Chapter Forty-Six Rory

Clanging church bells cut the silence that is thick with Ginevra’s revelations.

Even though I’ve just heard about my father and Ginevra—about their intimate moments, about the author’s incomprehensible betrayal of her sister, of my father—I can’t help but feel sorry for Ginevra. I know that feeling, after all, when your skin longs for its pair, hates to return to its solitary self.

I press my feet into the swirly Majolica tiles, cool under my soles. “That’s not the end of the story, though, is it?” I finally ask Ginevra.

“No. No, it—”

“You were pregnant.” It comes out harsher than I intend. I knew it already, of course, but I didn’t know the how, and now I’m finding it difficult to restrain myself. My grief over Max is pooling, overtaking things. My anger—at my brother, but also at myself. And now I have a new target, a new person to blame for all of our misfortunes: Ginevra. The person who sent me on this twisted journey. Who has played us all like pawns on her chessboard.

“Yes,” Ginevra says, not meeting my gaze.

“What happened next?” I feel Caro put a hand on my mine, but her touch burns. I flinch, pull my hand back to my own lap, can tell without glancing over that Caro’s hurt, but I think it’s more. There’s something needy in touch—I witnessed it in Ginevra’s story; I understand it in my own. And right now, I can’t contend with anyone else’s needs. I can only try, however imperfectly, to satisfy my own.

Now I need the truth.

Ginevra sighs and something slips over her face. Something impenetrable that I realize I’ve seen in Papa’s eyes, too—back before Alzheimer’s, when on the rare occasion an innocuous trigger would catapult him back into his past.

“I didn’t see Anatoly after we slept together. In fact, I never saw him again. The next day, Orsola went out on her tour. I stayed with Papa. I knew she’d go to see Anatoly. Of course—our last day in the city. I worried—no, worried is the wrong word. I was terrified out of my mind that my sister would figure out what I’d done. That she’d tell my father, too. That Anatoly would make a reference to sex, that he’d touch Orsola in an illustrative way. When she met us for dinner, though, she was all smiles. I didn’t dare ask her a thing. Not until the airplane—not until I could see the clouds. I asked her if she was sad to leave Anatoly, and she said that yes, she was, but we were going to get him an invitation to leave, and soon he’d join her in Rome.

“Then my sister said, You’re awfully interested in Anatoly, Ginevra. Don’t tell me you developed a bit of a crush on him.”

“But she was joking,” I say. “She didn’t really mean it?”

“Oh, she meant it. But she was joking in the way that she knew it wasn’t reciprocated. So she could smile about it. Because he did not reciprocate my feelings.” Ginevra shakes her head ruefully. “Obviously.”

I nod. Sentences form on my tongue, hang unspoken in midair. That must have been so hard for you to have pretended to be your sister to sleep with him. But even more so, it must have been so hard to part from him—to never get to say goodbye, to remember his kisses and his embrace, and know that part of life was over.

I don’t say it, though. I’m not so generous, I suppose, because I can’t just see Ginevra as a misguided girl. She slept with my father, pretending to be the woman he loved. I am not an uninterested party.

But still, I remember what it felt like when Nate broke off our engagement. How I didn’t shower for days because I wanted to keep the scent of him on my skin.

“What did Ansel mean, about the KGB listening in?” Caro asks.

“Oh.” Ginevra shrugs. “He was a Jew and a bit of a troublemaker. His place was ransacked once by KGB agents, looking for what they called Zionist materials. He dressed as a chef to come up to my room because he didn’t want to be identified. And they were listening; they did bug hotel rooms of foreigners in those days. And citizens could be rounded up for manufactured infractions. Maybe it seems like he was being overcautious, but when you saw your friends and family shuttled off to Siberia, imprisoned in the basements of Lubyanka—well, it paid to be safe.”

Ginevra pauses. “I’ve often wondered if that day would have gone differently if he hadn’t been so worried about the listening ears. Because when language can’t be resorted to for communication, bodies become the vehicles.”

She hangs her head. “Or maybe that was just my excuse. Trust me, I’m not looking for absolution, least of all from you, Rory.”

