The Husband Diet (A Romantic Comedy) (25 page)

Chapter 36:

April Fools and Irises

M
addy’s Minnie Mouse model, hanging from her bedroom ceiling, seemed to be suspended miles and miles above me. I had the sensation I was lying, stuck, at the bottom of the ocean, under a periscope that was focused on the Disney character. Minnie. Mickey. Goofy. Maddy loved them all.

“Minnie and Mickey Mouse,” I murmured with a smile as Julian’s face came into focus at the top of the periscope. He had come to bring me back to the surface. “Disneyworld…”

“Poor thing,” I heard a familiar voice say. Marcy. “She thinks she’s a little girl again. She wants to go to Disneyworld.”

“Bullshit,” came another familiar voice. Judy. “She’s always hated Disneyworld, Marcy, don’t you even
remember
?”

“Disneyworld!” came Julian’s voice again as I heard him click his phone open. “Detective Petersen? Block all the roads to Florida! Erica thinks they may be headed for Disneyworld.”

“Thank you,” I whispered, but it was already dark again.

* * *

I woke up to the sound of Maddy’s voice.

Had I dreamed it? Or was she downstairs playing in the living room as usual? I jumped out of bed and flew down the stairs where my parents and Detective Petersen were watching a family video of Maddy’s sixth birthday party. I turned away, tears running down my cheeks as Julian was coming in through the open door.

“Mom!” I heard, and whirled to see Warren as he catapulted himself into my arms and I clung to him desperately, wishing I could take his fears and pain away. Wishing I could dissolve his anger and hatred. They had never done
me
any good.

“Warren, sweetheart!” I cried, nearly strangling him. “She’s okay, you’ll see.”

“I know it,” he answered, his lips trembling. “Dad doesn’t hate her. Even if he doesn’t care. Right?”

I hoped Ira cared for Maddy a lot more than he hated me. I nodded, and he threw his arms around me again.

I glanced at Julian. His eyes were red and his face had the shadow of a beard. How much time had elapsed since Maddy had gone? How many hours had she been begging Ira to take her back home? Did Maxine have the sense to take care of her properly? Oh, God, I didn’t even want to think of what I’d do when I got my hands on both of them. Death wasn’t enough. I had something more twisted in mind, like re-enacting all my murderous dreams on him—all at the same time.

“Get some sleep, Julian,” I said, bringing myself back from my murderous thoughts. “Don’t worry about me. I’m going to be sitting on the phone until the damn thing rings.”

But instead Julian produced a box of muffins and coffee from Starbucks. “Eat. You need to keep your sugar levels up.”

He was the only man who had ever said that to me. Marcy actually had the gall to gasp and say, “Why don’t I just get you some yoghurt or something?”

Julian turned and incinerated her with a look that was worse than my evil eye, and she stepped back. If I hadn’t been so terrified for Maddy I would have laughed. Old Marcy had finally found a man who didn’t succumb to her charms.

As I was upstairs getting dressed, Julian’s cell phone rang.

“Erica!” he called, flying up the stairs. On the landing he grabbed my arms. “It’s Maxine! She’s called the police and Ira’s under their custody. Maddy’s with her and they’re on their way over with a squad car!” I covered my mouth with my hands—
my baby was coming home
!

When she came in through the door, whimpering “Mommy, Mommy!” I couldn’t keep my tears back any longer, clawing at her, squeezing her so tight I thought I’d break her.

“Baby!” was all I could say over and over for the first few minutes, then I cleared her face of her pretty reddish-blonde curls and whispered, “It’s all right, Maddy. Mommy’s here and I’m never going to let anything happen to you, okay?”

She nodded fiercely and threw her little arms around me again. “Maxine bought me some toys. She said she was going to take me home because Daddy was mad again.”

Warren threw himself at us, and I caught a glimpse of Maxine in the corner, talking to some police agents. Her stomach was incredibly huge now.

Julian watched us, his eyes shiny and red. Maddy looked up, noticing him.

