Very Valentine

  “It was also the homestead. They lived upstairs, just like us,” she adds.

  The second story has glass doors that lead to a balcony filled with terra-cotta pots overflowing with red geraniums. “No tomatoes, Gram.”

  She laughs and directs me up the street to park outside the Spolti Inn, a rambling hotel built of fieldstone. I help Gram out of the car and unload our bags. My grandparents stayed at this inn every time they traveled to Tuscany on their buying trips.

  The staff of the hotel know Gram, as do the locals. Some even remember her great-aunts and -uncles, Gram tells me. Most custom shoemakers get their leather from Lucca, while Gram insists on Arezzo, where our family has used the same tanner for over 100 years.

  As we climb the steep stone steps to the entrance of the hotel, Gram lets go of my arm, pulling in her stomach and straightening her spine. She takes the banister. With her brown hair and peasant skirt, black cotton blouse and sandals, she could be twenty years younger. It’s only when her knees give her trouble that you notice her age.

  We pass through a small, open breezeway lined with an eclectic mix of marble planters spilling over with edelweiss, daisies, and bluebells.

  “Signora Angelini!” the woman behind the desk cries.

  “Signora Guarasci!”

  The old friends greet each other with a warm embrace. I take in the lobby. The front desk is a long mahogany counter. There’s a slotted wooden box holding the room keys on the wall behind it. It could be 1900 except for the computer next to the sign-in book.

  A deep sofa, covered in gold-and-white damask, is anchored by two ornate floor lamps and an overstuffed gold chenille ottoman that serves as a coffee table. The overhead chandelier is white wrought iron with cream-colored linen shades over the bulbs.

  Signora Guarasci is a petite woman with small hands and thick white hair. She wears a blue cotton skirt with a pressed white smock over it, gray tights, and open black leather clogs, a more stylish version of the plastic ones that Roman wears in the kitchen of Ca’ d’Oro. The signora embraces me as Gram makes my introduction.

  While Gram catches up with her old friend, I take our bags, climb the stairs, and find our rooms. I unlock the door to number 3, place my suitcase by the door, and look over my new surroundings. The spacious corner room is painted sunflower yellow with off-white trim. There’s a high, soft double bed with six fat feather pillows and a pressed black-and-white-checked coverlet. There’s an antique oak library table under the windows. An old gray rocking chair is positioned near a white marble fireplace, both looking like they have been here for a hundred years. I open the windows and a cool breeze blows through, turning the long white muslin draperies into billowing ball gowns. The walls of the open closet are lined in cedar, which gives the room a green, woodsy scent.

  The bathroom that connects my room to Gram’s is simple, with black-and-white-checked tile, a deep ceramic tub with a shiny silver handheld nozzle, and a marble sink with an antique mirror over it. A large bay window on the far wall looks out over a garden. Privacy shades are pulled to the top. The signora has left the window open, letting in more of those fresh spring breezes.

  I go back out into the hallway, pick up Gram’s luggage, and unlock the door to room number 2. Gram’s room is twice the size of mine, done in china blue and white, with windows the length of the room, and a full seating area with two low chairs and a sofa covered in white duck fabric.

  “How are the rooms?” Gram asks as I skip back downstairs.

  “Gorgeous. Now I see why you stay here.”

  “Wait until you taste the signora’s cooking,” Gram says.

  Signora Guarasci enters the lobby and claps her hands together. “Now, you eat.”

  I help Gram up off the very soft sofa. She takes my arm as we go into the dining room.

  “When we go home, I’m making an appointment with Dr. Sculco at the Hospital for Special Surgery. You’re getting your knees replaced.”

  “I am not.”

  “You are, too. Look at you. You’ve got mod hair, good skin, and a great figure. Why should you suffer with bad knees? They’re the only thing about you that’s eighty years old.”

  “My brain is eighty.”

  “But nobody can see that in a pencil skirt.”

  “Good point.”

  We take our seats at a table by the windows that overlook a small pond at the back of the house. Every table is set with cutlery, pressed napkins, and small vases of violets even though we are the only patrons in the dining room.

