Annie Claydon - English Rose for the Sicilian Doc

One of the cars spun up into the air, and Matteo caught it deftly, just before it smashed into the receptionist’s coffee cup. The woman rolled her eyes in Rose’s direction, her meaning clear, and Matteo gave her a sheepish look. A laughing retort in Italian made it quite clear that the gorgeous Dr Di Salvo could do no wrong around here.

‘Your conclusions...?’ Matteo had sauntered back over, but there was no doubt in Rose’s mind that he must have some.

He shrugged. ‘Just passing the time. Until Dr Garfagnini is ready to see William.’

Okay. If that was the way he wanted it. Rose supposed that diagnosing another doctor’s patient in the waiting room was probably frowned on wherever you happened to be in the world. ‘Okay. I’ll wait. In the meantime, could you say the doctor’s name a little slower for me, please? I don’t want to mispronounce it.’

* * *

Whatever her name, she was a rose. Smooth, creamy skin and brilliant blue eyes. Fair, shoulder-length hair, which slid out from behind her ear every now and then before she tucked it back. Matteo wanted to touch her, to feel the silky texture of her skin and her hair.

And she was clearly worried about her son. She was working hard to give the impression that she was telling him everything, but the tremor behind her polite smile told Matteo that she was leaving something out. Maybe that something was relevant, and maybe not.

And maybe he wasn’t being fair. She didn’t speak any more than a couple of words of Italian, and anyone would be stressed, bringing a child to the hospital in these circumstances. Child psychology, or parent psychology for that matter, wasn’t his speciality, and he should leave that to Dr Garfagnini.

‘Where are you working?’ He sat down, leaving an empty chair between the two of them.

‘It’s a joint project between three universities, my own in London, one in Rome and one here. We’re excavating a site up in the hills.’

She looked altogether too fragrant to be tramping around in the hills, digging for artefacts. Her skin seemed untouched by the sun, her hands small and soft. Maybe she was in the habit of wearing a hat and gloves.

‘What’s your speciality?’

‘I’m an osteologist.’

‘So our interests overlap.’ It was pleasing to find a point of connection with her.

She nodded. ‘I tend to deal with older bones that you would generally come across, although I have done some forensic osteology.’

‘That’s difficult work.’ Forensic osteologists worked with more recent history, war graves and crime scenes.

‘Yes. It can be.’ She took a breath, as if she was about to say more, but lapsed into silence. Matteo decided not to push it.

‘You must be very good at what you do.’ Sicily’s rich history, and the many archaeological sites on the island, meant that it was unusual for any particular expertise to be needed from elsewhere.

She smiled suddenly. A real smile, one that betrayed a bit of fire. ‘Yes. I am.’

‘And you teach mainly?’

‘What makes you say that?’

‘Your hands.’

She smiled again. This time a touch of sensuality, all the more heady since it seemed to be kept strictly under wraps most of the time.

‘You’re very observant. I wear gloves when I dig. And, yes, I also teach.’ William had been running back and forth as they talked, depositing toy cars in her lap, and she started to gather them up.

Matteo watched her as she walked to the toy box, stacking the cars carefully back in their proper place. He might not be responsible for William’s diagnosis but he’d already made a few observations that might be of assistance to Dr Garfagnini.

Admittedly, watching the way her skirt swirled around her legs, noting the smooth curve of the fabric around the bust and tracing his gaze along her bare arms wasn’t the kind of observation that was necessary for a diagnosis of anything other than his own appreciation of a beautiful woman. But thinking that she was beautiful was about as far as Matteo was prepared to go.

Her son was a patient at the hospital where he was a doctor. That might change, but it would make no difference. Matteo had loved a woman with children once before. There was no changing the damage he’d caused then and no woman, however beautiful, could change the way he felt about it now. If he wanted to be able to sleep at night, he wouldn’t lay one finger on Rose’s perfect, porcelain skin.

* * *

Dr Garfagnini was a small, middle-aged man with a kind face. He appeared in the entrance to the reception area, beckoning to Matteo, and Rose caught William’s hand, her heart beating a little faster. Maybe this was some long-standing issue that had somehow escaped her notice. That verdict on her failings as a mother would be a lot easier to take coming from the older man’s lips, and Rose almost wished she didn’t need Matteo to translate.

Introductions were made and they were seated in easy chairs set around a large, low table in Dr Garfagnini’s bright, airy consulting room. William was given crayons and paper, and Dr Garfagnini pushed an upholstered stool up next to the table for him. Coffee was brought in, and Matteo waved it away, prompting a laugh and a joking observation from Dr Garfagnini.

‘He says I’m a coffee snob. That takes some dedication on this island.’ Matteo seemed to be trying to put her at ease. ‘Now, I’m going to fill Dr Garfagnini in on what you’ve already said to me, and then I’m sure he’ll have some questions...’

There were many questions, and at times it seemed that Matteo’s translations of her answers were a little longer than the original. Rose battled against the rising anxiety, and finally she snapped.

‘Please. Will you tell me what you just said to him? I need to know what’s going on.’

‘Of course. I’m sorry. I was mentioning what happened in the waiting room.’

‘What did happen in the waiting room?’ Rose pressed her lips together, aware that William had looked up from the blue and brown smudges that he was drawing. It would be a little more to the point if Matteo directed his colleague’s attention to those.

‘We played with cars.’ William provided the answer, and Matteo nodded, grinning broadly at him. His relaxed attitude seemed to reassure William that all was well, and he went back to his drawing.

Matteo turned to Rose. ‘Dr Garfagnini would like to test him for colour-blindness.’

‘Colour-blindness?’ How could she not have noticed something like that? Rose reached for her coffee and realised she’d already finished it. The empty cup rattled in the saucer as she put it back onto the table. The game had been a test after all.

‘It’s not going to distress him in any way.’ Matteo’s brown eyes were melting with concern.

‘No. I’m sorry, please, go ahead.’ She wanted to grab William and hug him. Tell him she was sorry that she hadn’t thought of this. That she’d allowed him to be confused by the world around him, without it even occurring to her that he might not see it as she did.

She watched numbly as Dr Garfagnini produced a set of Ishihara plates. These were obviously made for children, the blotches forming squares, triangles and circles, rather than numbers. Matteo explained what he wanted William to do, making it all seem like a game to him. Rose watched in horror as her son failed to pick out the shapes in almost a third of the pictures.

Then there were more games, all centred around colour. Matteo was pretending to make mistakes, some of which William gleefully corrected, and others that he didn’t notice. Then an examination of William’s eyes, and finally Dr Garfagnini nodded and spoke to Matteo in Italian.

‘What did he say?’ Rose tried to keep the tremor from her voice, for William’s sake.