“Hey, sweetie pie,” he whispered and she flew into his arms, burying her face into his stomach as he bent to kiss the top of her head, whispering comforting words to her. He lifted her and she rested her head against his, just happy to be there.

“I’m glad Maxine didn’t forget your number after all,” I muttered, wiping my eyes.

Maxine whispered, “I’m so sorry. I didn’t know he’d
abducted
her. He said you and Julian were going away somewhere. He said you were on better terms now and—”

“It’s okay, Maxine. Really.” I nodded at her, indicating the sofa for her to sit down. I wasn’t angry at her anymore. I was just grateful she had brought my daughter back to me before Ira became dangerous again.

“I don’t know what happened to him,” she sniffed as she slowly lowered herself next to me. “One minute he was fine, and the next—he just lost it because we had to go to the bathroom. Only then did I realize it was dangerous for us to stay with him. So I locked Maddy and myself up in the bathroom at a gas station and called the police.”

“You saved my baby’s life. Thank you,” I whispered, wondering how I could ever repay her.

* * *

“I need to speak to him,” I said to the detective as Ira was ushered into a private office, paler, scrawnier and skinnier than he’d ever been. There was a strange light in his eyes that I didn’t recognize and it scared me. The Ira I knew, I could handle. This Ira was someone I’d never seen before.

“Yes, ma’am. There will be an officer in there with you at all times for your safety.”

“Do you want me to come in with you?” Julian asked softly.

“I can do it, thanks.”

He nodded and whispered, “That’s my girl.”

I smiled wanly and sat in the chair facing the bulletproof glass. But it sure wasn’t hatred-proof. I hated him so much I was trembling, but I had something to say to him.

“I’m glad you’re finally out of our life. Don’t ever look for us. The answer will always be
no
,” I informed him and turned on my heel.

Tuscany. I could almost see it.

* * *

That night, after my family had come and quickly gone, as they always did when I was in trouble, I turned to Julian as he was climbing into his jacket.

“Julian, I don’t want you to have to leave every night.”

As a response, he took my face in his hands and bent to kiss me on the lips. “It’s not an April Fool’s joke, is it?” he asked. “Are you serious?”

Julian drew me into the circle of his arms and hooked his thumbs into the belt around my jeans. “
I
’d be the fool to let you go,” I murmured as he lowered his delicious mouth to mine. “I love you,” I finally whispered and it felt like going home.

* * *

I was spending more and more time with Julian at his home teaching him to cook. Well, not only. I imparted instructions and information, underlining the importance of using genuine
Italian
ingredients such as pure
Tuscan
olive oil, meats and wine. He diligently obeyed, having no idea I was doing a real Italian job on him. It was working like a charm, because once the stuff had been put in the oven, he lost all concept of propriety and spread me on top of his island to kiss the hell out of me and engage in some pretty impressive preliminaries.

Today we were doing
Tortino al formaggio
, which was basically a cheese and ham pie. But not just any ham or cheese. I’d swung by Italian Gifts and picked up some fresh
Parmigiano Reggiano
cheese and
Prosciutto di Parma
ham, some Calabrian onions (small but potent) and some
Panna da Cucina Parmalat
, Italian cooking cream. Yum-yum.

Julian pulled me to him to sneak a kiss. First they were clean, perfunctory kisses on my lips, but soon they became deeper, needier.

“Oh, wow...” he drawled into my ear, his teeth nibbling on my earlobes and my throat, making me shake. “You smell so good. I want to take you upstairs and taste you ever so slowly...”

I was too excited to answer; my brain was short-circuiting at the idea of having him in my bed again.

* * *

At work, things were always hectic, just the way I liked it. And sometimes you even got little satisfactions. Mr. Simmons, a very annoying guest whom I’d handled brilliantly, turned out to be the owner of a rival hotel in New England, The Pilgrim. He’d offered me a position over at his chain and I realized that his increasing difficulty as a guest had simply been him running me through his tests. Apparently I’d passed with flying colors. I was flattered, but politely refused. Soon I was going to be in Italy, if I had any say in it.

