The Demon Catchers of Milan #2: The Halcyon Bird (30 page)

When I came into the kitchen, I saw Anna Maria sitting at the table, looking less perfect than usual. I went over to kiss her cheek. Nonna said,
“Caffè latte?”
She spoke over her shoulder, already putting the coffee shower into action.

When she set my bowl in front of me, I sat over it, inhaling the smell of espresso and milk. I looked over at Anna Maria.

“Have you slept yet?” I asked.

She smiled to herself, swiftly and sadly. “Yes, thanks,” she answered. “You?”

“I didn’t expect to, but I did.”

“Good,” said Nonna, sitting down with us.

I swallowed hard, and asked, “Has anybody heard …?”

Nonna fixed her eyes on mine. “Bernardo has not woken, but they think he will,” she said. “Anna Maria will take you to see him, if you wish.”

“Yes, please,” I said. Though I could not imagine what I would say to him, if he woke while I was there. How could I apologize for exposing him to that terrible risk, even if I hadn’t seen it coming, even if no one had?

It took forever to get out the door. I stood staring at my
open wardrobe for five minutes, before I came out to the kitchen again and said, “Anna Maria, can you help me with clothes? I can’t think.” She nodded and followed me back to my room, silently pulling out clothes and laying them on the bed. Then we had to get a list of things Nonna wanted, since we were going out. I heard Anna Maria ask her, “Surely, she shouldn’t have to do errands?” Nonna replied, “The world keeps turning, and this family keeps eating up all the butter.”

“I’m actually grateful for errands,” I told Anna Maria when we climbed onto her
motorino
. “They’re comforting.”

Anna Maria snorted. “Tell me that again after we get the wrong kind of butter and have to take it back. I know this mood she’s in.”

When we arrived at the hospital, a nurse showed us up to the room. I realized I was shaking again. What would Bernardo look like? Could I bear it?

It was just as awful as I had imagined. I made myself walk straight up to the bed. He lay unconscious, stretched out like a corpse, his hands at his sides, a tube running from one wrist, an oxygen mask over his face. I stood looking down at him, taking in the dark circles under his eyes, the gauntness of his handsome face. His skin seemed even paler than usual.

“Signorine Della Torre,” said a familiar voice. I turned. I hadn’t seen Signore Tedesco sitting against the wall, with Uncle Matteo beside him. They both rose, and I felt a weight of guilt pressing on my heart. I fought the urge to run out of the room.
I hadn’t realized that there would be things even more unbearable than seeing Bernardo in a hospital bed. Anna Maria didn’t offer any protection, walking over to kiss her father on the cheek.

“I want to thank you for trying to save my son,” said Rinaldo Tedesco, holding out his hand. I took it automatically, thinking,
My family has lied to this man. He doesn’t realize I’m
responsible
for what has happened
.

It didn’t matter that Emilio had said it wasn’t my fault: I had exposed Bernardo to the danger.

“Working with your family, we know we run certain risks,” Signore Tedesco said. “Thank you for trying to protect him from Signore Strozzi’s demon. If that man ever regains his sanity …” he frowned.

Aha
, I thought, realizing what role I would have to play. But part of me screamed inside,
You had no right to lie for me!

I took a deep breath, fighting rage and nausea, and said, “I did my best, sir.” I added fiercely, “I am sorry I could not do more.”

“I don’t doubt you did all you could,” he said. He squeezed my hand again and stepped back, letting me stand over Bernardo alone.

I felt tears sting under my eyelids again.
Oh
, caro,
mi dispiace, veramente
. Oh, my dear, I am sorry, truly.
Ti voglio bene
, I told him in my mind, words we had never said.

“My wife will want to thank you, too,” said Signore Tedesco.
I thanked the Madonna she hadn’t been there when I arrived. “She will be back later.” I hoped I would be gone. I had no idea how to face her, especially since we hadn’t met. My chest ached.

Anna Maria had come up to the bed, too, and touched Bernardo’s hand before sitting down. I saw her texting rapidly and wondered who she was talking to, and whether she was getting the full story on whatever Signore Tedesco had been told.

I wanted badly to stay, and just as badly, I wanted to run away. I remembered the vigil by Lisetta Maria Umberti’s bed, after her exorcism. Nonno, Emilio, and I had sat for hours, watching, talking, even playing Briscola to pass the time.
You owe Bernardo that, at least
, a voice inside my head told me. I looked over at Signore Tedesco and wondered, if I stayed, whether I would be in the way of family.

