The Lost Art of Second Chances (7 page)

At first, he stomped along the beach, thinking of clever retorts to toss at his dad, though he knew he’d never say any of them aloud. He walked until his legs burned and stood on a dune, staring at the edge of the Atlantic, breathing in and out, trying not to think and to calm down.

A cutter skimmed past, catching the late afternoon wind in its sails. The canvas whooshed as it filled, bowing the navy blue sail out in front. The gleaming teak hull skimmed the waters. The lucky crew worked in unison to reach the open sea. Where were they off to? What exotic port of call was next? What adventure was over the horizon for those lucky sailors not landlocked and chained to a legal career?

If only he’d followed his bliss, as they say on the left coast, and become a sailor, like in the Jimmy Buffet and Kenny Chesney beach bum songs he played every morning. He couldn’t imagine himself as an island bum. He knew that it was an illusion. Their lifestyles were one more carefully crafted commercial persona. Still . . . he would love to follow them to freedom.

But Hamiltons did not go to the islands and become beach bums.

If it weren’t for his boys, he might do it for a season at least. Just quit the firm and head to the islands. He laughed to himself as he imagined his hair long and braided into rows, woven with seashells. He’d be tan and firm, without the soft layer of fat he’d gained in office life. He would sail all day, giving tours of the islands, and sleep under the stars in a hammock on the deck of his boat.

His mother, in a morphine haze as breast cancer consumed her insides, used to tell him about how, whenever she drove into the city, she’d always be tempted to drive to Logan and get on the next plane. Just leave and escape it all.

It seemed everyone had escape fantasies in life.

Of course, that never worked, did it? Even if you could escape your place, you could never, ever escape yourself.

Nonna Belladonna used to tell him that.

He sucked in the salty tang of the sea, doing the deep breathing he’d learned in Jenny’s childbirth classes. As he blew out his breath, he thought of Nonna, coming to see him at his office, just weeks ago. When she’d come to the office, she’d been healthy and spry but maybe she’d felt time closing in on her. He’d seen it before, in his work at Sunset Manor. Seemingly healthy men and women would call for his services, get their affairs in order, and be dead within a few weeks. Did Nonna know somehow? Get some supernatural signal from the beyond?

Toward the end, when the doctors gave up, his mother began relying on crank cures and wacky internet hoaxes. When he’d gotten angry and frustrated with her one day, accusing her of believing in woo-woo stuff, she’d said he needed to learn to believe in what he couldn’t see. Anything was possible.

He hadn’t heard from Lucy since his visit to her to pass on Nonna’s bequest. He wanted to go with her to help her fulfill Nonna’s last wish. When Nonna asked him to go with Lucy, she hadn’t shared the details of her last request with him though. He hadn’t realized it would be so complex and so difficult. Would Lucy go to Italy? Should he go with her? Would they be able to find this Paolo LaRosa? And perhaps most important to Jack, would she find the lover he’d heard her ask for?

As the sun dipped toward the horizon, he headed to Sunset Manor. He drove up the curving gravel drive, parking under the sprawling oaks shading the lane and parking area in front of the converted mansion. Rest home. What a joke. The residents there weren’t resting at all. Instead, they all fretted over what didn’t get done or the family breach that couldn’t be mended or the bucket list items they failed to check off.

He did
pro bono
work there twice a week to help the residents draw up wills or with any other legal issues. So many of the elderly died intestate leaving the state to eat up their meager resources. The history buff in him loved to listen to his friends’ stories, to learn their histories and life stories, all about to pass out of living memory.

He strode in to the spacious foyer, waving to the front desk clerk and headed to see his favorite residents, Don and Owen. Tall, thin Owen and stooped, mustached Don, both widowers, roomed together. They spent most of their time together bickering and playing endless board games. Tonight, he found them in the lounge, playing chess.

“Don, you’re cheating again,” boomed Owen before breaking into a hearty laugh.

“I am not!” Don answered in his squeaky, wheezy voice, long wrecked by emphysema. “That’s a special exception.”

“Might be how you all played chess down in Southie but . . .”

“Not from Southie.” The two friends laughed together again. Jack stopped at their table.

“If it isn’t Lawyer Jack!” Owen cried, patting the chair next to him. “Have a seat.”

“Good evening, fellas. I’ll only sit for a bit. I have several appointments tonight.”

