Chapter 7

SEVEN

MAY 2019

Wednesday

"Why isn't Mar taking me to school today?" Molly asked the next morning as she tossed her backpack into the back and then climbed into the front passenger seat.

"She was up late last night," Tori answered, putting the car into gear and backing out of the driveway. "She wanted to sleep in this morning."

"Why did she stay up late?" Molly asked, taking a sip of coffee from her stainless-steel travel mug. Tori knew it probably wasn't a good idea for someone as young as Molly to be drinking coffee. But she didn't have that much, only a few sips in the morning, and it was more like coffee-flavored milk. That was just the way Molly had grown up. Surrounded by two women who were big coffee drinkers, she'd become one of the gang. They were a team, the three of them. Without a father or a normal childhood, she'd grown up more quickly, in some ways, than a lot of her friends.

Tori took a gulp of coffee from her matching mug. "I guess to wait for me to come home last night."

"Did she ask you about Jeremy?"

"What about Jeremy?"

"About whether he asked you to marry him? We both knew he was going to. That's probably why she stayed up late. She wanted to be the first to know."

"You talked about it?"

Molly took another sip, and as they rounded the curve, some coffee sloshed upward from the cup and splashed onto her navy-blue sweatshirt. "Damn!" she exclaimed, as she wiped it with her fingertips.

"Molly!" Tori scolded. "Don't talk like that."

"I'm just saying it sucks that I splashed. I poured too much into the cup this morning. Damn winding road! Good thing it's a dark sweatshirt, so it won't show when it dries."

Tori looked at her, then turned back toward the road. Molly was a great kid, smart and funny. She did well in school and had a lot of friends. But she was a bit of a loose cannon, using words she shouldn't be using and often acting more like sixteen than eleven. Tori loved being a mother, she loved raising her daughter, but sometimes she worried that their life was a little too unconventional. Molly often behaved more like a pal, a roommate, than a daughter. Tori wondered if she was doing something wrong. She wasn't like the other moms of Molly's classmates. In a way, she was younger than her age—what with dating Jeremy all these years and living with her grandmother—or, at least, the woman she'd believed was her grandmother. How funny, that she was immature for her age and Molly was so precocious. How had that happened?

And yet they were kindred spirits. Tori also would have been angry about sloshing coffee onto her clothes. She would have blamed herself, too, for pouring too much coffee into her cup. She would have also said, "Damn winding road!"

"So did he?" Molly asked.

"Did who what? "

"Did Jeremy propose? Are you engaged? Or did you say no? I'm your daughter, this affects me, too. I have a right to know. I have a right to know about my life."

Tori had to concede that Molly had a point. "Okay, then. No. I'm not engaged."

"Why not?"

She bit her bottom lip and concentrated on the road, not knowing how to answer. Molly wasn't a girlfriend, and she wasn't someone who should be speaking like this. She was a child, and she shouldn't have an intimate knowledge of her mother's romantic entanglements. Should she?

"When I am ready to discuss my personal relationships with you, I will do so," she said. "And for now, there's nothing you need to know. When there is, rest assured I will tell you."

"Fine," Molly said with a shrug. "No skin off my nose."

Tori looked at her, shocked and a little amused. Where had she picked up that expression? Where had she learned to be that rude? "Please be respectful," she said.

"I'm perfectly respectful. That was respectful. You said it was none of my business, so fine. I'm okay with that. None of my business."

"Good," Tori said. They kept driving. The thing was, her daughter wasn't being respectful. But maybe she had a point. Maybe she was entitled to know the details of what had happened last night. It had to be a very big deal to her, her mother's reasons for turning Jeremy down. Maybe this passive-aggressive stance was simply a way to assert herself and gain some control over her life.

"Okay, I'll tell you if you want to know," she said. "Jeremy… Jeremy did ask me to marry him last night."

"And what did you say?"