  Signora Guarasci pushes through the kitchen door carrying a tray with two ceramic crocks of soup and a basket of crusty bread with a tin of butter. The signora pours us each a glass of homemade red wine from a decanter, then goes back into the kitchen.

  “Perfetto! Grazie.” Gram raises her glass.

  “I like having you with me, Val,” Gram says. “I think this is going to be a great trip for both of us.”

  I taste the minestrone made of pork, root vegetables, and beans in a thick tomato broth. “This is de-lish.” I put the spoon down and break off a piece of the warm crusty bread. “I could stay here forever. Why would anyone ever leave?”

  “Well, your grandfather had to. He was six years old when his mother died. Her name was Giuseppina Cavalline. Your great-grandfather called her Jojo.”

  “What was she like?”

  “She was the most beautiful girl in Arezzo. She was about nineteen when she walked into the Angelini Shoe Shop and asked to speak with the owner. Your great-grandfather, who was around twenty-two at the time, fell in love at first sight.”

  “And what about Jojo? Was it mutual?”

  “Eventually. See, she had come by to order custom shoes. My father-in-law, so eager to impress her, trotted out samples of the finest leather and showed her the best designs. But Jojo said that she didn’t care if the shoes were fashionable. Your great-grandfather thought this was very odd. What young woman doesn’t love the latest styles? Then she turned and walked across the room and your great-grandfather saw that she had a very pronounced limp. And she said, ‘Can you help me?’”

  Gram looks out the window, as if to better remember this story that happened just a few streets away. She continues, “He worked six days and six nights without stopping, and created a beautiful pair of black leather ankle boots with a stacked heel. He created a hidden platform on the interior of the shoe that evened out her stride without being visible to anyone else.”

  “Brilliant.” I wonder if I could ever build such an ingenious shoe.

  “When Jojo came back to the shop and tried on the shoes, she stood up and skimmed across the room. For the first time in her life, her steps were uniform and her posture straight and tall. Jojo was so grateful, she threw her arms around your great-grandfather and thanked him.

  “Then he said, ‘Someday, I’m going to marry you.’ And he did, a year later. And a few years after that, my husband, your grandfather, was born in the house I showed you.”

  “What a romantic story.”

  “They were happy for a long time. But when she died of pleurisy ten years later, my father-in-law was so grief-stricken, he took your grandfather and went to America. He couldn’t bear to be in Arezzo any longer, to walk in the streets where they lived, or stay in the bed where they slept, or pass the church where they married. That’s how deep his grief was.”

  “Did he ever find love again?”

  “No. And you know, a cobbler can be very appealing to women.”

  “Give a woman a new pair of shoes and her life changes.”

  “That’s right. Well, he was a wonderful man, very funny and bright. You remind me of him in many ways. Michel Angelini was a great designer, in my opinion, ahead of his time. He’d love that shoe you designed, believe me.”

  “He would?” This compliment means the world to me. After all, my great-grandfather designed every shoe our company makes. A hundred years later, his work is still relevant.

  “He would be hap
py to know that Angelini Shoes is still in operation. He’d also be thrilled that you are carrying on his legacy. He sacrificed so much for his work. Well, at least his personal life.”

  The meaning of his sacrifice is not lost on me. I get it: a creative life is an all-consuming one. If we aren’t in the shop building shoes, we are sending them; and if we’re not shipping them, we’re creating new ones. It’s a cycle that never ends, especially when we do our jobs well. “It’s sad he never found another woman to share his life with.”

  “My father-in-law was crazy about her. The truth is, no one could ever compare to her. He told me that many times. He missed her right up until the moment he died. And I know that for sure because I was with him.”

  “Gram, I’ve always wondered about something. Why does the sign over our shop say ‘Since 1903’ when, in fact, it was 1920 when Grandpop and his father emigrated?”

  Gram smiles. “He met Jojo in 1903. That was his way of honoring her.”

