“I don’t want to work with my future father-in-law and brother-in-law. I don’t want to be a cop.”
“Giacomo wasn’t sure about it either, and now he likes it.”
“Good for him.”
“Okay, let’s drop it.” Anina reached out and stabbed a few orecchiette onto the fork. She fed Paolo the bite of pasta. “Good?”
“Your grandmother might be mean, but she can cook.” Paolo kissed her.
“She’s not mean. She has high standards. That’s all.”
Paolo had told his parents when he moved into Anina’s apartment. She had not told her parents, not at first. Anina had not wanted to put her mother in an awkward position with Matelda. When she finally told her parents, Nicolina said, “Don’t say anything to your grandmother. It would kill her.”
Paolo had taken temporary positions since he graduated from college. He wanted to work with a sports agency, but those jobs were scarce. Now that he was engaged, he took the permanent job hunt seriously. There were so many things Anina loved about Paolo. He made her laugh. They came from similar backgrounds. Maybe he wasn’t as ambitious as some young men, but Anina appreciated that he put living a happy life above a material one. After all, he had volunteered at an animal rescue in Viareggio when there was an oil spill off the coast. Paolo had a good heart.
“Sometimes you look at me as though you have no idea who I am,” he said.
“Do I?”
“Like you’re sizing me up.”
“I’ve already done that. You passed.”
Paolo scooped Anina up in his arms. He carried her down the narrow hallway to their bedroom in the back of the apartment, covering her with kisses as they went. For Paolo, the small room with the bed that hugged the walls on either side of it was as vast as a field of sunflowers. He would stay there with Anina forever, if it were up to him. He gently placed her on the bed. He kissed her hands, her neck, and her lips. His body covered hers as she pulled the coverlet over him. When they made love, they solved all their problems without saying a word.
Paolo fell asleep wrapped around her. Anina lay awake, her fingers laced through his. She found the tiny bedroom confining. The poster of a beach in Montenegro did not make the room seem larger, as promised in a magazine article. The only way out of the claustrophobic feeling was to dream. She pictured a house by the sea. Their bedroom would be large and white, with a deep feather bed and many windows, which she would leave open. The sound of the surf would lull them to sleep at night, and in the morning, the reflection of the sun on the water would wake them. Somehow she had to make Paolo see her dream. She loved him but had to find the key to his ambition. Paolo pulled her closer as he slept. No one lived on love, and plenty survived without it, but she did not want to be one of them.
VIAREGGIO
Matelda sat on her bed with her earbuds in her ears. She removed one and looked over at Olimpio, who was in bed scrolling through the emails on his phone.
“You won’t believe this. Nino recorded what he could remember of the elephant story.”
“You’re kidding. He knew how? I had to show him how to clear his voice messages when he was here.”
“Patrizia helped him record it. Do you want to listen?”
“You go ahead and tell me later.”
Matelda put the bud back in her ear. She listened to her brother’s voice.
Hey, sis.
Pat told me you wanted the elephant story. I remember Nonno running around the room like a wild man acting it out. He wanted us to understand where the gems he cut came from, and how there were people who risked their lives to mine them. That was his point, I believe. I remember that he’d change things here and there just to keep it interesting.
Now about Nonno’s story. Okay, here goes. Here’s what I remember. It started with an elephant trapped inside a mine in India. Somehow she gets out. It was a she—her coat had been painted with red lines for a parade or something. I remember the part about what happened inside the mine because I imagined the layers of workers in the layers of earth like an ant farm with tunnels and curves stacked one upon the other.
Nonno described the great fire that collapsed the mine. Men tried to climb out. I can’t believe he told a couple of kids such a gruesome story, but what the hell? He did. We were different from the kids today. It’s all kitten stories now. Anyway, the elephant broke free. That was the happy part of the story. But I don’t remember where the elephant went. And I don’t know if the elephant died. The terrible part was the father and son who could not get out of the mine. Whoever dug the mine did not dig an adit, and the workers were trapped. The dangerous work they did provided beauty and value to the world, but they risked their lives to extract the stones. Was it worth it? How could it be? They died in the mine. I remember Nonno saying that a father will do anything to feed his family, and that always stuck with me.