Page 42 of Far from Home
‘Well, make sure you invite him into the house when he takes you home. Repeat after me.’ She adopted a seductive voice. ‘Would you like to come in for a coffee or something? That should do the trick, especially if you let your voice linger on the word “something”. Okay, then when you’ve got him inside, you lock the door and ravish him.’
Amy almost spilt her wine. ‘Luce, I’ve never ravished anybody in my life. I’ll take it slowly and naturally. Like they say here in Italy,che sarà sarà.’
‘Time, Amy, time. Remember that time is of the essence.’
Amy knew that only too well.
That afternoon she spent an interesting couple of hours bottling the wine, and it wasn’t all easy going. First she had to wash the empty bottles and in so doing she evicted a number of sinister-looking spiders. She had never been a fan of anything with eight legs and, in particular, two or three of the spiders she discovered had extremely hairy legs and she didn’t like the look of them at all. Still, she didn’t like killing any animal so she assiduously caught them one by one with the aid of a glass and a postcard and took them out of the French windows and relocated them in the shrubbery, hoping they didn’t have a homing instinct. As a result, it took her twice as long to wash the bottles than she had anticipated, but it soon turned out that this had been the easy part.
She remembered using a rubber tube to syphon liquid in science class at school but the plastic pipe that Pierpaolo had located in the cellar was three times as thick, two or three metres long and definitely more of a challenge. The first problem immediately became apparent. The builders had placed the huge fifty litre glass container on the kitchen floor but she knew that the end of the tube submerged in the wine had to be higher than the bottles she was filling for gravity to do its work. There was no way she could lift the container onto the table so she had to settle for dragging it close to the door to the cellar and doing her bottling on the second step down. The next problem was that in order to start the flow of wine she had to suck so hard she almost ran out of breath and then when the wine finally arrived at her end of the tube it arrived at such speed that it went up her nose, made her choke, and sprayed all over her.
She gradually got the hang of it and by four o’clock the kitchen table was covered with full bottles of wine, each with a few millimetres of clear oil on top of the liquid and a simple cork to conserve it. She was seriously concerned that this wouldn’t be enough to stop the wine from going off so she went out and looked in the vines until she found Signor Montalcino. After explaining why her clothes were splashed with red wine, she told him what she had done. He reassured her that this was the right way to do it and she had nothing to worry about. Feeling pleased with herself, she returned to the house and set about storing the bottles in the kitchen cupboards. By the time she had finished and went into the bathroom to clean up, she found that the wine on her hands had dried almost a blue colour rather than red. Still, it all washed off after a bit of scrubbing and she was relieved that she wouldn’t have to have her date with Adam looking as though she was wearing purple gloves.
That evening, changed into a clean top and leaving her wine-stained T-shirt to soak, she and her four-legged friend walked through the town to the pizzeria. It was another gorgeous warm night and when she sat down at table she checked on her phone and saw that the temperature in London was currently half what it was here. That, too, was going to be a shock to the system, when or if she went back.
She was just finishing another wonderfulpizza ai frutti di marewhen her phone rang and she saw that it was Dominica.
‘Ciao, Domenica, have you been able to persuade Rolando to come and talk to me?’
‘Hi, Amy, I’ve had a long talk to him – well, several long talks to be honest – and he’s finally agreed to sit down and talk to you. He says he’s free any evening this week.’
‘That’s great news. Why don’t you two come round for dinner tomorrow? Would that be okay? My new kitchen’s up and running now.’
‘Thank you so much. Tomorrow will be fine and, Amy, don’t let it bother you if he’s still a bit surly. He’ll soften up once he’s got to know you, I’m sure.’
‘Let’s hope so.’
The following night all went well as far as the food was concerned, or at least as well as could be expected for somebody with a new kitchen. Amy decided to go with a tried and tested favourite: her go-to chicken casserole, made with white wine, leeks and mushrooms. This was to be accompanied by a selection of vegetables roasted in the oven.
As she prepared the meal that afternoon, she found herself in reflective mood. On the one hand she was nervous at how Rolando was going to react to sitting down to dinner with her, but on the other hand she was excited to forge closer links with her only living relation whose existence had been completely unknown to her until barely a handful of days earlier. This meant that when the doorbell rang at seven thirty she was feeling both pensive and apprehensive.
Domenica was on her own. She came in and kissed Amy on the cheeks before apologising, telling her that Rolando had called to say he would be a few minutes late. Amy hadn’t planned on eating until eight, so she assured Domenica that was no problem, but secretly found herself wondering if this might be the prequel to Rolando crying off.
Domenica handed Amy a brown envelope. ‘You asked if I had some photos of Martin. I’ve got lots more and some time we can go through them together, but I thought you might like to have these for yourself. I have copies, so just keep them.’
They sat down side by side on the sofa and Amy opened the envelope, tipping out a dozen or so photos. Some were obviously taken at the seaside, one was taken somewhere in the mountains as her father was dressed in skiing gear, and a couple were of him looking very smart in a dinner jacket and bow tie. One in particular stood out. It was a close-up of his face, and she could see him in fine detail, from the colour of his eyes to the gentle, loving smile on his face. Somehow the eyes reached deep inside her and by the time she slipped the photos back into the envelope again, both she and Dominica had tears in their eyes.
To change the subject and while waiting for Rolando to arrive, Amy jumped to her feet and gave Domenica a full tour of the house and got the impression she was impressed, but she couldn’t miss the nostalgic look in Domenica’s eyes when they climbed the stairs and inspected the newly redecorated bedrooms, bathrooms, and her father’s study. In consequence Amy didn’t hang about and made sure they returned to the ground floor as quickly as possible. She was relieved to find that the chicken was still bubbling away happily and the roast vegetables hadn’t turned to a crisp. She opened a bottle of the local spumante, filled two glasses and saw Domenica gradually recover and start looking around the renovated kitchen.
‘Martin was a very generous man but he hardly spent any money on himself or on the house. I’m sure he wouldn’t recognise the place now. You’ve done so well.’
‘It was all done by some super local tradesmen who knew my father. I’m going to invite them all for a meal some time to say thank you.’ Although she was counting off the days until she would have to leave. ‘In fact, I’d like to have a party for all the friends I’ve made since I arrived here.’ She caught Domenica’s eye. ‘And hopefully Rolando will be one of the guests.’
They had just returned to the lounge area and were standing chatting when the doorbell rang. Amy took a deep breath, went over and opened the door.
‘Ciao, Rolando.’ She used the familiar greeting.
‘Buona sera, Signora.’ His choice of a more formal response spoke volumes but at least, she told herself, he was here.
‘Do come in, please.’ She carried on speaking to him in Italian as she imagined he probably hadn’t spent long enough with his father to have picked up much English.
She led him over to where his mother was standing and as she reached for the bottle of fizz to give him a drink she couldn’t help noticing how he was staring about with an expression on his face that was somewhere between awe and disgust. After handing him his glass she decided to take the bull by the horns and be the first to try to make conversation.
‘The builders have just finished. I imagine it’s changed a lot since you were last here.’
He returned his gaze to her and shook his head stiffly. ‘I wouldn’t know, Signora. I’ve never been in here.’
‘Oh, I see.’
