All at once, I’m flooded with a sensation I haven’t felt in so long I nearly cry.
Ricky wraps his strong arms around me, and I burrow my face into the crook of his neck, resting my cheek on his muscly shoulder. He pulls me so close, hugs me so tight, that our bodies fuse together. Cedar, oak, woodchips, Dove, citrus flowers.
And I exhale, expelling every ounce of nervous, frantic sadness that had been building and building and clogging me up.
Relief, safety,home.
If Mount Vesuvius erupted right now and blanketed the entire globe in layers of volcanic ash, it wouldn’t matter because the combined power of the lemon trees and Ricky’s arms would protect us.
Neither of us pull away. It’s the kind of hug where both people are fully content to justbe. Here. Now. In a space just for us. For as long as it takes.
He hums, and it reverberates through my chest.
Instinctively, we both loosen our grips at the same time.
Pull away, but only enough to look into each other’s eyes.
The sun overhead peeks out from behind some clouds, and his face is illuminated golden from the lemon tree branches. His eyes are pools of honey. I want to get stuck in them.
“You know what Nonno said to me when I came out to him?” Ricky says, his voice a low, deep whisper. “He told me that when you love someone, say it out loud. Never let”—his breathing is ragged, labored—“those moments . . .” His chest heaves in and out.
Pass you by?I finish for him, recalling how it felt yesterdaywhen we found ourselves in the exact same position, at the exact same lemon farm, except now it’s just us, with nothing stopping us from righting all the wrongs of the past year.
Except, so much time has passed, and it’s hitting me that as much as I want to kiss him and tell him that I love him, if I do, and it ends again, I don’t think I’d survive a second massacre.
If he felt what I’m feeling, the way he changed me and left me to put myself back together without him, he would understand my hesitation.
All I’ve wanted all year is for Ricky to want me again. But now that he’s here, inches away from me, I’m afraid. DoIreally wanthim, after the way he hurt me, knowing he could do that to me again? Knowing that he probably will because when I’m with him, I feel like the Fielder he left alone on the beach.
Uncertain.
I step back, out of his arms.
He stares at me, brows furrowed, head tilting in confusion.
“There you boys are!” Isabella says. “Andiamo! It’s time to finish the pici!”
RICKY DELUCA
“Master and Apprentice”
“You sure you boys don’t need a ride back into town?” Isabella asks. “Niccolò is almost done with his tour. Or maybe my son? Ma non so dove sia.” Brushing stray hairs away from her eyes, she turns every which way as if that will suddenly draw him out of hiding with Matty. “I find him—”
“No, no, it’s okay,” Fielder interrupts. “We can walk. A little exercise will help after all that pasta and pastry.”
“Va bene!” She nods as if she agrees that we both need to work off our pasta bellies. She grabs my shoulders and presses her cheek to mine and makes a kissing noise vigorously. “Buona giornata!”
“I love her.” Fielder nearly skips down the road toward town. “Her warmth radiates! Look!” He plays what he recorded of us making fresh lemon tiramisu and sweet honey lemon cake. Isabella’s voiceover says, “Thank you for respecting the lemons. Many people come through here and think they can pick thelemons from our trees themselves. They damage the trees. My husband has worked for many years to get protection for the Amalfi lemon and preserve the coastline, and so many tourists don’t understand the history and importance and how sometimes our ways of life feel so fragile. We work hard to preserve our history for future generations, like my son.”
That’s why Nonno taught my father, and then me, his craft. Why I work so hard to one day become the man Nonno taught me to be.
The last thing Isabella said reverberates: “Once you lose something forever, it’s gone.” So simple, yet frighteningly powerful. She held a Sfusato Amalfitano in her hand, and my own hands longed for the grip of Fielder Lemon’s.
“So beautiful, huh? Anyway, sorry.” Fielder slips his phone into his pocket. No editing software apps, no swiping or pinching or typing or squinting, spending hours editing content for his channel so intensely he would tune out the rest of the world in FTV: Fielder’s Tunnel Vision. It’s oddly unsettling.
“Why are you sorry? You don’t wanna edit? You can.”
“I’m working on being more present. Living in the moment. I’ll edit the footage from today later.” I surprise even myself with this. I’m not itching to be on my phone. At all. “Once we’re back and we’re . . .” He pauses.
