Page 97 of Summer Longing
Until she heard a knock at the door.
Marco didn’t move. She shook him gently. “Someone’s knocking at the door,” she whispered.
“What time is it?” he mumbled.
“I don’t know—early.”
He sat up and kissed her.
“What lunatic is coming by at this hour?” he said. He pulled on his boxers and a T-shirt and made his way to the door. She watched him open it.
“Why aren’t you answering your phone?” Lidia said from outside, her voice frantic.
Olivia sat up and pulled the sheet around her bare chest.
“I was asleep,” he said. “What’s going on?”
“Can I come in? I don’t need the whole neighborhood hearing our business.”
Marco glanced back at Olivia. She widened her eyes. He turned back to the doorway. “Ma, it’s not a good time.”
“Not a good time? This is a family emergen—oh.Oh. You’re…not alone?”
Olivia found her discarded clothes on the floor and quickly pulled on her sundress from the night before.
Marco slipped outside and closed the front door behind him.
Olivia sat on the edge of the bed. This was ridiculous. She felt like a teenager who’d been busted sneaking into her boyfriend’s bedroom. And maybe she deserved to feel like that. Keeping their relationship a secret suddenly seemed childish.
She took a deep breath and, barefoot and with disheveled hair, walked out into the bright morning sun to stand beside Marco. Lidia, clearly surprised, said, “Oh, good morning, Olivia.”
Marco looked uncomfortable.
“I hope everything is okay,” Olivia said.
“It’s Jaci,” Lidia said. “She’s packing up and leaving.”
“Today?” Olivia said.
“Today! She won’t say why, and she won’t hear a word about staying the rest of the summer. I don’t know what’s gotten into her.”
“Ma, you have to calm down,” Marco said. “I’ll talk to her.”
“Your father is beside himself. She won’t listen to us,” Lidia said as if Marco hadn’t spoken.
“Maybe I could talk to her?” Olivia said. She still felt guilty for having been so cavalier with her advice, essentially telling Jaci to feel free to disregard her family and just live her life. This, of course, had been before Olivia knew her family. Before she’d fallen in love with Marco. And, yes, before the thaw in her feelings toward her own mother. “I’m just thinking, since I’m sort of an objective outsider, she might at least hear me out. She seems really interested in my, um, life in New York. I have a feeling a lot of this is coming from her confusion about balancing her life here with you guys and wanting to have a career someday.”
Lidia closed her eyes and rubbed her forehead. “I’m willing to try anything at this point,” she said.
“I don’t know if that’s a good idea,” Marco said.
“It’s worth a try,” Olivia said. “Trust me.”
“Olivia, if you think it would help, then by all means, try. I’ll walk you over to the house right now,” Lidia said.
“Ma, give us a second, okay?” Marco took her by the hand, pulled her into the studio, and closed the door. “You don’t have to get involved in this,” he said.
“I want to.”
