And then he tells me that all he’s seen so far are the poppy fields, which are beautiful. That he borrowed a bike from his hotel and cycled there and back yesterday.
“How long to cycle?” I ask.
“About half an hour. They’re beautiful.”
I’m quiet, thinking about how I could achieve seeing a poppy field before I fly home tomorrow. I don’t think it can be done. There’s no time, with the wedding today and my silly-early flight tomorrow.
“If you want to borrow the hotel’s bike, I’m sure I can wangle that,” he volunteers. “The route’s easy enough—simply follow the main road out of town and down the hill.”
I think of those flashes of red I can just about see from my hotel window. I have to go. I have to see the poppies. Half an hour of cycling. Ten minutes standing in the field and then half an hour back. If I do this, I have to ask Miranda if I can sneak off in the middle of her wedding, whether she’ll mind.
I tell Joan and Geoff what I’m planning to do, and Geoff saysif I’m off to stare at a field, then he’s going to sneak off for a nap, the way men of a certain age can get away with doing.
“Of course you guys go and chill for a while,” Miranda volunteers. “They’ve opened the clock tower especially for us, if anyone wants to go up and look at the view. Some of the guests will go and do that. So there’s a bit of downtime. We aren’t cutting the cake until much later on. Just be back for eight o’clock, if that’s OK? Until then we’re sitting around, listening to a singer, soaking up the sun, drinking limoncello, and mingling.”
Jim and I make a beeline for his hotel. He’s going to borrow a bike for me and send me on my way down the road, and I promise to return it in an hour and a half or thereabouts, once I’ve whizzed down to the poppy fields and back. I am giddy with excitement. I don’t think the poppy fields are going to be life-changing. But I know that I’m here, in Italy, and I have to get to them.
Chapter 42
Davey
Marco saunters inas I’m putting the finishing touches to the tiramisu. I’ve only been working with him for a few months and this is the busiest day we’ve had. Marco was thrilled to be offered this contract, thrilled by the money and by the kudos that the bride and groom chose his restaurant over all of the others in town. This tiramisu is the biggest dish I’ve ever worked on and I can’t believe how trustworthy he’s being, leaving me with it.
An opera singer starts up across the square, over in the gardens. I can hear her faintly. I’ve been in the kitchen all day and Marco tells me I need to get out, grab some fresh air. I spy one of our waiters looking totally zapped. He’s carrying trays of empty coffee pots and waits for Marco’s mom to refill. They look beat, so I volunteer for both roles, giving them five minutes to catch their breath. I refill two pots, grab fresh cups from the special china brought in for the event, and leave the trattoria, walking into the sunlight. It’s so bright I need sunglasses, but I don’t have any. My eyes adjust slowly. I think it’s being stuck in the kitchen all day. I was happy in there. But now that I’m outside it’s good to see the scenery.
I carry the coffee over to the garden, cast my eyes around for anyone who looks like they want any. I’m not a natural waiter, but given that Marco assures me the guests at this wedding are mostly English, I’m fairly sure there’s no language barrier here.
A guy walks past me, heads to an older woman at a table, and sits near her. She turns in my direction, spies the coffee pots I’m carrying, and gestures for me to come over.
I give her a smile as she says, “Caffè, per favore.” She turns to the young guy next to her. “I try. That’s about as far as my Italian extends.”
“Mine too,” I say.
She looks up at me. “Well,you’renot Italian. The blond hair should probably have given that away, shouldn’t it?”
I smile, pour coffee for her, yawn, and then apologize. “Would you like some?” I offer the guy and he shakes his head.
“You look exhausted, mate,” he says. “Do you want to take a seat?”
The opera singer is going full pelt and although it’s not my kind of music, it adds something to this indulgent atmosphere. But I can’t sit with the guests, surely? Isn’t that a bit awkward?
“Nah, it’s OK. I don’t want to intrude. I’ll watch her from over there,” I offer, gesturing to one of the stone pillars by a portico, with fairy lights and white flowers wrapped around it.
“No, sit, please,” the woman says. She glances around. “If you won’t get into trouble, have a coffee, wake yourself up a bit.”
It’s not a bad idea and so I nod and take a seat next to her. The other seats are empty, the detritus of the food long since cleared away by my colleagues. There’s a mobile phone on the table with a pink cover on it, in the empty place I’m sitting at, and I push it toward the woman, assuming it’s hers.
“Oh, that’s my friend’s. I didn’t realize she’d left it here.”
The guy sitting with us barely acknowledges our conversation, and I wonder if these two actually know each other well or if they’ve just been seated together here, random guests, friends for a day and then…
That happens all too much in my life, I realize, especially now. Friends for a day. Or for a few months. And then, nothing. Gone.Why do weddings make me morose? Why this one? I was better off in the kitchen. Marco’s getting ready for the evening buffet. I can see the band assembling their instruments in the far corner. The atmosphere will change soon. I’ll get up when the opera singer’s finished, head back inside, out of sight of people.
The guy looks over. “She’ll be back soon,” he says to the woman. So hewaslistening. “I put her on a bike to the poppy fields. She won’t be long. An hour maybe?”
I yawn again.
“Pour yourself a coffee,” the woman instructs me and she lifts a cup from my tray, pours me a strong black coffee, inhales its aroma. “My husband’s gone for a nap. I should have just told him to have one of these.”