“Rodolfo is getting off work early,” Rinaldo Tedesco was telling Uncle Matteo.

I couldn’t help smiling a little; if I hung around I would meet the famous brother.

“Would it be a problem if I stayed a while?” I asked Signore Tedesco.

He looked over. “No, my child. Not at all. Please.”

Uncle Matteo rose. Turning to Signore Tedesco, he added, “It is our custom to watch over a … someone like this. But, of course, we do not do it if our friends do not wish it.”

“I would be grateful,” said Bernardo’s father simply. “I will
come back later, with my wife,” he continued, rising and joining Uncle Matteo. His trust hit me like a punch in the chest. Anna Maria jumped up to say good-bye to her father, and kissed Signore Tedesco on the cheek, murmuring sympathetically. “We’ll stay until you return,” she told him. “I’ll ask one of the boys to come in after us.”

After they were gone, I turned to Anna Maria.

“Tell me what they told him,” I said. I didn’t have to explain exactly what I meant.

She frowned. “Yes, it would have helped if someone had filled us in,” she said. “But it was what you heard—just that it was revenge.”

“That it was,” I agreed. “But not the Strozzi demon’s revenge.”

“We can’t tell everybody everything,” she said. “You already know that. Would you have preferred Signore Tedesco to rage at you and keep you from seeing his son?”

“I think it would keep me from feeling unbelievably guilty,” I said.

“No, it wouldn’t,” she snapped. “You’d feel guilty anyway. You blew it, sure—but so did other people. We didn’t prepare you. I don’t think anyone had really thought he was in danger. I think my father and Nonno both thought they had time to teach you a few things, before …” she stopped. “Before your emotions were involved enough to make Bernardo a target.” She shook her head. “I sometimes think they have
no
memory of what it is to be young.”

I laughed suddenly.

“You sound like you’ve forgotten, yourself, at the ripe old age of nineteen,” I said.

“Twenty next month,” she put in, not in the least disturbed by my words. “Think, Mia. Who’s really responsible here? Don’t carry it all on your shoulders, as if you were some kind of martyr or something. Spare me.”

“I’ll try,” I said. “But, Anna Maria, if he had been dating some ordinary girl …”

“Completely true,” she agreed. “But he wasn’t. You can talk about what might have been all day long, Mia, and it won’t change what’s happened. Besides, we have to date people, too,” she added. “It’s not like we’re monks or something. For one thing, we need to make more of us.” She flicked a smile at me and then frowned again. “I think nobody prepared you because we’re too used to having to take precautions
later
, when things get really serious.… Nobody thought, hey, these are special circumstances. They acted, or didn’t act, out of habit. That’s my best guess.”

I didn’t answer. Her mention of monks reminded me of what I had learned from my demon. When I left this room, I would search until I found what I was looking for. I sat staring at Bernardo, his strong hands slack at his sides. Had I seen a movement out of the corner of my eye while we were talking? There it was again—his eyelids fluttered. Then suddenly, his eyes were wide open and full of panic. His hands lifted off the
bed, weakly reaching for the mask on his face. The heart monitor began to beep, racing, and Anna Maria stepped smartly out into the hall, in time to be pushed out of the way by a nurse. Bernardo had finally reached the mask, and he was trying to pull it off. I was half out of my chair, reaching toward him, saying, “
Caro
, don’t pull it off—” but the nurse had already taken charge.

“You’re all right,
signore
, you need to keep the mask on. You have been in a coma. Breathe, breathe. You are all right. You are in the Ospedale San Giuseppe and it is ten in the morning. Can you tell me your name?”

He slurred out, “Bernardo. Tedesco.”

“Yes. And can you tell me what day of the week it is?” she asked.

His eyes crinkled suddenly. “How long have I been asleep?” he countered.

She laughed. “A little more than ten hours,” she said.

“Then it is a good day of the week,” he joked. And then he saw me.

For one instant, I saw relief and joy in his face. One instant was all I got. I watched him remember. I saw the smile in his eyes fade. He made a low sound in his throat that echoed against the mask, and turned his head away.

I hadn’t admitted to myself that I had hoped he might not realize exactly what had happened. But I remembered a great deal from my own possession; I recalled having to watch,
trapped within my body, as my demon had used it for his own.

