the terrace. How can it fail to touch you?’
His words caressed and taunted me. I could tell that he was full of something more than facts alone, but my mind prodded with uncertainty. I offered a tentative smile.
‘Look outside, Santina.’ He placed stiff hands upon my shoulders and twisted me round toward the open wooden doors. The last hands I’d had upon me were my father’s. The memory prickled down my spine to a sting. I felt the weight of his hands upon me, noticing the tips of his thumbs pressing into my shoulder blades. The garden rolled down a steep incline and the trees stretched out their branches in greedy gnarls toward the early autumn rays. Beyond, the sea had begun its descent into dusky purple, Capri’s tip golden in the dipping sun. I wanted to move but daren’t, hating myself for it.
His voice fell toward a whisper; I could feel the breath skim the top of my ear. ‘Educating the mind without educating the heart is no education at all.’
My body softened out of trained fear to the lull of his voice.
‘That is what Aristotle said, and I’m inclined to agree.’ He straightened. ‘Tomorrow,’ he went on, removing his hands, his voice once again crisp, ‘we will heat sugar in the oven upon a tray for ten minutes. Then we will reheat the preserving liquid and add the warmed sugar. When it has all dissolved in the liquid, and not before, we will turn up the heat. We will allow it to reach a rolling boil. We will remove the pan from the burner, allow to cool for thirty minutes, and finally pour into sterilized jars. Then what?’
Another prickle of a question, which required no remedy.
‘Then, Santina, you, Adeline and I may taste the glorious marmalade throughout the winter. And when the fog rolls in once again, and the tiresome visitors have abandoned the streets at last, we will sit and savor the memory of my trees once plump with bounty. Is that clear?’
Of course it wasn’t. He turned on his heels and closed the door behind him.
I breathed in the aroma, the citrus deepening toward a warm caramel now. The setting sun streaked in from behind me, burnishing the tiny kitchen with russet rays. Only a month remained before I left for America. I couldn’t shake the sense that the lessons that remained, like the marmalade of this afternoon, would be nothing besides bittersweet.
The mid-morning sun cast hopeful arcs of light upon the curve of the cobbles as I walked Elizabeth up the hill on her new-found legs. We’d stop every now and again, for me to catch my breath if nothing else, whilst I held her facing out to the sea, which spread out in a turquoise sheen toward the grey cliffs. Onward we climbed, as the path narrowed. To my right, beyond a squat wall, was a jagged drop to the water below. I walked without any particular aim, the smell of citrus and caramelized sugar still clinging to my hair from the previous afternoon, floating into focus every now and then on the breeze.
The path ended by the entrance to the cemetery. The dead had the best view in town. There was a small bench just outside. We sat for a moment to rest before returning home. I longed to lay flowers for my mother. I envied those little tombs, perched upon the uneven hill, goat-like, defying gravity with stubborn marble. At least all these people could find rest. Their loved ones could sit by them, remember them, whilst the wide expanse of the sea and mountains comforted them with awe and tranquillity, the landscape assuring them that their grief was all part of the natural fabric of the world, no more, no less. But I had none of this. There was a gaping hole where my mother should be, and another wherever my brother roamed; love without the freedom to be expressed.
The sound of footsteps drew me round. A figure stood by the gated entrance, fiddling with a heavy chain. I rose to my feet. It must be getting close to lunchtime if the gates were already being shut. I turned to begin my descent but something about the man playing with his lethargic lock spiked a memory. I turned back to take a closer look. I didn’t know this man, but there was something about the shape of his round face, the gentle slant of his almond eyes that stirred me. His hair looked like it hadn’t been washed in a while, it clung to his scalp in sweaty strands. He looked up at me for a brief glance. My heart twisted with sorrow and joy.
It was my little brother.
‘Marco?’ I called out, my mouth so dry the word almost stuck to it.
He turned, nonchalant. ‘Si?’
We looked at one another. I fought seeping doubt. Perhaps my memory was playing a cruel trick on me? But there was no mistaking the pointed arch of his eyebrows, just like Mother’s, or the tiny mole on his left temple.
‘The cemetery opens again at five o’clock,’ he said, as if I was just another visitor muted by grief, which of course I was.
‘It’s me. Santina.’
His face marbled into stillness. I noticed my breath change. I watched his expression shift through a painful spectrum, much like the sea behind me rippling with light and shade beneath the moving clouds. I ran, wrapped my one free arm around him, grasping Elizabeth in the other. After a moment I felt his arm around us. I looked up at him, wiped his cheek and kissed the tear streaks twice each, knowing that a lifetime of kisses could never make up for the way I’d abandoned him.
‘I’m so so sorry, my Marco,’ I stuttered through snatched breaths.
He shook his head and took my hand in his then kissed it. That’s when I noticed how very thin he was. That’s when I took in his uncertain pallor, a grey day that hovers, expectant of a forgotten sun. His nails were chewed and his cuticles an aching pink with nervous strands of skin pulling away from them.
‘Is it really you, Santina?’ he whispered at last, looking at my face like someone determined to put the parts of a puzzle together, rearranging my features into the picture he remembered.
‘It’s really me.’
‘And this? Tua bambina?’
‘No – I look after her. I’m living just down the hill, Marco. I’m home again!’
The words honeyed my mouth. It was the first time I had used the term.
He turned away from me, as if unsure. ‘I have to go now. You’ll come back and see me?’
Through the neglected hair falling down over his face, and the tension scarring his nails, I saw a glimmer of the child walking down the mountainside only weeks after we lost our mother. ‘Of course.’
His face creased into a bleak frown.
‘You must believe me, Marco – I’m here now, working for a family at Villa San Vito.’
His eyes widened. The words felt an accidental betrayal. To this moment I’d been counting the days till my departure.
‘I’d have you come back with me right away, only I have this little one to feed and her mother and father are very particular about when they eat and—’
A yell from another young man further up the steps leading toward Nocelle interrupted my excited blabbering. Marco gave him a perfunctory glance, before looking back at me. His features hardened.
‘I have to go now, Santina. Come back tomorrow?’
I nodded, wondering if I could bear to watch him leave.
