,’ she said, giving him a quick, hard kiss on the lips.

‘Enough of that now, lovers!’

Jules flinched away at the sound of Berengario’s voice from behind her and turned to find all of the neighbours taking surreptitious glances at them.

‘If you can’t stop touching each other, how about you two work with the ladder?’ Berengario suggested gruffly. ‘You’re both tall enough. Up you go. Alex, hold it steady.’

Jules followed his instructions with a wry smile, brushing past Alex as she climbed the rungs. She passed the fruit down to him, meeting his gaze occasionally at the graze of his fingertips over hers.

‘ Romeo e Giulietta , eh?’ Si?r Mauri joked to Berengario.

‘The unlucky lovers?’ Berengario replied, giving Jules a sidelong look.

‘Star-crossed lovers,’ Alex corrected him tightly. ‘That’s the expression, isn’t it?’ He glanced at Jules for confirmation.

‘The original story was based in Udine, not Verona,’ Berengario added, as though the change of setting personally offended him. ‘But there are no “star-crossed” lovers today – only stupid ones.’ He slapped Alex on the back, making the ladder wobble.

Jules lost her footing, arms flailing for a sturdy branch as her balance shifted precariously, but Alex’s hand closing in the waistband of her jeans steadied her again and she heard him grumble something in Berengario’s direction.

He didn’t move his hand for long enough to heat her skin and she glanced down, expecting to find him giving her a cheeky smile, but he stood frozen, his gaze fixed on the entrance to the courtyard. The neighbours had all gone quiet too and only Arco’s barking – suddenly agitated – sounded in the courtyard.

She dipped her head. ‘What’s going on?’

Cold slid down her spine when she heard a response from the direction of Alex’s gaze in a voice she knew too well. ‘I could ask you the same thing, Jules.’