The Last Promise Read online

  The pickpocket, his wrist still in Ross’s grasp, dropped the wallet. As the bus slowed for the next stop, the thief yanked his hand from Ross and jumped off the bus, knocking an elderly woman over as he did so. He quickly disappeared down a side street.

  The man stooped down and picked up his wallet. “That was close,” he said to Ross. “Thank you.”

  “Give him a reward, Martin,” the woman said.

  He fished a couple of ten-thousand-lire bills from his wallet and offered them to Ross.

  Ross waved them off. “No, grazie.”

  “I insist.”

  “Say, insist-a. Just add an ‘a’ to it, sometimes they understand that.”

  Ross just waved. “Veramente, no.”

  “I don’t think he wants it,” Martin said to his wife. He turned to Ross. “Well, I sure as heck appreciate it,” he said, shoving the thick wallet into the same back pocket it had just been lifted from. “Grand-ay gra-zee.”

  “Prego,” Ross said again. They stood in silence as the bus jogged along, until a few minutes later, when the woman pointed ahead. “There’s the big dome up ahead. I think the next one’s our stop.”

  A moment later the couple stepped from the bus, and turned back before the doors closed. “Grazee, again.”

  Ross smiled. “There are a lot of pickpockets in Florence, sir. It’s best to leave a wallet that big in your hotel.”

  The couple just stared at him in wonder as the door closed.

  At the next stop Ross stepped off the bus and walked a half block to the Uffizi.

  Even before he entered the gallery’s courtyard he could feel his mood begin to change.

  The Uffizi was more than a gallery to Ross, it was a temple, and standing before its art was a religious experience.

  During his darkest hours, when faith deserted him, art had been his closest link to divinity and it still sustained him. He felt his work a calling in the same way some feel a calling to preach the word. That is what he was, he decided—a preacher, expounding the divinity of art. Though more times than not his pearls were cast before swine, before those too jet-lagged and culture-shocked to hear, but sometimes his sermons fell on willing ears, and he saw the light come into their eyes, and sometimes tears, and that was when he was happiest.

  By nine o’clock Ross had completed his first tour of the day. His second group canceled. Their tour bus had broken down in Siena, and Ross had waited in the courtyard for nearly an hour before Francesca found him and gave him the news. He took coffee at a bar in Piazza della Signoria then went out to the city to purchase a scooter.

  His first week in Italy he had decided that riding a scooter on the Italian roads was akin to a death wish, but he had since repented of the thought. A scooter was the only practical way around Florence. After a little while he found one he liked, a Piaggio Vespa, black and yellow like a wasp. He bought a helmet and lock and drove out of the dealership feeling more like a native. He drove to the northeast perimeter of Florence, upward to the hills of San Domenico and Fiesole. He stayed awhile in Fiesole, toured the Etruscan amphitheater and tombs. The town square, Piazza Mino, was as beautiful as he had been told it was, but there were too many tourists, so he drove back down from the hills, across the Arno toward Rendola.

  Earlier that morning, while Ross commuted to work, Eliana had taken coffee with Anna. The sky was a brilliant blue, and Eliana had opened an upstairs window near the parlor overlooking the courtyard.

  Anna spooned her third teaspoon of sugar into her coffee.

  “The American moved in yesterday.”

  “I saw him.”

  “He leaves for work early. He left at six this morning.”

  “Are you spying on him?”

  “Every chance I get. He’s very bello. And he speaks un buon italiano.”

  “Really?”

  “He speaks better Italian than my ex. I told him so.”

  “Gorbachev speaks better Italian than your ex. I could never understand his accent.”

  “Maybe you should go welcome him to the villa.”

  Eliana looked up over her cup at Anna. “By welcome him do you really mean seduce him?”

  “Certo.”

  Eliana laughed. “I’m married, Anna. For worse maybe, but until death do us part.”

  “We could only be so fortunate.”

  Eliana ignored the comment. “Why don’t you make a go of it? You definitely could use a man.”