“Rushing around is no good for you. Sit a spell.” Jack smiled and dropped into the chair next to them. After a few moments, Don continued, “Jack, I wondered if I could ask you a question. It’s about my family farm. It’s up in New Hampshire, just over the state line. We used to grow the most beautiful apples up there.”

“And pumpkins too. He showed me pictures.” Thus reminded, Don pulled out a small photo album—the smartphone revolution hadn’t reached here—and pressed it into Jack’s hands. Dutifully, Jack flipped through the pictures and admired and exclaimed over prize pumpkins and goats. As the pictures passed, he saw Don as a young man, with a pretty wife by his side, and a little boy seated atop an enormous pumpkin.

“That’s my Richard. He was so proud of that. We carved it into a Jack-o-Lantern. He was only about three there, so tickled he could stand up in it and peer out.”

“I didn’t know you had a son, Don,” Jack said.

“I did. He’s still in Vietnam,” Don murmured, pushing his glasses up on his face.

Owen winced and waved at the chessboard. After a pause, he said, “We goin’ to finish this game?”

“Yes, but, just let me ask Jack a question first. After we gave up hope of Richard ever coming home, the heart went out of my wife. We sold most of the farm and packed up and traveled some. Cancer got her soon after that. Anyway, I wondered whatever happened to the farm and if you could tell me.”

“Of course. Let me get a few details.” Jack took a few notes and stood to go, just as he made a decision of his own. “It might be a few weeks before I get back to you, Don. I’m going to Italy.”

“Is it about a girl?”

“Aren’t all the best journeys?” Jack smiled at his friends and headed off to work.

When Jack knocked on the door, just after eleven that night, Lucy opened it warily, dressed in a fluffy yellow bathrobe that made her look like a sleepy duckling, her dark hair loose around her sleep-creased face.

“Jack?

“I’m sorry to drop by so late.”

“That’s okay.” Lucy smiled, waving him inside. He stepped into her tiny living room as she turned back to him. “Is everything all right?”

“I’ll go to Italy for you.”

“For me?”

“I’ll take the painting and find Paolo for you. I didn’t realize that Nonna’s request would be so . . .”

“Insane? Crazy?”

“I was going to say difficult,” Jack chuckled. “But, you indicated the other day that you couldn’t go to Italy so I will instead. I loved Nonna too. I don’t want to let her down.”

“You could never do that, Jack.” Lucy’s espresso colored eyes locked on his face. She licked her lower lip and Jack fought the urge to pull her close and kiss her, as he should have, all those years ago at their junior year Homecoming dance. He stuck his hands in his pockets instead. “I’m leaving for Italy tomorrow morning.”

She gestured to the neatly stacked suitcases by the front door. He’d walked right past and hadn’t even notice them. “You’re going alone?”

“I’m taking a week-long tour of Tuscany, see the sights and all that. But yes, after that, I’ll be on my own to find this Paolo, whoever he is, and give him his painting back and Nonna’s letter.

Jack’s shoulders slumped. Once again, he was too late. “Oh, well,
bon voyage
then. Have a safe trip.”

He headed for the door when Lucy called his name. He turned back to her. She fiddled with the tie of her robe, biting her lip. “I wouldn’t mind company though. If you want to come . . .?”

He smiled at her then and she grinned back. “Let’s make a plan then.”

Ali d’Angelo, Italy
1944

Belladonna felt nothing but trapped, like the paintings and sculpture hidden beneath the church, wrapped up in burlap to protect her from the ravages of war. Her
Mamma
died during the first year of the war, a sudden, shocking death from influenza. Her final letter from Tommaso expressed his deep condolences. Then he’d vanished. Missing in Action.

She didn’t miss him, precisely. She missed her way of life before the deprivations of war, the bone-rattling echo of bombs, the constant fear and worry and anxiety. And she missed her
Mamma
, more than she’d expected to.

Her sister, Ava, always up for any adventure, joined the war effort to become an ambulance driver of all things. Her infrequent letters were full of dashing off to rescue bleeding, near-death men and delivering them via bumpy rides over damaged roads to make-shift field hospitals.

Bella dutifully stayed with Babbo, as he became increasingly infirm each day. She wouldn’t have minded going off to help the war effort and indulge in adventures of her own but someone needed to stay and tend to the old people. Babbo couldn’t manage on his own without
Mamma
. Once sharp and vital, he’d shrunken, preferring to sit among his vines and ponder the ruin of their world.

