The Star-Crossed Sisters of Tuscany(91)

While Poppy sits at Rico’s bedside, combing his hair, shaving his face, whispering her love, he slowly comes back to life. Every day, we see progress. He opens his eyes again. He smiles. He utters words, then speaks in short sentences. The doctor calls it a miracle. Poppy calls it fate. I call it beautiful.

By the second week, Rico’s eating on his own again, and most days he’s sitting in his wheelchair when we arrive, plucking his violin strings or fiddling with his old Leica camera. The color has returned to his face, and it’s easy to see the dashing German violinist who charmed the crowds—and my aunt. His jawline may not be as chiseled, his body might not be as taut, but I can clearly see the piercing blue eyes, the head of hair still thick and wavy, the brilliant smile that Poppy adored.

As if we’d struck some tacit agreement, Lucy and I talk in future tense, both of us intent on staying in Italy until our aunt’s dying breath. We take up a comfy spot in the hospital visitors’ lounge, giving Poppy and Rico their privacy.

Lucy sits at the hospital’s complimentary computer for hours at a time, researching something, though she won’t tell me what. Lucky for us, I still write the old-fashioned way—in my notebook. But now, the words stream from my pen, as if all around me the air is charged with love and light and a resurgence of life. When, hours later, we return to Rico’s room, we often catch them snuggled together in the hospital bed, Rico stroking Poppy’s bald head. Other times, they’re laughing at an old memory. Still other times we find them in tears, and I suspect they’re talking about the child—and the time—they lost.

“I want to marry you at the cathedral,” Rico tells her one rainy Monday, his voice deep and raspy. “I have all my paperwork completed for the government.”

She bats a hand at him. “We’re already married!”

My independent aunt, a second daughter who, after all these years, feels no need to prove their love, kisses her husband’s cheek. “You have been mein Ehemann for nearly six decades. You always will be.”

He smiles. “And you shall always be my wife.”

Poppy claps her mouth, as if catching herself, and spins around to where Lucy and I stand. “Oh, dear,” she says. “How thoughtless we are. Might it be important for you two that we marry?”

She’s letting us know, in case we’re concerned, that she will put an end to the Fontana Second-Daughter Curse with a legal marriage certificate, in a way nobody can dispute. I have zero need for this sort of closure. But perhaps Lucy does. I let her answer for us.

“If you marry,” Lucy says, her voice slow and deliberate, “just to disprove some effed-up, whack-a-doodle curse that never was, I, for one, will not be attending the wedding.”



* * *





It’s November third, a warm, overcast Saturday, and we’re sitting at a table in the hospital courtyard playing Shoot the Moon, a card game Poppy taught us.

“You had a club in your hand, but you played a spade,” I say to Rico. “No wonder you always win.”

Rico tsks and shakes his head, laugh lines shooting from the corners of his eyes. “You are a poor loser, mein M?dchen.”

My girl. Just like my aunt calls me. He places the cards into a box and reaches beneath the table for his old Leica camera.

“Enough with the pics,” Lucy says, sticking out her tongue as he snaps a picture of her. She yanks the camera from him. “You three,” she says and motions for us to gather.

Poppy comes up on one side of me, Rico on the other, their hands intertwined. Poppy kisses my cheek. I turn to Rico, his blue eyes bright with joy and love.

“Say formaggio!” Lucy says, making me laugh just as she snaps the photo. She sets down the camera and scoots to the edge of her chair.

“Guess what?” she says. “I’ve finally decided what to do with my life. Ready for this?” She mimics a drumroll. “Duh-duh-duh-dah! I want to cut hair. That’s right, I’m not exactly sure when or where, but at some point I’m enrolling in barber school!”

“Marvelous!” Poppy says, clapping her hands.

“So that’s what you’ve been researching on the hospital computer.” I hold out my hand for a fist bump. “That’s awesome, Luce.”

“I emailed all the info to Carol and Vinnie. My mom thinks I should go to cosmetology school instead, but I like cutting men’s hair. I’m not into waxing and facials and all that stuff.”

I cannot believe this is the same girl who once chose her eyeliner over her toothbrush.

“I talked to Grandpa Dolphie about it,” she continues. “He says I can do an apprenticeship in his shop.”

I picture Uncle Dolphie’s forlorn shop, with the opera music and empty chairs. He has no idea what he’s in for. His granddaughter will flip his sleepy shop on its axis, providing a much-needed shot of adrenaline. Uncle Dolphie will complain every step of the way. But deep inside, he’ll love it. Finally, he’ll have a purpose again. His shop—the business he worked so hard to build—will continue on to the next generation. He will not be forgotten. Isn’t that what we all want?

“You’re becoming the character your playwright intended,” Poppy says. “Next year, after you’ve finished barber school and Emilia has completed her novel, we will all celebrate together.”