  “Perhaps when I return. I may not have my looks anymore, but I’m definitely available. Isn’t that half the battle?”

  Eliana smiled, looked at Anna’s cup. “More coffee?”

  “Just half a cup, per favore.”

  Eliana took the cup to the counter and poured the coffee. “What’s his name?”

  “Ross,” she said, though the way she said it sounded more like Roz.

  “Is he here for work?”

  “I don’t know. I didn’t ask. He wired his rent from Switzerland.”

  Eliana finished her coffee, looking out over the courtyard at Ross’s apartment door.

  “Is Alessio still asleep?”

  “Penso di sì.” I think so.

  “It’s a shame. I wanted to say goodbye.”

  “I’d wake him but he needs to sleep. I’m pretty sure he’s sick. His cheeks are flushed.”

  “You’ll say goodbye for me?”

  “Certo. He’ll be sorry he missed you. You won’t be back until September?”

  “If I can stand being with Claudia for that long.”

  Eliana smiled. “If she’s such miserable company, why do you go on holiday with her?”

  Anna raised her hands. “Who else is there? You won’t come with me.”

  “Maybe if Maurizio was around.”

  “If Maurizio was around, I would not invite you.” She glanced over Eliana’s shoulder at the wall clock. “Is that the correct time?”

  “Sì.”

  “Claudia will be crazed if I’m late. I better go.” She downed her coffee; then the women walked to Anna’s apartment. Eliana helped her carry the last of her luggage out to her car and they kissed farewell.

  “Goodbye,” Eliana said.

  “I don’t say goodbye,” Anna replied. “I’ll see you soon.”

  Eliana leaned against the villa wall as she watched Anna drive off, her small red car disappearing at the end of the drive in a haze of dust. The world is flat, she thought. It drops off just a few kilometers from the grounds of Rendola. Maybe she should have gone to the sea. She already felt lonely.

  She looked out over the valley. The olive trees bristled from a summer breeze, dusty and blanched as the soil beneath them. As she crossed the courtyard, she glanced over at Ross’s door. Even though Anna had said he was gone, a part of her wished he would walk out at that moment. She wanted to meet him. And though she hadn’t admitted to noticing, what Anna had said was true. He was bello. From her window she had watched him move into his apartment with little more than a backpack—as free as the foreigners she often passed on the Chianti roads backpacking through Tuscany. There was something about his appearance that intrigued her. He had a rugged, yet boyish look.

  She buried the thought. She was starting to think like Anna. She didn’t want to notice. She was married. Married but not dead, Anna would have countered. Sometimes she felt even that was debatable.

  Still, for the next three weeks, he was her only neighbor. Was she to pretend he didn’t exist? Maybe she would make him a housewarming offering as Anna had suggested. It would be the right thing to do. It would be worth it just for the conversation in English.

  With the exception of her brief encounters with the American tourists who came to the wine tasting parties in the nearby frazione of Greve, it had been a while since she had spoken with an American.

  She went into her apartment and up to Alessio’s room. She quietly opened his door. Alessio was awake but still lying quietly in his bed.

  “How are you feeling, munchkin?”
/>   “Mommy, my head hurts. It feels like somebody sat on it.”

  She smiled. “I don’t think anyone did. But let me feel it.” She laid her cheek against his forehead, and as she had suspected, it was warm. And he was congested. This worried her more than the fever. The last time he had had a cold, he had suffered a serious asthma attack. She kissed his forehead. “You have a fever, little man. I’m going to get you a little medicine.”

  “No.”

  “It’s okay, it’s the grape chewy kind you like. And also a little something for your cough that tastes like cherry.”

  “Okay.”

  “Would you like a gelato to go with it?”

  “Sì.”

  “Chocolate or limone?”

  “Chocolate.”

  She kissed his forehead. “I’ll be right back.”

  A few minutes later Eliana returned with her hands full of health care: a damp washcloth, cough medicine, a plastic Mickey Mouse bowl filled with gelato and a couple Children’s Tylenol. She gave him the medicine, then folded the washcloth and laid it across his forehead.