And... I had managed it. My irises were finally starting to bloom in my now beautiful garden. Swallows began to circle the yard out back, diving to catch any insect stupid enough to hang around. I leaned out the window, my elbows on the sill, and sighed with what I believe was contentment after a very long time. I’d been right. It had been an endless winter. I thought about all that had happened to us this past winter. If I’d survived it, I’d survive
anything
in the future.

Chapter 37:

Truth is Freedom

T
he next day I got a call from my Aunt Monica to stop by at
Le Tre Donne.
“Hello?” I called out to the empty dining hall. “
Zia
Maria? Martina? Monica?”

Silence, and then a burst from the kitchen and three happy women bearing gifts. Never trust three happy Italian women bearing gifts.

“
Vieni qui
, Erica, come and sit down. We have something for you,” said
Zia
Maria as the other two huddled around her, their faces red with excitement.

“What’s up? Why is the shop closed?” The last time one of my family closed a shop was when
Nonna
had died. I bolted to my feet again. “Is someone ill?”

“
Zitta, zitta!”
They silenced me, looking around.
Zia
Monica locked the door and pulled down the blinds. “Everything is fine.”

“So why do I feel like we’re in a mob movie and I’m going to get a half-moon stuck in my throat?” I chuckled. Sometimes they could be so dramatic it was sweet.

“We were cleaning out the storage room and found some of
Nonna
’s stuff that she left for you. It’s time you had it.”

“Had what?” I asked, curious and intrigued by the whole setting: the empty restaurant, the air of secrecy and the bright eyes. Out of a large cardboard box hidden under the table, they each pulled out a packet as I eyed them, confused. Then they passed me an envelope.

I stared at them and
Zia
Monica rolled her eyes. “Come on, will you? I’m dying to see your face!”

“Why? What is it? Stocks? Bonds? Are we suddenly rich?” Maybe the kids and I could move, lock, stock and barrel, back to Tuscany after all? Maybe find a nice farmhouse and rent out a few rooms? Anything to get away from the rat race.

Still eyeing them, I carefully opened the envelope addressed to me. It was wrinkled and grey. I froze as I recognized the writing:

My Dearest Granddaughter Erica, light of my life,

Although I probably won’t be there to celebrate you coming into womanhood, I wanted to leave you four gifts.

The first is for your own home one day.

The second is for your matrimonial bed.

The third is for you personally.

The fourth will free you.

You were not blessed with a good mother and we have all tried to make up for her faults. Use your strength to get through life and to keep it light and think of love—the possibility of real love—when you are down.

I love you with all my heart,

Nonna Silvia Bettarini.

When I finally managed to see through my tears,
Zia
Maria nudged me softly. “Go on—open it,” she whispered, her voice shattered, her eyes red. On either side of her my aunts nodded.

The first gift, the one for my own home one day, was a large set of white linen hand-embroidered curtains, signed at the bottom in linen thread by
Nonna
herself. I stared up at my aunts who were now in tears, patting me. This stuff was worth thousands and thousands of dollars. But to me it was priceless because I knew what an endless feat it was once you started the work, assuming you had the talent to do so. I lightly touched the linen, waves of sorrow passing through me.
Nonna
. My one and only
Nonna
.

“Go on, this one next,”
Zia
Martina said, passing me the medium-sized parcel.

I opened it to find a matching linen sheet, pillow cases and coverlet, again all hand-embroidered. The linen was smooth and the embroidery flawless. As a child I’d seen this stuff in my
Nonna
’s Italian magazines. I also remembered that year in, year out I’d seen her working on them. I hadn’t realized they were for
me
.

“And now for your third gift,”
Zia
Monica whispered, sniffling.

“But—what did I do to—?”

“You don’t know?”
Zia
Maria chuckled. “You’re one of us, Erica—absolutely nothing like Marcy. And
Nonna
wanted you to know.”

“But I’m not! I’m nothing like you!” I protested under my breath, and they all laughed at me, patting me on the back and handing me the smallest parcel, which fit in my hands. Despite my doubts I tore at the plain brown paper and stared. Inside was a rectangular blue velvet box. With tight lips and shaky hands, I opened it and peered inside. It was a beautiful pearl necklace, identical to the ones my aunts – and
Nonna
Silvia—wore on special occasions—but with a gold E hanging from the clasp at the back.
Zia
Monica slipped it around my neck and the cool pearls nestled under my collarbone.