  I think about Roman, and if our love will last. It seems the women in my family have to fight for love to sustain it. It doesn’t come easily to us, nor does it stay without a battle. We have to work at it. I look over at her. “Is something wrong?”

  “The last trip I took with your grandfather was this time of year, the spring before he died.”

  “We didn’t even know he was sick.”

  “He did. I think he knew that it was the last time he would see Italy. He had a bad heart for years. We just never talked about it.”

  Gram breaks a roll open and puts half of it on my plate. I remember Tess telling me about Grandpop having a friend. We’re far from Perry Street, and Gram is opening up in a way that she never allows herself at home. I’m usually as reticent to discuss these matters as she is, but the moment is here, and the wine is hearty, so I ask, “Gram, did Grandpop have a girlfriend?”

  “Why do you ask?”

  “Tess told me that he did.”

  “Tess has a big mouth.” Gram frowns.

  “Why wouldn’t you tell me?”

  “What good would it do?”

  “I don’t know. An honest family history is worth something.”

  “To whom?”

  “To me.” I reach out and put my hand on hers.

  “Yes, he had a girlfriend,” Gram sighs.

  “How was that even possible? When would he find the time?”

  “Men can always find the time for that,” Gram says.

  “How? You lived and worked in the same building.”

  “This is a buying trip, not a Lenten retreat,” Gram says. “I save my secrets for the confessional.”

  “Pretend I’m a version of Father O’Hara with better legs.”

  “What do you want to know?”

  “Did you confront him? Did you confront her?” I have a vision of my independent grandmother standing up for herself, like Norma Shearer when she takes on Joan Crawford in The Women.

  She nods. “After my husband died, I saw her on the street. I told her I knew, and she denied it, which was nice of her. Then I asked her if she made him happy.”

  “Did she answer you?”

  “She said no, she couldn’t make him happy. He wished that he could make it work with me. Well, that got to me. With all our problems, the truth is, I loved your grandfather. We had tough times in our business and that really took a toll on us at home. I was hard on him when he’d try new things and fail, and he grew to resent me.”

  “Being an artist is all about trying new things.”

  “I know that now. I didn’t then. I also learned that when a man resents his wife, he acts on it.”

  “You must have been furious.”

  “Oh, of course I was. And I did what lots of women do with rage. We bury it. We withdraw. Stop talking. We go to bed angry and we wake up angry. We fulfill our obligations, we keep up the house and the children, but the very act of holding it all together is resentment in a different form. My way of hurting him was to act like I didn’t need him.”

  Gram lifts off her glasses and brushes away a tear.

  She continues, “I regret that deeply. Maybe, I think, on one of those days when he was taking a break and having a cigar on the roof, I should have climbed the stairs and gone outside and put my arms around him and told him that I loved him. Maybe we could’ve gotten it back. But I didn’t and we couldn’t and that was that.”

  I’m jet-lagged and can’t sleep. I sit in the window of the Spolti Inn and wait for morning. The houses are dark, but the moon is bright, turning the main street into a glistening silver river. The rolling hills fall away in the darkness as the clouds pass in front of the moon like party balloons.

  I throw back the coverlet and climb into bed. I pick up Goethe’s Italian Journey. My bookmark is a photograph of Roman standing in the door of Ca’ d’Oro. I close the book and pick up my cell phone. I dial. Roman’s phone goes to voice mail. So I text him:

  Arrived safely. Bella Italia! Love you, V.

  Then I dial home. Mom picks up the phone.

  “Ma? We got here.”

  “How was the trip?”

  “Good. I’m driving a stick shift. Gram and I will need neck braces after a month in that rental. It bucks like Old Paint. How’s Dad?”

  “Hungry. But the organic diet seems to be working.”

  “Give the man a plate of spaghetti.”

  “Don’t worry. He sneaks salami, so when he’s cured, we can’t say it’s the bean curd that did the trick. Hey, I put a surprise in your suitcase for Capri. It’s in the red Macy’s bag.”

  “Great.” My mother’s idea of a surprise is a 75-percent-off demi-bra and matching tap pants made with a print of dancing coffee beans that have the word Peppy embroidered across the rear end.

