“Cazzo,” Viola murmurs, spluttering on her drink.
“Viola!” Maria frowns.
I glance at Gio for clarification. “It means fuck,” he says with a laugh.
“Gio!” Maria says.
“Sorry, it’s just so strong,” Viola says, going in for more even though her eyes are watering.
I can only agree—the limoncello is rocket fuel.
Sophia is curled into a deep-green leather button-back armchair, her feet tucked beneath her bum. “What do you think, Iris?”
I feel as if someone just turned a spotlight on me as all eyes swivel my way. “It’s, umm…” I gesture toward my throat—“like drinking lemon fire.”
They fall around laughing, and Pascal shrugs again, as if he cannot be held responsible for his own creation.
“You know what would be the perfect thing to show Iris right now, Mamma?” Sophia throws a subtle wink at Bella. “Some really embarrassing photos of Gio as a kid. You know, the ones of him wearing Fran’s pink overalls after he peed himself at the park?”
“Gio was such a beautiful child,” Maria says, ignoring the context. “You all were. Bella, pass me the album.”
I don’t miss the look of pure sibling insta-hate Gio shoots across the room at Sophia, or the absolute couldn’t-care-less insta-joy on her face in return.
Maria balances the thick old photo album on her knees and opens it, one hand on her heart as she flicks through the first few pages. After a moment she passes it across to Gio, her emotions close to the surface.
“Here, you can show Iris.”
The album is open on a spread of old birthday photographs: Gio’s seventh birthday, going off the cake and the badge pinned to his Garfield T-shirt. It looks like countless other family parties, dated in the eighties by the clothes and hairstyles. Bella perches on the arm of the sofa to peer over her dad’s shoulder.
“You looked like a girl,” she says, laughing at Gio’s curls.
“I couldn’t bring myself to cut it,” Maria says.
“Remember when you let me put it in pigtails?” Francesca says.
“I didn’t let you, I lost a bet,” Gio corrects her. “You know I’ve always been a man of my word.”
He turns the pages: family days out at Coney Island, Christmas trees in the corner of this very room, countless pictures of the kids behind the counter in the gelateria, some of them too small to see over it. This is the first time I’ve seen any other photographs of Santo besides my mother’s single shot. To me, he has forever been that cool guy frozen in the eighties, but of course he wasn’t always. Here I see how his life played out. The lines that bracket his mouth, the receding hairline, and the family he built.
Gio turns the page again and the strangest of sensations slides over my bones, and it’s nothing to do with the wine or the limoncello.
“That’s my father, Felipe,” Gio says, touching a black-and-white photo. “With Papa.”
Felipe is standing with his arm slung over Santo’s shoulders, both of them holding half-full pint glasses and laughing into the lens. Felipe has an electric guitar hung over his tall skinny body, and the sweaty sheen of someone who has been under the glare of stage lights.
Several small explosions happen in my head at once. I’ve seen Gio’s biological father in photos before. He was in my mother’s band. But it’s not only that. The photo looks as if it was taken late at night in a club, and in the background, her face turned away from the camera, is my mother.
“Was he in a band?” I manage. I’m glad everyone has had a few drinks, because I’m struggling to process this and aware my voice sounds strained. Pieces begin to slot into place in my head as I sit there. This is how my mother is connected to the Belottis. This is how she met Santo.
“He was always in some band or other,” Gio says. “Still is.”
“He never really grew up,” Maria says. There’s no edge to her voice; it’s clear she doesn’t in any way resent Gio’s presence as the son she’d never have otherwise had.
I’m suddenly sickly warm from the fire and over-full of food and wine, and just too damn blindsided to sit here for even a second longer.
“I need to nip to the bathroom,” I say, getting unsteadily to my feet.
“Off the hall,” Sophia reminds me.
I wait until I’m in the bathroom and I’ve locked the door, then sit down heavily on the closed loo and drop my head in my hands. I’m shaking. It was such a shock to see my mum in the Belotti family album, thank goodness her face was turned away—our likeness was always the first thing commented on by strangers as I grew up.
I wish I hadn’t had that limoncello, I can’t think straight. My mother barely told me anything about Santo, certainly not that his brother was the guitarist in her band. God. She was in their album. My mother is in Gio’s family album. I feel like an imposter, a cuckoo in the nest, and I want to go home. I should never have agreed to come here. I stay in the loo as long as I dare, running myself through the breathing exercises I’ve used often since I left Adam, calming down, getting a grip so I don’t go out there and blow it. If it wasn’t terribly rude I’d grab my coat and let myself out without facing them all again, but because that would look ridiculous, I splash some cool water on my face and meet my own eyes in the mirror. My mother’s blue eyes. Oh Mum. I miss you so much, but you’ve got me into a right bloody mess here. Straightening my shoulders, I head back into the living room.
Games have been fetched in my absence; Bella is setting up Monopoly and Pascal has cards.
I hesitate for a second, feeling like an outsider, and then Gio glances over and catches my eye.
“I think I’m going to call it a night,” I say, one foot tucked awkwardly behind my other ankle. “I’ve had a migraine threatening all day, I should probably get home to bed.”
It sounds stupid as I say it, and I’m certain they all know I’m lying.
“But I was going to let you be the top hat,” Bella says, holding the small silver playing piece on her outstretched palm.
“She always insists on being the top hat,” Gio tells me. “That’s quite something.”
I smile back. “I was always the boot.”
Gio throws his hands out. “That’s my piece.”
“What can I say? We can never play Monopoly,” I say, pulling my phone from the back pocket of my jeans. “I’m really sorry, Bella. Another time, I promise.”
Gio gets to his feet. “Come on, Bells, we’ll leave too—we’re going the same way, we can give Iris a ride.”
I see Bella’s face fall and feel terrible.
“Let Bella stay over,” Sophia interjects, lining up the banker’s money on the table. “It’s about time I beat her at this. Plus, if you go, I get to be the boot.”
Bella sits back down at the table and pushes the silver boot toward Sophia, then looks up again at Gio as an afterthought.
“Is that okay, Dad? Please?”
He looks at her, frowning, as if he’s unsure what to do.
“You stay too,” I say quickly. “I’m fine going on my own. I’ll just call a Lyft, it’ll be here in a jiffy.”