“E for Erica,” I choked, and my aunts all looked at one another.

I sat there like an idiot, trying to make some sense of what had happened, as if from one day to another I had magically become someone else, someone who deserved something so precious, something so rare.

“There’s still your fourth gift, Erica,”
Zia
Monica said softly, glancing at her sisters, who winced. “Well, we have to—don’t you remember the pact?”

Zia
Martina nodded and sighed. “I knew this was going to happen.”

“Pact? What pact?” I asked, raising my eyebrow. Was it true that they really were sorceresses or fairies of some kind? I always knew there was a special, magical bond there and that
Nonna
Silvia was at the heart of it.

“Well, we thought Marcy and Edoardo would’ve taken care of it by now,”
Zia
Maria explained.

“Well, they didn’t, as Mamma had predicted,”
Zia
Monica answered and then turned to me, a hand on my knee. “
Nonna
must have forgotten to do this—she was not well toward the end and it must’ve slipped her mind.”

“
What? What must’ve slipped her mind
?”

At that point,
Zia
Maria reached into the box and pulled out another parcel. I unwrapped it to find an old, leather-bound family album. One I’d never seen before. Now pictures of Marcy, I’ve seen a
million
times, but family pictures, where they were all together, were a rarity because
Nonna
had always taken them, but never been in them. But she was in many here, I noticed with satisfaction as I flipped through the album.

There were pictures of a beautiful medieval town, San Gimignano, from where the Bettarinis had originated. I’d recognized the old towers that the most powerful families had built to assert their commercial and financial prowess among their rival families.

There were pictures of their large farmhouse, the stables and stalls, the cheeses and hanging prosciuttos. A family that had been doing well. And then the war had come, taking my grandfather away from
Nonna
, leaving her no choice but to sell up and go.

But something made me stop and go back to page one, as if I already unconsciously knew that there was more. One particular picture had caught my eye. The women were there in their Sunday best, all pretty and frilly, between five and fifteen years of age, standing on the steps of an old Medieval church in Tuscany. I smiled, recognizing younger versions of Marcy (whose name back then was Marcella),
Zia
Maria,
Zia
Monica,
Zia
Martina and… Marcy again?

I looked back at the Marcy on the left, then at the Marcy on the right. It was an old photo that had been folded and had a crease down the middle to show for it. Had the image on the left bled onto the background of the right-hand side, producing a copy of Marcy?

I now know that in my mind I was trying to come up with the easiest, less painful solution.

I took a closer look. There was no mistaking it. There
were
two Marcys. And dressed exactly the same. Twins.

“What’s going on here?” I asked my aunts, who were all holding their breath. “How come we were never told we had another aunt? Where is she now?”

“Her name was Emanuela. And she had a baby.”

I stared at them. “We have a cousin and we didn’t know? Where do they live? In Tuscany?”

“Manu—Emanuela—died,”
Zia
Maria croaked as if it was difficult for her to speak. “She was your mother’s twin. They were physically identical, but on the inside they couldn’t have been more different. Manu was sweet, selfless, a hard worker. She had excellent grades. And a young man who loved her and was going to marry her. But she got pregnant before that and died during labor.”

Oh my God.
“Where’s the child? Was it a boy or a girl?”

They turned to stare at me sadly and I understood. “It died too?”

Zia
Martina shook her head slowly, her eyes never leaving mine, until I got this real creepy crawly itch at the back of my neck where the gold E hung. And then I understood. This was her necklace—Emanuela’s.

I am the daughter of Emanuela Bettarini.
My mother’s dead twin. I was never Marcy’s daughter. “I am Emanuela’s baby,” I whispered and
Zia
Maria sobbed, reaching for me as the other two hugged me and stroked my hair. Dumb-struck, my mind on pause, frozen in time, I tried to thaw the concept, to accept it into reality.