  “Want me to read a book to you?”

  “I want to play Nintendo.”

  “Later. Books are better.” She went to a cabinet and brought out a stack of books. The first was one of his favorites: Prosciutto e Uova Verdi. Green Eggs and Ham. A thought crossed her mind. If someone had told her that someday she’d be reading Dr. Seuss to her child in Italian, she’d have thought them pazzo. She read several other books as well, in both English and Italian—it didn’t matter to Alessio—including his absolute favorite, an Italian pop-up book she had bought him for Halloween: Paura ed Orrore in via del Terrore. Fear and Horror on Terror Road.

  Alessio ate his gelato as she read. She paused once as he had a coughing fit and she set down the book to hold him. Alessio often coughed, as is common with asthma, but it was never without Eliana’s concern. She set up a small nest of sofa cushions and blankets in her painting studio then wheeled the television into the room, so she could keep an eye on him as she painted. She could not risk leaving his side.

  There was a new blank space on the wall in her studio. She had taken her favorite landscape to the new apartment—I Girasole di Arezzo, she called it. It was a picture of sunflowers she had painted last summer just outside the Tuscan township of Arezzo. She already missed it. She wondered why she had given that one to the new tenant.

  Why does a man come alone to live in Italy? she wondered . She had lived in Italy long enough, had met enough expatriates, to know that whether anyone knows it or not, no one lands in Italy by accident. And if you listen to their excuses long enough and care enough to ask questions, you will eventually discover the real reason they are there, and it usually turns out to be only a shadow of the reason first proffered.

  She thought of her own reason for being there and of the man who had brought her. Where was Maurizio now? Where would he be tonight? Or with whom? A darkness rose up in her thoughts. If she didn’t love him, why did his philandering still make her crazy with jealousy? Was jealousy a sign of love? She wasn’t sure, but if so, maybe there was hope for her marriage yet, as Maurizio was wildly jealous of her. As jealous as a Sicilian, Anna had said.

  During their second year in Italy, as they prepared to rent out part of the villa, they had had some electrical work done. One of the electricians, a young, handsome apprentice maybe three years younger than Eliana, had paid more attention to Eliana than Maurizio thought necessary. Maurizio threatened him so fiercely that the young man dared not even look at her, would not speak to her again—not even to request payment.

  But if Maurizio loved her, how could he cheat on her? What part of his love for her allowed him to rendezvous with a different woman in every city? Or was it a different woman? She honestly didn’t know if he had just one mistress or many. If she had to choose, it would be many. Dozens. Hundreds. That way they could remain faceless. That way it wouldn’t be about how she compared to another woman. It would be more about him. But his dalliances were not the only hardship in their relationship. She was equally jealous of his most demanding mistress—his work. I do it for you, he said. You and Alessio. But that is not what she or Alessio needed. What they needed most was his attention and companionship.

  The reality was that Maurizio would live his life this way whether she and Alessio existed or not. Even when he was home, which was less than one week out of the month, his distance had become increasingly obvious.

  He rarely left the house while he was in town, as he was always too tired for going out to dinner or to the cinema. I eat out every night, he said. I’m tired of eating out. I want your cooking. He intended it as a compliment and never understood why it didn’t please her.

  Four years earlier, fearful of the rut their relationship was falling into, she began looking for something that they might do together. She had loved to dance, once. So had he. They had met dancing. So she spent a week looking into dance classes. She found an adult class taught weekly at the community center in Grassina. She arranged with Manuela to watch Alessio one night a week, and she put a small deposit down to hold their place.

  When she told Maurizio what she had done, he laughed out loud. Only after he saw how angry it had made her did he take her seriously. He told her to go without him. Take Anna; she needs something to do. Surely there are other women you could dance with.

  She forfeited the deposit.

  When they were together, there was little more than polite conversation. No discussions about life or death or God or health or schooling or cooking. No more discussions of art, hers or others. Nothing of beauty was ever talked about. No theology, or poetry, or philosophy. At this point she’d welcome a travelogue, but he no longer even spoke of business, where he’d been or what he’d seen. For the most part their talk had become pragmatic.

