Taking Tuscany (23 page)

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Sophia Degulio

Did she really think I'd do all that for ten bucks?

I'm almost done clearing the dishes, except Nonna is still sitting at the enormous table alone, working away on her pie. There's a loud knock. Mama makes for the door and swings it open. It's Angelo. But he isn't alone. He's holding Little Luigi in his arms and hands him off to Mama.

“Oh, Angelo, I just know this will help Benji get well,” Mama switches to Italian and asks him to come and have some pie.

Escorting Angelo into the dining room, I offer him a seat next to Nonna. Darned if she doesn't look over and wink at him.

I follow Mama back to Benji's room. “Are you really going to let him keep it?” I ask.

“Of course I am; that's why I asked Angelo to bring him over.”

“That was
your
idea, Mama?” I'm shocked.

“Let's just say a mama always knows what's best for her babies, and this little runt is going to help my baby get well—you just watch.”

Mama hands the little butterball to my brother. Benji lights up like sunshine on snow. “Little Luigi! He's … mine?”

I have never seen a happier face.

While I'm waiting my turn to hold Luigi, Mama bows out to check up on Angelo—we did, after all, leave him alone with Nonna. “A. J. will be happy to help you with the housebreaking task until you're up and about,” Mama says.

Thanks, Mama. I knew I'd get the short end of this deal.
Luigi is a real piece of work—in the creative sense. He is a shaggy ball of gray, white, brown, and tan, with enormous feet to grow into. I have a feeling he will look like one of those prehistorical hairy mammoths when he's full-grown. Watching Benji hug that pup, I wonder how on earth Mama ended up giving in. But that isn't all I'm wondering about.

“Hey, Benji, you know in the hospital when you were unconscious and the doctors said they … almost lost you, were you—I mean, where
were
you?”

A quizzical expression comes over him. “I was having a really good dream.”

“A
dream
?
About what?”

“I was back on Indian Island.” He smiles.

Lucky.
“What were you doing?”

“Fishing. Me and Dino were fishing out in the rowboat. I even caught a fish.”

“Was I in your dream?”

He thinks for a minute, then laughs.

“What?”

“Well … Mama was getting mad at you for talking with your Southern accent. Adriana was mad 'cause you let Sailor shake water all over her. And J. R. was mad at you for throwing his fish back in the water.”

Yeah, those were the good ol' days.
“Was Danny there?”

Benji thinks. “Yeah. He was the only one not mad at you. He was just laughing.”

“That sounds more like paradise than a dream.” If I'd had that dream I would have thought I'd died and gone to heaven. It would almost be worth falling off a roof to have a dream like that.

I leave Benji alone with his hound
from
heaven and walk back through the dining room. Nonna and Angelo are eating pie together. I can only imagine what Nonna is telling him, but whatever it is, Angelo is smiling his toothless grin. I slip out the door to the courtyard.

Looking around at Nonna's statues, I'm wondering who all these saints really were when they were living.
I'll bet there are some stories here.
Mama comes out and asks if I can give her a hand straightening up the guesthouse. They're short on rooms over at Uncle Nick's and will be sending a few relatives back over to stay with us. I'm glad they're coming—I'm not ready for all of this to end.

After helping Mama make up the beds, I stand at the big picture window looking out over the Tuscan hills. “Mama,” I say, “come over here and tell me something.”

Mama makes her way over to the window and stands beside me.

“Tell me what you see when you look out there.”

Mama stares out the window for a moment. She puts an arm around my shoulder and sighs. “A. J.,” she whispers, “I see family.”

“Me, too, Mama.”
Me, too.

Finita

Epilogue

Two years later . . .

November 27, 1974

Dear Danny,

How's Sailor? Here's my school photo of me at sixteen. I can't believe I've been here for six years! I'm still planning to come to Indian Island when I turn eighteen, to attend veterinary school. Be sure and reserve Papoose for me to rent for the summer. Only two more years until I get to see Sailor again.

How are you? Are you a pastor yet? Besides being a vet, I'm kind of thinking of being a nun. Then I could help starving animals and people. I wrote Sister Abigail about it. She said I could probably do both.

Write back, please.

Yours truly,

A. J.

In December of 1974, Grandma Angelina comes to visit us for Christmas. When she arrives, she hands me a gift and a Christmas card, but won't say who it's from. And she tells me not to drop it. Whisking it carefully up to my tower, I set it gently on my bed while I open the card.

A photo of Sailor falls out. He's playing in the snow in front of our cabin. On the back it says:

MERRY CHRISTMAS!

Love, Sailor

I unfold the letter:

December 13, 1974

Dear A. J.,

Sailor really liked your school photo. You sure don't look ten years old anymore. Sailor is very glad you're coming back. He wants you to be sure to call me as soon as you get here. Things are going well for me. I'm now the youth pastor at Squawkomish Baptist.

I was walking through Saddlemyer's Dime Store when I saw this. For some reason it make me think of you. Merry Christmas, A. J.

Hurry home.

Yours,

Sailor & Danny

P.S. About the nun idea—have you ever thought about being a youth leader? They're always looking for help at the Baptist church.

Inside the box is a snow globe. A winter scene with a church, a boy, a girl, and a dog standing in the snow by a nativity. Snow swirls gently down, then lays completely still … all is calm … all is bright.

