she’s accomplished. Emotions rush in, so proud of her. I cross the street searching to see her through the strangers’ faces. Quickly her strawberry-blonde hair comes into view as she grabs two liquor bottles to turn upside down into a martini shaker, a smile on her young face. Standing outside the patio, ignored by people in the seats, I watch her, visited by an image with hair all chopped and black, thumbing through a ragged translation book, searching for food to eat with Adolfo blowing smoke into her lost face.
I head for her. When she sees me her eyes change to discomfort momentarily. The look in mine washes away the look in hers, and she smiles, wondering what I’m thinking, why I look so different, where my need has gone. She points to an empty chair and I know she will be right with me. I’ve done this a hundred times with her in Benito’s bar. She finishes helping two women who might be more than friends, and walks to me, wiping her hands on a bar towel, her eyes searching mine for answers.
“Hi,” she smiles, cautiously. “You look good.”
“There is no more desperation.”
Her eyebrows rise up and she lays the towel down, her hands lying on the edge of the counter. I smile at the familiar sight.
“Oh? I never saw you as---”
I raise my hand and she stops. “I love this place, Bella.”
She beams at me, her eyes filled with relief and still some confusion. “Really?”
I nod, a knot forming in my throat. “Truly. It is an accomplishment and you should stay and enjoy it, feed it, help it grow to everything you wish for it.”
Her hand flies to her chest. “Oh!”
“I am going back to Italy. This is not my home.”
She frowns and looks down for a second. “Just a few hours ago, you insisted you could change my mind.”
Sitting back on the barstool, I laugh. “Sono stato uno sciocco.”
She gently shakes her head, a sad smile tugging at her lips. “You could never be a fool.” Glancing to her left, she holds up a finger to tell me she’ll be back.
I watch her leave to pour red wine into the glass of an artistic-looking older woman with wild hair and bangle bracelets. Her eyebrows are drawn on with pencil and she cocks one thin line my way like she would enjoy eating me alive. There is a playfulness to her flirtation and so I wave with a small flick of my hand. She jogs her eyebrows up a few times over a saucy grin, and Bella comes back to me, shaking her head, saying on a laugh, “That’s Barb. She just whispered to me that I’m the luckiest woman in the world.”
My smile fades; hers, too. “Bella, I want to tell you how much you added to my life.”
She tries to blink away emotion but it clearly will not be shut down. “Oh, please stop. You’re acting like I’ll never see you again.” When I say nothing, she exclaims, “You don’t know that! You can’t just disappear on me. You’re family to me now! What would I do if I thought I could never talk to you?”
I will need to make up to Sophia what I have done, and how I’ve treated her, and she will not want me talking to Bella. “It might be best to not speak for a time,” I answer, solemnly.
“Why?” A thin crease forms on her brow, but she looks away, shaking her head again and this conversation away, with it. “I have to work. You’re staying at least tonight, right. Don’t tell me you were going to run off to some hotel room?”
I was thinking of doing exactly that. “Do you want me to stay?”
“Yes. Please stay with me tonight,” she says, imploringly.
“Okay. I need your keys. I locked up when I left…” I was about to mention Brendan, but she interrupts me, glancing over to see new people in need of a drink.
“If you promise not to vanish while I’m working. If you don’t promise, I’ll make you wait until we close so you can’t get your suitcase!” Her face is so severe as to be very funny.
With amusement, I stand. “I promise. I will be there when you get home.”
With a few strides to the register, she reaches behind it for her keys, pulling off the ones to her home and tossing them to me, one after the other. I catch them both and nod to the woman called