a glass of the good stuff with my favorite uncle!” Franco yelled, appearing at the kitchen door and sauntering over with a bottle of wine and a couple of glasses.
“There’s the vagabond!” Peppe replied. “You’d do best not to travel till she’s got that ring on her finger, if you know what’s good for you.” He chuckled.
“Gonna keep my treasure safe, don’t you worry.”
Franco’s eyes planted on hers. For a fleeting moment, they slit with a passion that Carmela would have liked to describe as love. She was his treasure. Had he ever described her this way? Perhaps. So why did her mind claw the word just now? There was so much still to do inside with her sister, as the party was dancing into life. Yet the word pricked, a minuscule spike from a cactus fruit that can’t be seen to be removed but sharpens into the skin with even the gentlest brush of fabric. Treasure? Hold on to precious, she lied to herself. Treasure: something to keep hidden under lock and key. Something to covet, gaze upon. Own. Carmela had followed Franco into the muddy distance between love and ownership. She had become his possession after all. If he wasn’t assured his father’s empire, if his brothers would usurp him in the end, then Carmela was the one thing in his world that would belong only to him. She had promised him as much. A mist of quiet doubts fogged her mind. Her gaze lowered toward the fire. She willed her thoughts to whip up into the dark night with the flames.
By the time Carmela returned to the kitchen, Piera was reaching boiling point faster than the pan of linguini. “Russian army at the door, or were you having a cocktail?” she asked, heaving a huge tray of roasted potatoes out of the oven, then lifting up her apron to wipe the sweat off her brow.
Carmela lifted the pasta off the heat and drained the salty water into the sink. The steam blinded her for a moment. “Franco’s here.”
“I don’t see him helping.” Piera darted to the large wooden dresser that took up almost half the length of one side of the kitchen. She opened one of the upper glass-paned doors with such ferocity that the lace curtain inside nearly swung off its hook. “Oh, for crying out loud! Tore!”
“Take it easy,” Carmela said, trying to smooth her sister’s ruffled feathers. “They’ll think we can’t cope.”
Piera stomped back to the other side of the table and reached into the wooden icebox for a small jar filled with bottarga, dried fish roe. “We can’t! I said three simple courses. But no! You had to turn Mrs.’s ear with a menu fit for a godforsaken royal wedding! Which, in case you didn’t know, is not what I like to be sweating over on a hot summer’s night!”
Tore entered. “Please bring down that top bowl, Tore,” Carmela said, trying to keep her tenuous grip on calm. He reached up, then carried the large bowl over to her. Carmela tipped the linguini into it, covering the hand-painted circle of traditional dancers. She reached for the bottle of olive oil, then waved a generous amount across the steaming heap of pasta, while Piera attacked the potatoes with a metal spatula. Tore snatched a small piece from the corner just before Piera made to swat his knuckles.
“Franco found a soldier to dance with, then?” Piera snipped, punctuating each syllable with a scrape.
“He’s with Zio Peppe.” Carmela sprinkled the cured fish roe over the linguini and stirred the strands so that each piece was coated with an even, salty glaze. “Am I like Zia Lucia?”
“No. Your breasts still point to heaven.”
Carmela smiled.
“Now for the love of God, let’s get this out!” With that, she snatched the hot bowl from Carmela’s hands and shoved it at Tore, who beat a hasty exit, wincing at the heat of the potato ricocheting about his mouth.
Carmela returned to the radicchio leaves and laid them in a glass bowl. She shaved slivers of cucumber and placed them on top. Then she took a handful of ruccola from an enamel bowl filled with pickings from the garden and tore them onto the other leaves, releasing their metallic aroma. Finally she peeled a couple of long radishes and sliced them. Piera threw a generous sprinkle of salt over the salad. “Here, take the salt cellar out to Zio Peppe,” she said, placing it on the center of a large slab of cork lined with myrtle stems. Carmela thought about leaving Piera with a line to soothe, but the way her sister stabbed the enormous watermelon in preparation for the fruit tray persuaded her it was best to wait till later.
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