… a little more …

When a delightful concert comes to an end,
the orchestra might offer an encore.
When a fine meal comes to an end,
it's always nice to savor a bit of dessert.
When a great story comes to an end,
we think you may want to linger.

And so, we offer ...

AfterWords—
just a little something more after you
have finished a David C. Cook novel.
We invite you to stay awhile in the story.

Thanks for reading!

Turn the page for ...

• Excerpt from
Heading Home

• References

• The Stories Behind the Story

Return to Indian Island

(Excerpt from
Heading Home)

Indian Island, Idaho, July 1976

The rowboat smashes into the dock with a thud. A startled mallard plunges into the lake and paddles quickly away.

“I'm home!” I yell at the top of my lungs. I've waited eight long years to hear myself say those two words again. Stepping onto the shores of Indian Island is like stepping back in time. Hidden among the trees in the Pitchy Pine Forest sits little Papoose, our lost cabin, waiting for its family to return. Voices and laughter still echo from its walls: Mama, Daddy, Adriana, J. R., Dino, and Benji. The faint squeak of a hamster wheel drifts from the shed like a sad melody, carrying the memory of Ruby Jean.

Running toward the cabin, the words ring over and over in my head,
I'm home! I'm home!
I whisper it this time, just to hear myself say it again. I let myself in, relishing the thought that no one else knows I'm here. I'd debated over clanging the bell on the main shore, knowing the mini-tug would come for me, but I wanted my reunion to happen right here, on my old beloved island.

I'm relieved to find everything in Papoose the same as when we left, as though no one has taken our place. My eyes dart to the phone number of Big Chief, still tacked to the wall above the phone. I've played this moment in my mind so many times.

Lord, help me to pull this off
. Dialing the number, my hands begin to shake. The old familiar ring blares in my ear …

“Hello?”

It's Danny
.
That same Southern voice that made my heart skip a beat the first time I ever heard it is making it pound now. “Well, howdy on ya!” I bellow, in the best Southern drawl I can muster—not easy, after spending eight years in Italy.

There's a long pause. “Howdy yourself. May I ask who's callin'?”

“You can ask all ya want, but I ain't gonna tell ya. I'm frankly more in'erested in that log cabin you've got over yonder from your place a piece. Any chance it might be up for rent this summer?”

There is no way Danny would even think of being stuck on an island with some kook. He'd rather leave Papoose empty than have to deal with a nutty neighbor.

“Who's this?” He sounds more curious than annoyed.

“Well, who in the Sam Hill do ya think it is?”

“Um, I really don't know, but in answer to your first question, I don't rent that cabin out. I have a family I keep it reserved for whenever she … whenever
they
come back.”

I can't stand it any longer. “Well, Danny boy, it just breaks my li'l heart that you don't recognize a true Southern belle when you hear one.”
That'll get his wheels turning.

“… No way …
A. J.
?
Is that you?”

“
Bingo!
Race you to Juniper Beach—and bring my dog!” I slam down the receiver and dart out the screen door so fast it nearly flies off its hinges.

I'm whippin' down that old Pitchy Pine Trail faster than a baby jackrabbit. The first thing I see when I reach Juniper Beach is my big old dog.

“Sailor!” I cry, with tears streaming down my face. Sailor comes barreling down the beach, twice as fat and half as fast as when we parted. He pounces on me so hard I nearly fall over. I bury my face in his fur and sob like the day I found him on death row. When I look up, I see Danny walking toward me real slow, as though he doesn't want to intrude on my reunion with Sailor.

As I wipe my tears, my eyes come to focus on the face I've so longed to see—besides Sailor's.
Oh … my … gosh.
This is
not
the Danny I remember. Before me stands a towering six-foot-somethin' sandy-blond, sun-bronzed cowboy—a perfect cross between the Duke and Little Joe Cartwright. When we're within arm's reach of each other, we both just stop. Eight years is a long time—from saying good-bye as kids to saying hello as adults.

“Hey, A. J.,” Danny says, real tender.

No one has
ever
said my name the way Danny says my name … with the most beautiful Southern accent I've ever heard in my entire life. I stand still, just staring at him … and I have only one thing to say. “Can you ride a horse?”

Danny looks taken back and amused at the same time. “Did you just ask me if I can ride a horse?”

(Daddy once told me, “A. J., when you find your cowboy, make sure he can actually ride a horse. Any man can put on the hat and the boots and call himself a cowboy, but only a real man can actually ride the horse.”)

“Um … never mind,” I answer. “But can you?”

“Ride a horse?”

I nod. “Uh-huh.”

Now he's grinning, like he just realized I must be the same quirky kid he knew before. Not bothering to ask why, he just answers the question. “Yeah, A. J., I can ride a horse.”

“Oh. Okay.”

“Is that good?

“Yeah. That's good.”
That's real good.

Now Danny's looking at me with those blue, blue eyes that always made me feel like he could see right into the depths of my soul. Is this really my childhood friend? Our nearly four-year age difference that once posed such a gap between us seems strangely insignificant now.

Danny sticks his hands in his pockets. His quizzical expression suggests that maybe he's thinking the same thing.

Yep, I'm the same freckle-faced kid, with the fake Southern accent, who could squirt half the lake between my two front teeth.
At least I've grown into my teeth now and speak Italian instead of Southern.

So here we are face to face, after all these years, in a standoff, wondering how we're going to fill this awkward moment …