Bernardo knows a demon was after me
, I thought.
He knows it’s my fault this happened to him
.

“I should go,” I said, standing. The nurse stared at me, surprised. “You’re his girlfriend, no?”

“I was,” I said. He hadn’t moved his head. The nurse looked so sympathetic that I couldn’t keep the tears back. “I’ll go,” I said. “Anna Maria, can you stay, please?”

“Of course,” she said. She already had her phone out. I wondered who she would text now.

I grabbed my purse and walked quickly down the hallway. It was too full of people. I kept going until I found an alcove by a supply closet, and then I leaned against the wall and cried and cried.

When I finally dried my eyes and made my way outside the hospital into the sunshine, I stood for a moment, trying to think what to do next. I didn’t want to go home, but I felt too tired to wander the city. I thought of my demon, and my bell, and wondered whether its protection still held. I reached out in my mind, feeling for my demon, and was rewarded with a shock: I could feel him
precisely
. It felt so different from our meeting inside the Second House. If there was such a thing as a map of the Left-Hand Land, I would have been able to point to where he was. I also knew I had time. He couldn’t cross back yet. He had to gather his strength.

I stood there, while people bustled past on their way to
lunch, trying to take this in. Finally, I turned toward home, skirting the Largo Cairoli and avoiding the Parco Sempione altogether.

When I turned down the Via Fiori Oscuri, I slowed my steps, thinking about Nonno, who would be sitting in his usual place, probably writing up notes for last night. I imagined, for one appalled moment, having to do the same. Then I gritted my teeth. Of course I would. This was my case, after all.

I didn’t want to talk to Nonno Giuliano, though; I had many questions to ask him, and also some things to say, but I wasn’t ready. I wondered if he would understand. I didn’t know if I cared.

But when I got there, Nonna Laura was the one sitting at the desk. I kissed her cheek and asked my question with a look.

“Giuliano is at the park,” she said. “Did you see Bernardo?”

“Yes,” I said, my eyes beginning to smart.

She said nothing, gazing at me with such sad understanding that I just sat down and bawled. She handed me another handkerchief when mine got soaked, and waited. When I finished, she said, “I am taking you on a trip. Go upstairs and pack: clothes for a week, a jacket and sweaters, walking shoes, nice things and things to get dirty in. And some books, fun books, not study books.”

When I didn’t move right away, she added dryly, “I think that demon took part of your brain with it.”

I stood up. “Where are we going?”

“To the coast,” she said vaguely. She shooed me with her hands. “Francesca will drive.
Avanti!
”

Upstairs, I pulled clothes out at random, stuffing them in the rolling bag that had crossed the Atlantic with me. I remembered that first night, falling into bed, trying to speak my first words on Italian soil.

“Signora Gianna?” I called up toward the ceiling.

There was no answer. I could feel her nearby, but not in the room. I wondered why I had never thought about how there might be a Second House in our apartment. Had any of us ever tried to enter it, or did we leave it for our dead relations to hang out in? Who whispered from the photos on our walls?

I didn’t realize that Nonno Giuliano had returned from the park until I heard his voice raised below, in the shop. The door to the stairwell must have been open. I heard Nonna reply in a low, even voice, and then I heard her lighter tread, moving up the stairs. The door at the top opened, and I heard her say, her voice muffled as if she was speaking down into the office below, “I will not argue about this.” She went into the kitchen and I heard her putting dishes away, muttering to herself.

A few minutes later, I heard Nonno’s footsteps on the stairs. He continued down the hall toward my door. I heard him tap on it.

“Mia, may I come in?” I found my fists were clenched. I took a breath and opened them. “Yes,” I said.

He opened the door and came in slowly, glancing at the suitcase open on my bed and frowning.

“May I sit down?” he asked.

“Yes,” I repeated, watching him.

He took the chair by the balcony door, the one I had fallen asleep in the night before. I still hadn’t moved the glass of water Nonna Laura had left for me. I sat down on the bed.

“I don’t know what to say to you,
carina
,” he said.

I looked down at my hands. He sighed. When I looked up again he was staring out at the courtyard. He gripped the arms of the chair and pushed himself up out of it. He walked over to me, reaching into his coat pocket, and brought out my fountain pen, the old box of matches, and three more of my silver nails. He put them into my hand when I held it out.