  “Something wonderful is going to happen for you on the Isle of Capri. I’m thinking engagement.”

  “Ma, please.”

  “I’m just saying, hurry up. I don’t want my first face-lift and the first dance at your wedding to coincide. I’m sinking like a soufflé over here.”

  “You don’t need any work, Mom.”

  “I caught a glimpse of myself looking down in the bathroom tile when I was scrubbing it and I said, ‘Dear God, Mike, you look like a sock puppet.’ I’d get the Botox but they aren’t saying good things about it, plus, what’s my face without any expression? Animation is my thing.”

  My mom could talk twelve transatlantic hours in a row about cosmetic enhancement, so I cut her off. “Mom, how do you know if the guy is the guy?”

  “You mean if he’ll be a good husband?” She pauses, then says, “The ticket is for the man to love the woman more than she loves him.”

  “Shouldn’t it be equal?”

  Mom cackles. “It can never be equal.”

  “But what if the woman loves the man more?”

  “A life of hell awaits her. As women, the deck is stacked against us because time is our enemy. We age, while men season. And trust me, there are plenty of women out there looking for a man, and they don’t mind staking a claim on somebody else’s husband, no matter how old, creaky, and deaf they are.”

  She lowers her voice. “Even with the cancer, at sixty-eight, your father is a catch. I don’t need round two in the infidelity fight. I’m twenty years older and fifteen pounds heavier, and my nerves, let’s face it, are shot. Plus, I’ll let him make a mistake once, but twice? Never! So, I keep myself nice and smile, even if I’m crying on the inside. Maintenance! Do you think I wanted to go to the dentist and have all the silver pried out of my mouth and replaced with enough porcelain to build a shrine and fountain to the Blessed Lady? Of course not. But it had to be done! When I smiled with my old teeth it was like looking into a pickle barrel and that wouldn’t do. A woman must endure a lot to keep herself in shape and keep a man…intrigued. And don’t think I’m kidding about the face-lift. I’ve got the infomercial on Thermage Tivoed. I’ve watched it plenty; the only thing is, there are women on that commercial who look bet
ter in the before pictures and I’ve yet to figure that out. And show me one woman over sixty—”

  Mom gags and coughs. Saying that number actually closes her throat. She goes on.

  “—one woman over that fence who doesn’t know she’s got to fight like a tiger and I’ll show you a woman who has given up. The only difference between me and the women who let themselves go and wind up looking like Andy Rooney in a wig is my will. My fortitude. My determination not to quit.”

  “Mom, you’re the Winston Churchill of antiaging. ‘Never, never, never, never, never give up your sit-ups.’ You make me want to jump out of this bed and do squats.”

  “A nimble bride is a happy one, honey.”

  Gram grips my arm as we climb the steep hill past the church to Vechiarelli & Son, our tanners for as long as the Angelinis have been shoemakers. The back streets of Arezzo burst with color, red cabbage roses on pink stucco walls, crisp white laundry hanging high against a blue sky, collections of small ceramic pots spilling over with green herbs in kitchen windows, and an occasional wall fountain, in the shape of a face, cascading sparkling water into an urn.

  “It’s the first shop to the right,” Gram pants once we make it to a level street.

  “Thank God.” My heart is racing. “I’d say we should have driven, but I don’t think the car could have made it up this hill. I don’t think there’s a shift on the stick for straight up.”

  Gram stops, adjusts her skirt, smooths her hair, and secures her shoulder bag just so on her arm. “How do I look?”

  “Great.” I’m surprised. Gram has never asked me to comment on her appearance.

  “How’s my lipstick?”

  “You’re in the pink, Gram. Coco Chanel pink.”

  Gram throws back her shoulders. “Good. Let’s go.”

  Vechiarelli & Son is a three-story stone house on the end of the street, with a similar setup to our shop at home. The main entrance, used for business, is a wide wooden door under the portico. On the upper floors, there are double doors that lead to small balconies on each level, the top one propped open with a plant, a throw rug hanging over the balcony, airing out in the breeze.