Invitation to Italian

Lena smiled. “She’s a wonderful granddaughter. I am so lucky. Just like your grandmother is lucky to have you,” she added to Julie.

From the dining room, they heard the wooden front door being opened. There was a sound of muffled voices. Julie tried not to eavesdrop and dug into her food. “Oh, my God, this is like heaven! I can’t tell you the last time I ate, and that was probably a candy bar.”

Lena looked horrified.

The footsteps grew louder as they made their way down the central hallway to the dining room. Lena raised her chin and looked over the centerpiece. Her mouth dropped open.

Julie saw Lena’s startled expression, turned and saw Katarina standing awkwardly in the doorway. She held the baby tightly in her arms as if protecting it from gale-force winds.

Next to her stood a middle-aged woman. Her thick braid was dark blond with streaks of gray. Her face was tanned and lined from the sun. She wore a fleece vest, jeans and work boots.

“Lena,” the woman said, offering a tentative smile.

Julie stared at the woman’s cornflower-blue eyes. She was sure she’d seen ones just like it before. She glanced over at Katarina’s grandmother.

“Julie,” Katarina said.

She turned.

“I don’t know if you remember. It’s been many years. But this is my mother, Zora.”

CHAPTER SIX

“FOR AN OLD MAN, you can still pound the ball.” Sebastiano mopped his forehead as he walked to the bench beside the tennis court.

“I may be fifty-three, but I’m not old. I just feel old most of the time.” Paul Bedecker stopped to gulp down half a bottle of Gatorade. Still breathing hard, he wiped his mouth. Despite the years, he had a wiry build. Dark red stubble covered his gaunt cheekbones. If the man had an ounce of fat on him, he was hiding it well.

He waggled his racket menacingly in Sebastiano’s direction. “Just don’t get the idea that I’m about to start playing like an old man. Those little dink shots. The underhanded serves.” He demonstrated some ditsy hand motions. “Don’t you just hate them?” He pulled the beak of his baseball cap down over his shaved head. It bore the logo of a reality TV show from a bunch of years back, a remnant of his time in Hollywood.

Sebastiano deliberately folded his towel into thirds and draped it over the end post of the net. “So you played and lost to an old man recently I take it?”

Paul shrugged. “Monday, which was…was it just yesterday? I’m starting to lose all track of time these days.”

Monday had been one to forget for Sebastiano, as well, thanks to Dr. Julie Antonelli. Why that woman insisted on periodically getting to him was beyond him. He did his utmost to maintain control over his emotions and his life, and she seemed somehow…somehow…to upset the applecart. Sebastiano smiled. He liked that image. Metaphors in English frequently seemed mysterious to him, but this time he could easily picture Julie lying sprawled on the ground as a mound of tempting red apples spilled over her long, lanky torso. Her tempting torso… Sebastiano’s smile became more thoughtful.

He shook his head and looked at Paul. Their relationship was the closest thing Sebastiano had to a friendship in town—a friendship basically consisting of a standing tennis game once a week. They played at eight in the morning, before Sebastiano went to the office and Paul helped out at the family garden center or nominally worked on his novel. The two had met a few months ago, right after Paul had returned to Grantham. Talk about the prodigal son. Paul had been a whiz kid who seemed to have it all—top of his class at Grantham High School, Ivy League education and hotshot job in Hollywood. But the air had gone out of his dream bubble—due to his own fault, Paul would have been the first to admit. And now he was back living with his father and helping out with the family business.

Sebastiano wasn’t a snob. He didn’t need to hobnob exclusively with members of the upper tax bracket, let alone the glitterati. In fact, he was more comfortable with Paul the way he was now—for many reasons. He liked Paul’s humor, his sardonic take on the world. He even found his edginess interesting. But that didn’t mean Sebastiano was blind to Paul’s faults.

“Paul, are you okay? Something bothering you?” He paused. “Have you started drinking or using again?”

Paul breathed in deeply. “Thanks for asking. And, no, I’m not using. And I haven’t touched a drop.”

“I’m glad to hear it because I haven’t seen you at the A.A. meetings lately.”

“Hey, I know you’re my sponsor, but you don’t need to keep tabs on me. I was busy with my father. I had to take him to his eye doctor for a checkup. His eyes were dilated, so he couldn’t drive. Then there was my niece’s birthday. Other stuff, too.” He idly watched a doubles match a few courts away.

Sebastiano waited.

Paul sighed. “Okay, it’s just that being back in Grantham has a way of dredging up old memories, not all of which are good. But, I can deal with it. Really. I know not to sit around and let them get to me. Anyway, sometimes you just miss meetings, you know? Everyone’s done it, even you.”