“I can’t give it, anyway.” I manage a half smile. “It’s my father you deluded. And I still don’t know the rest. When you realized you were pregnant…”

“Yes. Well, it wasn’t even a month later that I knew. The signs were immediate. Suddenly meat made me sick. The sight of raw chicken—the smell—sent me rushing for the toilet bowl. I lay awake at night, feeling paralyzed, although to be honest, I wasn’t surprised. I deserved this. This was my punishment for what I’d done. I thought about aborting the baby, finding some back-alley way, but every time I contemplated it was a sucker punch. I had loved Anatoly—for me it had been real. The realest love I’d ever known. He hadn’t reciprocated it, no. And our baby was born of my deceit. I couldn’t get around those facts, but still, that baby was born of love, too. Mine. And Anatoly’s—he’d told me in one of our early conversations that he dreamed of being a father.”

“How did you tell Orsola?” I ask, feeling sick imagining it, that scared girl, hating that sympathy is bubbling in me for Ginevra, even though she brought it all upon herself.

“Well.” Ginevra peels a chunk of purple-red hair from her face and tucks it behind a wilted ear. “Orsola realized something was off with me. There was a little twinly intuition, I suppose. She asked if I was sick, and I said that, in a measure, I was. We were at dinner with my father. I’d made amatriciana. I knew I couldn’t hide it. I was going to have this baby. I hadn’t yet thought beyond that, but I knew in my soul, I had to have this baby. It all spilled out—fast. I couldn’t look them in their eyes. I remember the shock. The anger. The disbelief.”

“Orsola?” I ask. “She must—”

“Orsola was silent.” Ginevra swallows hard. “My father was the one blowing up. I’d never seen him so angry. He was Mount Vesuvius. And all of a sudden, he started clutching his chest. The left side.”

“No.” I cover my mouth with my hand, because I can intuit now where this story goes.

“Yes,” Ginevra says simply. Her shoulders budge up, her face painfully childlike. “He had a heart attack. Another. A big one this time. He died in the hospital a couple of hours later.”

Ginevra’s father. That would be Max’s biological grandfather, I realize.

“Yes. Yes. I killed my father. That’s how the story went. Can’t rewrite it, after all. Make it any different. I stole my sister’s love, and then I killed my father. Those are the facts.”

Ginevra’s mouth sets in a grim line and she brings her fist down hard onto a teak side table, as if she is a dictator of centuries past, pronouncing her own guilty verdict.

“I might as well have killed myself, too. But after my father died, I never felt like I deserved to exist at all.”

The chef calls us for lunch. Nate joins, too, asks what happened, his eyes flickering with concern. Caro pulls him to the side of the terrace by the pool. I figure she’s filling him in, but I don’t have the energy to join, chime in. Instead, I watch our feast filter out. I can’t summon the appetite to eat, although I note bitterly that Ginevra doesn’t suffer the same affliction. She eats almost ravenously: grilled branzino, pasta al pomodoro, a Neapolitan babà for dessert. And as always, Ginevra imbibes prosecco like water. I count two refills of her glass before I lose track.

I watch everyone eat, watch forks enter mouths and retreat again, stare out at the turquoise perfection of the day that is trying valiantly to pull me out of my spiraling thoughts.

Finally, I say, “You didn’t finish the story. You just gave baby Max over to my father? Just like that?”

“Oh.” Ginevra puts her fork down, chews. Watching her do so is revolting—fish juice on her lips, flakes in her teeth. Then Ginevra sighs a sigh so emotive it has worlds inside it. “Not just like that. To tell the truth, I was so mired in my grief, mourning my father, knowing I’d killed him. I desperately wanted to give the baby to my sister. Maybe even that was selfish. I wanted to make everything up to her in some way. What other way existed than giving my child to her? I wanted her plans to proceed. The life she and Anatoly desired, I wanted them to still have it. I suggested that Anatoly still come to Italy, that they raise the baby as theirs. But Orsola wouldn’t hear of it. After she knew what I’d done, after I became pregnant, she said she couldn’t fathom a life with Anatoly anymore. That I’d ruined it, sullied it. Destroyed it.