"I said no. Because I'm… comfortable with the way things are. I don't see a reason to make any changes." She gritted her teeth and continued to drive, her eyes glued to the road. She felt ev en stronger about her decision today than she had last night when he'd proposed. Way too much had happened last night to throw her world into chaos. The news that Marilene wasn't her actual grandmother, that her real grandmother was a dressmaker who had apparently been living quite contentedly in Rome despite the heartache and trauma she'd caused by abandoning her child—it was shocking and made Tori feel unsettled, as though the ground under her feet had sunk several inches, or the atmosphere had taken on a different hue. And armed with this news, Marilene seemed bound and determined to confront the woman who had uprooted her life, the woman she'd decided was dead because there was no other explanation for her disappearance.

From the corner of her eye, Tori could see Molly studying her as though she were a complicated puzzle piece.

"Mom, did you and Jeremy break up?" she finally said.

Tori hesitated then nodded. "I… yes, that seems to be what we did."

"Damn," Molly said.

Tori didn't have the inclination to scold her again.

"Yeah," she murmured. "Can't argue with that."

They reached the traffic circle in front of the school building and waited in line until she could pull up to the front walkway. "Have a good day, honey," she said, but before she could get the whole sentence out, Molly had scrambled out of the car and was rushing after some friends. "Kate! Sophie! Wait up!" The girls stopped and waited for her.

There was a sudden loud blast as the driver behind her leaned on the horn to get her to move. Startled, she put the car into gear. She hadn't realized she'd been sitting there. She didn't even know how long it had been.

Leaving the school drop-off point, Tori drove downtown and parked in the merchant parking lot, then made her way to the store. It was only nine o'clock, and South Main was quiet, as only the diner on the corner and the bakery down the block were open. Inside, she started up the coffeemaker, then sat down on the stool by the front counter and powered up the computer. The garment bag with the wedding dress she intended to change up was still draped over an armchair. It seemed like a million years ago that she'd decided on the asymmetrical hem.

There was still almost an hour before the store would open to customers. She supposed she could get started on the change to the gown right now. But she couldn't bring herself to begin the work. She didn't feel as inspired as she had yesterday.

Because sitting here by herself, all she could think about was Giulia. Her grandmother, her real grandmother. The beautiful woman with the wavy, honey-colored hair. The woman who'd sewn a remarkable wedding gown that ended up on display in a museum.

The woman who'd abandoned her daughter. Her baby.

Could there be any excuse for Giulia not coming back? Knowing her husband was dead, had she decided that she didn't want to raise a baby on her own?

Tori knew she was getting carried away, letting her thoughts take off like this. And yet the more she thought about it, the more she believed that Marilene had a right to be angry. And after giving up her family and her home, she had a right to answers. Even after all these decades, she had a right.

She put her elbow on the counter and rested her forehead on the heel of her hand. Could Giulia possibly know how much damage she'd done? Because Olive hadn't been the only daughter abandoned by her mother; Tori had faced that outcome, too. She thought now about her mother, the mother she barely knew. Marilene had often said that Olive had been a nervous, anxious child, and Tori remembered her that way as well. Scattered as a parent, someone who barely remembered to brush her hair before taking Tori to school each day. Someone who would refill her square, wide-mouthed glass three or four times each evening with clear liquid from the fat bottle with the yellow label that she kept in the refrigerator. Growing up, Tori had known that her mother was suffering, was tortured by something, but she had no idea what it was. And maybe her mother hadn't known what it was either. But what Marilene had said last night—how very awful, that Olive had been ripped from the only home she'd known and instructed as a five-year-old to start calling Marilene "Mama."

Tori remembered her father as sweet and helpless, someone who tried hard but couldn't calm her mother down when she was in one of her moods. They'd both had trouble with alcohol, Marilene had told Tori in later years. In fact, her father had been drunk when he crashed his car into the side of a bridge one winter night when Tori was ten. He'd been going to the mall that evening to buy Olive a Christmas present. Tori's mother had never recovered from the loss of her husband.