  But perhaps most painful of all was that Maurizio seemed to have lost interest in her physically. He had once raved over her beauty. Tesoro mio, he called her when they first dated. My treasure. Now he did not even seem to notice her. She had no doubt that she could dress in her sexiest lingerie and parade in front of the television set during a soccer match and he would only ask her to move. She wondered if her looks had changed that much in the last six years, or if she only failed by comparison to other women younger and without blemish. Women with firmer breasts untouched by babies, with hips unbroadened and skin unstretched by childbirth.

  This rejection hurt less when he was gone, and as lonesome as she was, she would take the loneliness to his rejection—a dull ache compared to a sharp sting. She could handle ache. Handling ache was simply a matter of distraction, and there was always something else to occupy her mind.

  Alessio fell asleep in front of the television set. His fever had not yet broken, but his breathing seemed calm. She put away her paints and, without waking him, brought him out to the living room sofa so she could watch him while she cleaned.

  Eliana kept an immaculate house. It was one part of her life where she felt in control, and as a result she had become compulsive about it. Afterward she pulled the clothes from the washer and carried them outside to hang on the line, thinking for the millionth time how much she wished she had a dryer.

  Then she went into the kitchen and made two trays of chocolate chip cookies, one for them and one for their new neighbor.

  As the cookies baked, she called Manuela, her nanny, on the telephone to see how she was doing. Her husband answered the phone.

  “Ciao, Vittorio. How is Manuela?”

  “She’s still in bed.”

  “Is she feeling any better than she was yesterday?”

  “No, I don’t think so. She is still very sick.”

  “I’m sorry. Please give her my best.” She hung up the phone. It’s going to be a long weekend, she thought.

  A half hour later she heard the whine of a scooter outside the courtyard walls. She went to the window and slightly parted the sheer, embroidered curtain. She saw the f
ront gate open and Ross cross the courtyard, removing his helmet as he walked. He must have bought a motorino, she thought. Ross unlocked his door and disappeared inside. She looked at the plate of cookies and suddenly felt apprehensive. Why would he want to talk to her? Maybe she’d wait until Alessio was feeling better and have him take the cookies over.

  Around eight, Maurizio called. His voice, typically low and calm, was difficult to hear beneath the sound of the restaurant.

  “Amore, how’s your day?”

  “It’s okay. Alessio is sick.”

  “Is he okay?”

  “Yes. Where are you?”

  “I’m still in Genoa. Ascolta, I’m not going to be home tomorrow. I need to go back to Milano. One of my clients had a problem with an order. Seems half the shipment was corked.”

  “Can it wait? I really need your help. Manuela’s still sick. I don’t have anyone to watch Alessio so I can go out.”

  “Why do you need to go out?”

  Seven years ago the question would have astonished her. “To buy groceries, for one thing.”

  “Have Anna watch him for you.”

  “Anna left on holiday.”

  “Oh, that is a problem.” There was a long pause. “Well, what can I do, Eliana? I need to see the client. You have food in the house.”

  Eliana sighed. She had no fight left in her. “When will you be home?”

  “Next Wednesday. I am certain.”

  She ran her hand back through her hair. “All right. I’ll see you then.”

  She hung up the phone. Then she pounded the wall with the heel of her palm. “Damn, damn, damn, damn.”

  When she went back to Alessio, he was still asleep. She carried him up to his bed, pulled the blanket up to his chin, kissed his forehead, then walked out of the room. She went to the bathroom and turned on the water in the tub. She took off her clothes, looking at herself in the mirror as she did so. She had not put on any makeup or done her hair that day. She was barely thirty and she already looked worn out, she thought. She felt like she had been run over by life. No wonder Maurizio doesn’t find me attractive, she thought. Compared to the fresh young girls he met at business lunches, why would he? How could she compete with them? But why should she have to? Was she still pretty?