I was Emanuela’s daughter. I was not Marcy’s daughter. And that, precisely, was why she had never loved me. Not because I was unlovable or unworthy of anyone’s love, but because I didn’t
belong
to her. I never had, and never would. I swallowed and looked up at my aunts’ beaming faces. “And my father? My real father?”

“Edoardo
is
your real father, sweetie. He was Manu’s husband to be. He loved her completely. And still hasn’t gotten over it.”

My father, in love with another woman. In love with my real mother. That certainly explained my father’s melancholic sweetness.

“Marcy had been in love with your dad for years,”
Zia
Monica explained. “And when he chose Manu she was heartbroken. But when Manu died—”

“Marcy saw her chance to swoop in,” I finished for my aunt, who nodded and bit her lip.

I finished the sentence for her. “The only catch was she had to take care of me. Jesus, what a price to pay for a husband, huh?” As if I hadn’t known.

All this time… all this time she had resented me because I’d been the deal breaker in her marriage. If she wanted my dad, which she did, she had to take me on as her daughter. A child she had never wanted.

I looked up at my aunts through a swell of tears.

“We were there, every step of the way, you know that,”
Zia
Maria said defensively. “All of us. That’s why you lived in the same building as us. So we could all keep an eye on Marcy and…”

“And love me like she never could?” I whispered and, after a few moments, they all nodded simultaneously.

That was why Marcy never appreciated her sisters—but heavily depended on them all the same to take me to school and back, help me with my homework, growing pains and… life in general. They had represented, in Marcy’s little mind, a necessary evil. But she got away when she could, with what she could, by ignoring me most of the time. Living under the same roof so that everyone would think she was acting as my mother. Everyone, I’m now sure, knew the truth. Everyone from Bartolo the butcher to Mirella from
Mirella’s merceria
knew my family’s story. The story of how I was born. Everyone except for me.

It all finally,
finally
, made sense. I looked down at the album and leafed through some more while they each told me stories about my real mother, of how she loved my father and how he was going crazy after her death. Emanuela.

She had been the smartest in her class. She loved sports (I sure hadn’t inherited that from her), painting (that I did) and was training to get a junior flying license. Now that was something I would love to do myself.

Although Emanuela and Marcy were like chalk and cheese, they were sent away together to England (didn’t Marcy hate England?), perhaps to help them bond. It had only been a waste of time and money.

And now suddenly I didn’t know who I was anymore. And I’d thought I’d been doing just fine with the divorce thing. Being really strong and determined and all. Who the hell was I? I didn’t know anymore. I’d never known. And now I felt… lost.

I gathered my things and stood up slowly, feeling a hundred years old.

“Are you okay?”
Zia
Monica wanted to know.

“Leave her,”
Zia
Maria ordered. “She needs time now.”

I nodded. “Time.” I knew exactly what I needed.

* * *

A couple of hours of brooding later hadn’t been enough so I went to my parents’ home and used my key. Thinking of Marcy as my non-mother was surprisingly easy. And uplifting.

She was lying in bed, leafing through a magazine. The pose that I would always remember her in. She looked up, startled. “Erica, what are you doing here?” No,
Hi, sweetheart, how nice to see you.
It was yet another piece that fit the puzzle.

“Why didn’t you ever tell me you had a twin sister?” I whispered.

Her eyes widened, then narrowed. “Where did you get that crazy idea from?”

“From this,” I managed, shoving the album in her face. Marcy pushed the album away from her nose to focus and suddenly paled.

“Well?” I prompted.

“I’m sorry you had to find out this way. We wanted to tell you, your dad and I, but no time ever seemed right.”

I rubbed my face in exhaustion. Why oh why was everything always so difficult?

“Sit down, sweetheart. It’s time you knew.”

Sweetheart? Now she calls me sweetheart. “I already know. I want to know why you never told me. Why the big secret? Why have we never seen any pictures?”

To which Marcy sighed. “Your dad has tons of them, only he keeps them to himself. I don’t interfere with his lost dream.”

I was surprised Marcy could admit defeat so easily. “He loved her very much and I was nothing.”