Tori rarely thought about her mother. But now she recalled that beautiful face, those long eyelashes and silky blonde hair, and she felt hot tears in her eyes. Was it possible that Olive became such a troubled child because she knew she'd been abandoned? Because she'd waited with Marilene's family for a mother who never came back? Might Olive have been a different person, a happier person, if Giulia had returned to her?

It was jarring, too, to think that Giulia designed wedding gowns. What else did Tori have in common with this woman? She had always thought she got her independence, her spirit, from Marilene; but did she? If she ever were to meet Giulia, would she recognize her own dark eyes? Or Molly's dazzling green ones? Would she spot her small ears or her bottom lip, relatively thick compared to her thinner upper one? Or her oval-shaped face, which she used to hate when she was growing up, wishing it was heart-shaped like her mother' s? How could she know who she was anymore, when the biological thread she shared with Marilene had turned out to be nonexistent?

Suddenly she felt as angry as Marilene was. She, too, wanted to know why Giulia never returned for her child. How could she choose to settle in Rome, knowing she left a daughter behind? Did she know that Marilene had given up everything to raise her daughter? And what would she say if she knew what a troubled life Olive had led? And how that troubled life had impacted Tori even all these years later?

Like Marilene, she wanted answers.

Like Marilene, she believed she deserved them.

But how? How could she find a woman now in her nineties who was thought to have died more than two decades ago? How could she track down the person who had left the comment on the museum's website about meeting Giulia? The specifics about Giulia were buried deep on a tiny island in Italy, tucked behind olive groves, lost in the long-forgotten history of Marilene's family as they hid from the horrors of the Second World War. Even if she wanted to, could she find out the truth?

She booted up the laptop on the counter and navigated to the English version of the Parissi Island Museum website, which Marilene had found last night. She scrolled through a few pages until she found the picture of the wedding dress. Once again, she was blown away by its design. She longed to touch the fabrics, run her fingers along the seams, trace the scallops along the neckline, and feel the column of tiny pebbles that served as buttons. She yearned to know what had inspired her grandmother to create such a masterpiece. And what her grandmother would think, would say, if they could ever meet. Would Giulia even want to meet her granddaughter and great-granddaughter? Would she be heartbroken to know how her daughter's life had ended? Would she want to know all about the family she'd turned her back on?

Tori went back to the home page and clicked on the link that brought her to the "About Us" section. Then she scrolled down to the email address for the museum's director, which seemed the best contact for her query. She felt it would be best not to reveal that Giulia was her grandmother because she thought that sounded so outlandish, and she didn't want the man to think she was some kind of a kook who should be ignored. So she clicked on the address and carefully crafted her request:

Dear Signor Mansirio,

I hope you can help me. I came across your website and saw the museum exhibit with the wedding dress designed in the 1940s by a woman named Giulia Sancino. I know someone who was part of Giulia's life for a period after Giulia left Parissi Island. She believed for a long time that Giulia had died, but we came across the comment below the exhibit description, which seems to indicate that Giulia may still be alive. Would it be possible to put me in touch with the person who commented, so I can try to find out how to locate Giulia?

Thank you very much for your help.

Sincerely,

Tori Coleman

She reread the email over. It seemed a big ask, especially since the person who'd posted the comment hadn't given a name. If the person who'd seen Giulia had opted to be anonymous, why would the museum director have access to the poster's identity? And even if he did, why would he give it to Tori? Under these circumstances, would Signor Mansirio even bother to respond? Was it even reasonable to assume that he spoke English and would understand her note?

Tori breathed out heavily. Whatever the case, it was very late right now in Rome—what were they, six hours ahead? There was nothing more to do than wait and see if she received an answer.

For good measure, she wrote a response to the comment on the website page, saying that she was looking for information about Giulia and asking the commenter to reach out to her and to please provide an email address. Then she translated both her email to the director and her comment on Google Translate and resubmitted both through the website's Italian version. She hated not knowing what would happen, if she'd ever hear back from either person. This was the kind of situation she avoided. But there was nothing more to do now. If luck was with her, tomorrow she'd have some kind of answer. Some kind of clarity.

Some route to meeting her grandmother.