“And of course, I understood, or I tried to. During my pregnancy, Anatoly received an invitation to leave the Soviet Union. He was denied by the government, became a refusenik. But he made a big enough stink that eventually he got to leave. He understood by then what had happened in that room at the Metropol Hotel, how big a blunder he’d made, mistaking one twin for the other. Orsola filled him in on everything. I was so ashamed that he knew. But my grief over my father’s death overshadowed it all. Orsola said Anatoly wanted the baby to raise on his own, in America, and I was so numb. Of course, I agreed. When I gave birth, I didn’t even hold him. I couldn’t. If I held him, I feared I’d never let go. Instead, I handed him to Orsola, and she took him to America.”

I nod numbly. “Max.”

“Yes. Your father named him. Your father was—”

“Is,” I interrupt.

Ginevra nods. “It’s not the Alzheimer’s that makes me talk of him in the past tense. For me, he’s long been in my past.”

I open my mouth, about to say, I found all the clippings, all the photos—that clearly Papa hasn’t been in her past but communicating with her all these years.

But then Ginevra says, “He kept in touch with Orsola. Sent her pictures that she’d share with me.” Ginevra smiles sadly. “She loved Ansel, you know? He was the love of her life. I always thought she made a mistake, that she didn’t go to him, that she didn’t raise Max as hers. But she couldn’t do it, and I understand that, too. Instead, we soaked in the pictures, mementos.”

“You sent money, too, didn’t you?” It spurts out of me, surprising myself. But all of a sudden a picture is forming—a clearer picture of my childhood that in hindsight I realize I never quite understood. Sometimes those overdue bills arrived, and I would worry like crazy that we were going to be evicted, have to live in a homeless shelter, or eat Spam, but then somehow, things would be fine and Papa would even buy us extras, special items, like he was suddenly flush with cash. I remember having the childish thought that my babysitting money stuffed into those envelopes had made the dent, gotten us over the hump of hard times.

Ginevra blushes. “I did send money to Ansel. It was my pleasure and joy to do it. My responsibility, too. Orsola was our go-between. I always felt it generous of Orsola, to let me stay in her life. If our roles were reversed, I’m not sure I would have found the same generosity. And it was kind of Ansel, inordinately kind, to allow me to share in Max’s milestones, and in yours, too, Rory. To allow me to provide for you children in some way. Even though, he was always clear about it, he wasn’t going to rest on his laurels and take handouts. He worked hard.”

“Very hard. Until his Alzheimer’s worsened, he was still doing double shifts once a week.” Emotion swells in my chest. “I don’t understand something else. I thought the past few days you might be my mother, or maybe Orsola was. So—”

“Who is your mother? Yes.” Ginevra sighs. “I felt so horrible when I asked you about your adoption and realized you didn’t know. It never occurred to me, I suppose, that Ansel didn’t share it with you. Although I knew from Orsola that he hadn’t told Max the truth… about me… And why would he?” She says the last part loudly. If her words were an object, they’d be a knife she was aiming directly at her own heart, like she deserved it.

“Why would he tell Max a painful truth—that his mother was still alive and wanted him, but couldn’t be with him? That the woman who should have been his mother—my sister—was thwarted from such. Why tell such a terrible story to a child? No, it makes sense your father invented Sandra Lowenstein. And it makes sense now, to me, why he continued the fiction with you, Rory. I’m only sorry to have shattered that.”

“So my mother—my birth mother—who is she?”

“Like I told you, I think she was a woman from your father’s diner. A teenage girl. I remember vaguely hearing of it from Orsola. A girl who wasn’t ready to have a child. Your father was a sort of mentor to her, I think.”

“Not… I mean, he didn’t…?”

“With a teenage girl? Your father?” Ginevra frowns. “Come now, Rory. You know, he would never.”

“I know,” I whisper.

“No. I am certain of this—Ansel isn’t your birth father.” Ginevra must note the sadness stamped on my face. “I’m sorry to break that to you.”

“No.” I try to brush it aside. Not like I wanted Papa to have had a creepy affair with a teenage waitress, but the confirmation that he isn’t really my father, not by birth, is painful. I swim through my memories, through all the sweet waitresses who cut me extra slices of halvah. One of them… one of them is my mother. Probably she’s alive, possibly even still in Michigan. I shove the information back into my recesses. I can’t deal with it now.

