Chapter 8 - THE FAMILY SHE WANTED TO FORGET
"Bellini. Only Bellini."
For several seconds, Luca didn't speak.
I could hear the faint ticking of the grandfather clock beyond the dining-room doorway.
Teresa was staring at Vanessa with a confused expression.
Then she quietly asked, "Would the baby still know who we are?"
Vanessa looked at her.
"Of course."
"Then the name isn't the important part."
Everyone turned toward Teresa.
She smiled sadly.
"When Antonio and I got married, I took his surname because I wanted to. But he always told me that a family name meant nothing if the people carrying it didn't know how to love each other."
Luca looked down.
Teresa continued.
"If the child has Vanessa's name, that doesn't change who their father is."
She looked at her son.
"Does it, sweetheart?"
"No, Mom."
"Then you two need to decide what's best together."
Vanessa stared at her.
I'd never seen her look so uncertain.
She'd spent weeks treating Teresa as someone who would fight to preserve every Moretti tradition.
Instead, Teresa had just said the baby's surname mattered less than the child's safety.
Luca leaned toward Vanessa.
"I'm not angry because you considered your name."
She looked up.
"You're not?"
"I'm hurt because you made that decision without me."
Vanessa wiped her cheeks.
"I thought you'd say no."
"Maybe I would have. Maybe we'd have found another answer."
He paused.
"But I deserved to know you were considering it."
Evelyn folded her hands.
"Vanessa, you told me Luca had agreed that the baby would use our family name."
Her daughter looked down.
"I said he understood my concerns."
"That's not what you said."
Evelyn's face changed.
I watched her realize how many decisions she'd defended without understanding them.
She turned toward Teresa.
"I owe you another apology."
Teresa shook her head gently.
"We can talk about that later."
"No. I've treated you as though you were trying to take control of the baby."
Evelyn swallowed.
"And meanwhile, I've been trying to make all the arrangements myself."
For a moment, nobody spoke.
Then Teresa said, "We both raised children, Evelyn."
"Yes."
"But this isn't our baby to raise."
Evelyn's eyes filled.
"No. It isn't."
Vanessa stared at the two women.
Her expression was difficult to read.
She seemed relieved that neither grandmother wanted to control her.
And frightened because she'd lost another reason for keeping them away.
Luca turned toward me.
"Emily, would you bring my mother's knitting basket?"
I lifted it from the sideboard.
"Of course, sir."
Teresa looked surprised.
"What are you doing, sweetheart?"
Luca carefully took out the damaged yellow sweater.
"Trying to understand something."
He held it up.
One sleeve hung unevenly.
The little buttons caught the chandelier light.
"Vanessa, when you first saw this, what did you think?"
She looked uncomfortable.
"That Teresa had spent too much time making something we didn't need."
"Anything else?"
Vanessa hesitated.
"That it would become another family keepsake."
Luca nodded.
"And why did that bother you?"
She glanced toward his mother.
"Because I imagined the baby wearing it in photographs. Everyone saying how much the child looked like you."
Teresa looked bewildered.
"That would be wonderful."
Vanessa shook her head.
"Not if those photographs started appearing everywhere. Not if people used them to connect our baby to your world."
Luca considered her words.
"Then we don't share photographs publicly."
Vanessa looked surprised.
"Just like that?"
"Just like that."
"And if your friends ask?"
"We tell them we're protecting our child's privacy."
"And your mother?"
Teresa answered before he could.
"I'd never share something you asked me to keep private."
Vanessa looked down.
I could see her running out of arguments.
But there was one question I hadn't stopped thinking about.
"Miss Bellini?"
She turned.
"What?"
I swallowed.
"When you put the sweater beneath your chair, did you know Mrs. Moretti was going to ask for it?"
Vanessa's face flushed.
"Emily, that's not important now."
"It is to me."
Luca looked at me.
I continued.
"Mrs. Moretti made it because she loved the baby. But you treated it like something that needed to disappear."
Vanessa stared at me.
I thought she might threaten my job again.
Instead, she looked toward Teresa.
"I didn't want another reminder of the life everybody expected me to accept."
Teresa's face crumpled.
"So you put it beneath your shoe?"
Vanessa's eyes filled.
"I wasn't thinking."
Luca shook his head.
"You had time to move your foot when Emily asked."
Vanessa closed her eyes.
She couldn't deny that.
Evelyn looked at the little sweater.
Then at her daughter.
"Vanessa, I think you should apologize to Teresa."
Vanessa whispered, "I know."
But she didn't do it.
Not yet.
Luca placed the sweater gently in its basket.
Then he looked at the brass key.
"There's something I still don't understand about this house in Evanston."
Vanessa looked up.
"What?"
"Your mother believed you'd be staying with her."
"Yes."
"She didn't know you'd signed a yearlong lease."
"No."
"And I didn't know about the house at all."
Vanessa said nothing.
Luca picked up the key.
"Who else knows where it is?"
"Just the property manager."
"Have you already moved anything there?"
"A few baby things."
He nodded slowly.
"Clothes?"
"Yes."
"Furniture?"
"A crib."
Teresa lowered her eyes.
Luca looked at Vanessa again.
"Is there room for me?"
She hesitated.
"There's a bedroom."
"That's not what I asked."
His voice was gentle now.
Almost unbearably gentle.
"Vanessa, was that house supposed to be somewhere our family could live together?"
She looked at her mother.
Evelyn shook her head slightly.
"Darling, tell him the truth."
Vanessa began crying again.
Luca placed the key between them.
He looked directly into her eyes.
"There's one thing I need to know before we discuss anything else. Were you ever planning to give me a key?"
Vanessa stared at the little brass object.
May you like
Then she whispered:
"No, Luca. I wasn't."
