Adriana Trigiani - Very Valentine

I hear the door to her room close softly. When I hear her running water in the bathroom, I seize my moment and tiptoe back to my bed. I pull the covers up around me and close my eyes.

I wake up again at seven. I bolt out of bed, take a bath, do my hair, and get dressed. Then I rap on her side of the bathroom door. She doesn’t answer. I pull the door open and peer into her room. Her bed is made. Of course it is! She didn’t sleep in it. I grab my tote bag, notebooks, and phone and go downstairs.

Gram is sitting in the dining room reading the paper. She wears a navy blue skirt and a matching cashmere sweater. Her hair is brushed out softly, and she’s applied her pink lipstick.

“Sorry, I slept late.”

“It’s only seven.” She looks up from her paper.

“But we have so much to do today. That drive to Prato is two hours, right?”

“Yes. I wanted to talk to you about that.” She puts the newspaper down and looks at me. “Could you go without me?”

“Well, sure, Gram, if you’re sure you trust me to pick the fabrics-”

“I do. You did a marvelous job, great, with the leather yesterday. Gianluca will drive you to Prato.”

“What are you doing today?”

“Dominic is taking me on a picnic.”

Signora Guarasci places the hot coffee, steamed milk, and sugar on the table. She brings a basket of rolls, with a tin of sweet butter and blackberry jam. “Did you sleep well?” the signora asks.

“Yes,” Gram and I answer together.

“I don’t know how you can say you had a good night’s sleep, Gram. The thunder was so loud.”

“Oh, it was,” she agrees.

“I am surprised you could sleep at all.”

“It wasn’t easy,” she says, not taking her eyes off the newspaper.

“All that crashing, and banging and thunder and lightning…”

She continues to read. “It was something.”

“Gram, you’re busted.”

“Valentine. What are you getting at?” Gram puts down the paper and looks around. Lucky for her, we’re still the only patrons at the Spolti Inn.

“When I woke up this morning around five, it was raining and I went to close the windows and I saw you out walking.”

“Oh,” she says. She picks up her paper again and pretends to scan it. “I was jet-lagged and I went out for an early stroll.”

“In yesterday’s skirt?”

She puts down the paper. “Now…” She blushes. “That’s enough.”

“I think it’s wonderful.”

“You do?”

“Absolutely.”

“It’s just a little odd…,” she begins.

“For me to learn about this side of you?”

“Well, yes.” She clears her throat. “And it’s not a side of me, it is me.”

“I approve. In fact, I more than approve. I’m happy for you. I think it’s difficult to find love at all in this world, and for you to have a…” I can’t find the strength to say the word lover, so I say, “… friend is a gift. So why pretend it isn’t happening? There’s no need for you to come traipsing down the mountain in the morning acting like you stayed here. Pack up your stuff and go over there and stay with him. What happens in Arezzo stays in Arezzo.”

Gram laughs. “Thank you.” She sips her coffee. “And that goes for you, too.”

“Hey, I’m taken.” I look out the window and it feels like New York and all our problems are a million miles away. For a moment, I forget the Bergdorf’s contest, our mounting debt, and the agony of dealing with Alfred. I even decide to put Roman on the shelf until we get to Capri, because I’m weary of analyzing us. All I see for now is spring unfolding in Italy, with the tiniest buds of green breaking through the gray branches. “But before you go, I need to know one thing.” I pull out my notebook.

“Yes?”

“How much double-sided duchess satin do you think we need in the shop?”

I wait for Gianluca to pick me up on the sidewalk in front of the Spolti Inn. The morning fog has lifted, leaving the cobblestones clean and wet, and the air brisk.

Arezzo is famous for its windy mountaintop climate, and it does not disappoint. I’m wearing a sleeveless pink wool shift with a matching bolero my mother found for 75 percent off at Loehmann’s. Giving credit where credit is due, my mother insists you can find great stuff at Loehmann’s if you search. The bolero was one of her greatest triumphs as it’s a gorgeous, tightly woven cashmere the color of sand.

Gianluca pulls up and gets out of his car. He comes around and opens the door for me.

“Good morning,” he says.

“Good morning.” I get a whoosh of the scent of his skin as I climb in; it’s crisp and lemony. He closes the car door behind me, bracing the outside handle like it’s a lock on a bank vault. I’m sure Dominic warned him that if I accidentally fell out of the car while in his care, he’d have to kill him on behalf of my grandmother.

Gianluca goes around the front of the car and gets into the driver’s seat. This is an old-model Mercedes, but the interior still has the scent of new leather, while the navy blue exterior is polished to a glassy finish.

Gianluca hits the gas pedal like he’s bolting from the first position at the starting gate at NASCAR in the Poconos.

“Whoa,” I say. “Keep it under ninety miles an hour, will you?”

I scroll through my e-mails. I answer Wendy’s about the hotel, Gabriel’s about the leather, and Mom’s about Gram. Roman writes:

I dream of you and Capri. R.

I text back:

In that order? V.

“You like that thing?” Gianluca points to my phone.

“I couldn’t live without it. I’m in constant touch with everyone I know. How could that be a bad thing?”

He laughs. “When do you think?”

“Funny you should ask. I actually turned this off and soaked in the tub last night, and then I did some reading.”

“Va bene, Valentina.”

That’s funny, only my father ever called me Valentina.

He continues, “I don’t like those things. They interrupt life. You can’t go anywhere without beeps going off and silly songs playing.”

“I’m sorry to tell you, Gianluca. But I think these things”-I hold up my phone-“are here to stay.”

“Agh.” He dismisses the entire contemporary-communication matrix with a wave of his hand.

“Oh, I’m sorry. I’m being rude e-mailing instead of talking to you.” I put the phone on pulse and put it in my purse.

I catch the corner of his mouth turning up in a smile. Okay, Gianluca, I’m thinking, you’re Italian. You’re a man. This is all about you. “I’m all yours,” I tell him.

To reward me for my undivided attention, Gianluca frequently slows down to show me the exterior of a rococo church, or a roadside shrine to the Madonna placed by a devout farmer, or an indigenous tree that grows only in this part of the world. On the outskirts of Prato, he takes a turn off the autostrada and onto a back road. I grip the handle above the door as we jostle over the gravel roadway.

As Gianluca slows down, I see a lake through the trees. It shimmers like pale blue silk taffeta. The edges of the water are blurred by wild fronds of deep green stalks that bend and twist over the shoreline. I commit the color scheme to memory. How luscious it would be to create an icy blue shoe with a deep green feather trim. I roll down the window to get a closer look. The sun hits the water like a slew of silver arrows.

“This is one of my favorite places. Lago Argento. This is where I come to think.”

The lovely silence is broken by the beep of my cell phone. I’m mortified that I’m spoiling Gianluca’s sacred space.

“Go ahead and answer it. I cannot fight progress.”

I look at Gianluca, who laughs, and then I laugh. I reach into my purse and check my phone.