“I guess that clears things up.” I stare at my pasta, unable to fathom dragging it into my mouth.

“Clears things up in an insane way,” Caro says.

“In an insane way. Yes. Except—I have one more question, Ginevra.”

“Anything, dear.”

“Why me?” I still don’t understand. “I’m not your child, then. Why did you and Orsola care about me at all? Why did Papa send you both pictures of me? And this train trip… yes, I understand now, you wanted to meet Max. You wanted to take him to meet your sister. You wanted to save his company ostensibly from Caro. But why involve me? And why invite Nate?”

I say it so quickly, before I remember he’s sitting here. “Sorry, Nate.”

“It’s fine.” He waves a hand. “You deserve all the answers now. I’m certainly intrigued myself.”

I nod. “I even understand inviting Caro, to fix stuff at Hippoheal. However misguided that was.”

Ginevra clears her throat, sets down her fork.

“But inviting Nate, that was for me. It means you cared about me, that—”

“That I wanted you to have the perfect trip? Well, I did. I understood that Nate wanted you back, and I didn’t want you to miss your chance at love. You think when you’re young and beautiful that it will come again, but I saw it with my sister—it didn’t come again. She mourned the loss of Ansel her whole life. Oh, sure, she had men wound around her fingers. Wining and dining her, buying her pretty bags and jewels. But she didn’t love them. And I didn’t want you to let love stream through your fingers. I didn’t want you to lose your great love. And I wanted Orsola to meet you at last. I knew that would mean a lot to her. And all my life, I suppose, I’ve tried to make things up to my sister. Not that I ever could. Not that anything would ever be enough. But I suppose I can’t stop trying.”

“But why?” I’m still not seeing through the weeds. “Why did you and Orsola care about me at all?”

“Oh.” Ginevra stops. She looks right at me with such a tender, loving gaze that transfixes me. I’m embarrassed, ashamed, of the feeling that bubbles up—that this is what a mother’s gaze is like. That I never knew it, never felt it. That even having shed my childhood long ago, I still somehow want it.

“Oh, I’m surprised… no, it makes sense you don’t understand. I thought it was rather obvious at this point. I’ve thought of you like my daughter ever since Ansel adopted you. Orsola has, too. We love you just as much”—Ginevra’s face crumples—“just as much as Max. I’m not sure if it’s because I loved Ansel, or because I loved Max, that I came to love you. I forget now if it was instant, right when I heard he adopted you, or if it took a little time to grow. All I know is that I’ve loved you for a very long time. And Orsola has, too.

“I thought it so perfect when I planned this trip for you all—that it would end in Positano, where my sister lives. Because of me, she has lived a difficult life. Oh, sure, I have tried to make it nice for her, materially so, once I realized success with my writing. I bought her a villa in Positano, where she always dreamed of living. I buy her clothes, bags—whatever my sister desires. It doesn’t, as you can imagine, make up for what I did. But I still do try. And I figured—when Ansel was lucid, well, he could determine not to tell Max the truth of his parentage. That I am his mother. It was Ansel’s right not to refer to a far-off mother when I could not be a true one in Max’s life. But now that Ansel’s Alzheimer’s has progressed, I thought this the right time to tell Max the truth. To introduce you both to Orsola—the love of your father’s life. And I knew that it would make Orsola’s heart soar to meet the children.…”

Ginevra croaks with a cry. I take it all in, stare mutely ahead.

“Yes, well. That was my plan. My horrible fucking plan.”

I’ve never heard the author curse before. I watch stupidly as her anger—all directed at herself—pings through her.

“Well, there it is. I regret many things in my life, as you now know, Rory. But I’ll be honest: One thing I will never regret is the fact that I’ve spent my life watching you from afar. I’ll never regret thinking of you like my own child. And I’ll never regret loving you.”

Ginevra stops, and her face suddenly softens, like her admission has exorcised something. “I’ll never stop loving you, Rory. Even if you never want to see or speak to me again.

“And that, my dear, is that.”