Bella struggled to run the vineyard without workers. Most of the fruit rotted on the vines as she could no longer harvest it. The bottles in their wine cellars diminished as the early years of the 1940s rolled by without a single vintage. She planted vegetable gardens and learned to cook simple, peasant fare.

Now, with the war edging ever closer to Firenze and to the north, they lived in constant danger of siege or attack. Life in Ali d’Angelo rolled past in an uneasy combination of anxiety and dull monotony. Until Father Torricelli asked her to help him on his secret project.

She no longer remembered what Tommaso looked like, now she’d met Paolo. It wasn’t just Paolo was handsome—though he was, with gray-blue eyes and chestnut hair shot through with auburn highlights in the sun. He radiated a warmth, a vitality that she missed from her endless cycle of dull days. At eighteen, Bella was old enough and honest enough to recognize her feelings as pure, unadulterated lust.

Handsome might not have been enough to interest her though, beyond a passing fancy. But not only was Paolo handsome, he didn’t mock her for wanting to study art. They spent many nights in the cellar, chatting about their mutual favorites. He and his men would arrive near dusk. Before the moonrise, they would unload whatever treasure trove of paintings, sculpture, and other art Paolo brought into the secret storage area, and, hunker down for the night to depart before daybreak. She would bring them sandwiches and wine. She and Paolo would chat all night. They never touched, never did anything more than talk, or assist each other to bundle away priceless art treasures in rough burlap and twine. Still, they’d become friends. Paolo knew her better than anyone, understood her far better than Tommaso ever had or ever could.

One gray January day, just after the New Year, though they had precious little to celebrate, she told him about the diNovo painting.

“A diNovo painting, here? Antonio diNovo?”

“The very same. After his lady love married another, he he fled Firenze and traveled amongst the little towns, painting the Madonna with his lost love’s face. Ali d’Angelo was his favorite stop. My Babbo always said the Rossi wine kept him here but . . .”

Paolo laughed, his blue eyes dancing in his handsome face. She grinned back and toasted him before sipping her own wine, a particularly good vintage from the mid-1930s. “Would you like to see it?”

“A diNovo? You bet!” Paolo scrambled to his feet. They picked their way through the jumble of treasures to the cramped exit into the catacombs of caves, stooping as they walked along, single-file.

“It’s like Aladdin’s cave in here,” Bella laughed. She laughed more with Paolo than she had in the previous three years. She stubbed her toe on a statue and Paolo took her hand to steady her. She glanced up into his face and tightened her fingers on his. They made their way through the maze of caves until they came to a large, open space, full of bundled treasures. She shifted aside the statue of the Madonna they used to crown every year, a custom abandoned with the war. She pulled out a small, burlap-wrapped canvas, less than a foot square. She struggled to unknot the ties securing the burlap. Together they pulled away the covering. His jaw dropped.

“A real diNovo. That’s amazing,” Paolo breathed, admiring the way the painter caught the orange blossoms in mid-breeze, the lovely expression on the Madonna’s face, as well as the gleeful exuberance of the Christ child.

“It’s the
Coronation of the Virgin
, though we always called it the
Madonna of the Orange Blossoms
.”

“Yes, that was quite a popular subject for the Renaissance painters. DiNovo himself supposedly painted it some fifteen times. But most were thought lost.”

“Nope, just hiding out here. You’d be surprised at the treasures hidden all over the Italian countryside.”

His eyes locked on hers and heat flashed through her.

“No, I wouldn’t,” Paolo whispered, his gaze dropped to her mouth before meeting her eyes again. He stepped closer. Even in the chill of the subterranean chamber, his body radiated warmth. When less than a foot separated them, he whispered, “Thank you for showing me the painting, Bella.”

“You’re welcome.” Bella shocked herself by reaching up to touch his soft, shiny hair. Cupping the back of Paolo’s head, she pulled him down to her, pressing their lips together briefly. She let go and stepped back.

“You call that a kiss?” Paolo laughed before winding an arm around her waist and pulling her against him. He pressed his mouth to hers, and she tasted the richness of the summer wine on his lips, smelled the heady mix of bay rum, lime and manly musk. She wrapped her arms around him and kissed him back.