Sebastiano hadn’t. Ever. Not for six years anyway. Not since he decided to get control of his life, stop drowning his guilt in vodka and join Alcoholics Anonymous. It hadn’t solved all his problems, but it allowed him to wake each morning and face each new day and do the best he could. In fact, hadn’t he just explained yesterday in his office to Julie Antonelli that he worked daily to do what was right by the hospital? Sebastian blinked, startled at where his line of thinking had unintentionally wandered. Julie Antonelli? Suddenly insinuating herself into his very thoughts?

THAT SAME MORNING, Julie headed to Fine Threads, Grantham’s premier knitting and needlepoint shop. After poking around the piles of needlepoint canvases spilling over the table in the center of the store, she approached the cash register with one she’d chosen. “I saw you had a trunk show, so I decided to come in.”

Caroline, the owner, held up the printed canvas. “It so looks like something you would do, Julie. I can see all your different stitches on the flowers and along the geometric border.”

Julie rested an elbow on the gray granite bench surface and admired the pattern on the canvas. “I really liked the Hungarian peasantry feel to it. And after getting the twenty-percent-off coupon, I couldn’t resist.”

Caroline, a thin middle-aged woman with short gray curly hair and the placid demeanor of a seasoned kindergarten teacher, beamed. “You got the coupon? That means it’s your birthday this month! Congratulations! When is it?”

“Oh, I have days to go.” Julie waved off her enthusiasm. “Besides, I’m at the stage where I try to ignore birthdays.” Actually, Julie had made a point of ignoring her birthday since she was twenty.

Caroline shook her head. “You’ve got a long way to go before you get to that stage. Anyhow, do you want to pick up the needlepoint thread, too? It’s twenty percent off the entire purchase, you know.”

“I’m not sure what I need, but maybe I’ll just take another peek at the pile?”

“Take your time. And you know what? I was going to call you. I just put together your latest pillow, and I’ve got it downstairs. I’ll just go look.” Caroline headed down to the storage area.

Julie wandered over to the display. Neat rows of needle point threads in silks and wool, some shot with glittery strands, covered the walls. Jars of buttons, knitting needles and books rounded out a cozy seating area, where knitters of all ages gathered together.

Julie liked the shop and Caroline immensely. In fact, she sometimes thought of Fine Threads as her little club. When she wasn’t working or thinking about work, she was most likely curled up in an armchair in her apartment with the television tuned to some sports channel, while she compulsively needlepointed.

The bell over the front door chimed, signaling a new customer. Julie glanced around. Her heart sank. Not again.

“Julie, my dear, fancy meeting you here. And to think I was just about to get in touch.” Iris Phox entered the small shop, preceded by a well-loved L.L. Bean canvas carryall and her oversize confidence.

“Mrs. Phox. How nice to see you, too,” Julie said. Maybe she’d just forego collecting her pillow.

“Here you are, Julie,” Caroline announced, mounting the stairs to the checkout counter. She carried a blue Fine Threads bag with a sausage-shaped pillow peeking out from one side. “It looks fabulous.”

“Oh, I must see.” Iris undid the belt and buttons of her Burberry raincoat.

Caroline removed the pillow from the bag and unwrapped the plastic covering. “Isn’t it magnificent. I love the way you mixed in beads and buttons with the needlepoint. And the idea to roll the canvas into a bolster pillow was brilliant.”

Julie looked over Iris’s formidable shoulder. The large patchwork of scrolls and hibiscus flowers in a mixture of warm yellows, oranges and brick-reds, coupled with the light greens and beige and pale yellow background, had come out nicely, even she had to admit it.

“Yes, the shape is quite clever.” Iris squinted. “Whatever made you think of doing that?”

“My grandmother has been complaining that her lower back hurts, and I thought it would provide some support when she’s sitting down.”

Iris ran a boney index finger over the loopy stitches with beads attached that formed the anther tips of the flowers’ stamen stalks. “Yes, very clever. Indeed, you’re just the person to help me.” Iris marched back to her carryall that she’d left on the high worktable in the center of the shop.

“I am?” Julie asked, looking warily at Caroline before turning to Iris.

“Yes, indeed.” Iris pulled a giant canvas from her bag. “I’m making a Christmas stocking for my granddaughter Natalie—the start of a family tradition—and I am having trouble with Santa’s beard. According to the instructions, it’s supposed to be something called Turkey Work, but I am completely baffled. Clearly, the instructions were not written by an educated person.”

There was much to be learned from a person like Iris, Julie realized. Here was someone who felt no compunction about blaming others for her own failings. She, on the other hand, assumed she was responsible for any and all failures.