Aria told me every day, “I am going to marry Fernando.”
I wanted to marry him too, but I wouldn’t have said so, not to Aria. I could sense where danger lurked.
After lunch Aria and I sat on the wall, kicking our feet and yelling “Bravo!” each time Fernando scored a goal on the grassy field below.
Aria leaned close and whispered, “His parents had to pay back taxes or leave Brazil after the new president was elected.” She nodded, delighting in her superior knowledge of the world. “His mother kisses him on the lips. Isn’t that weird? That’s how Brazilian moms kiss their sons.”
Aria told me many secrets, secrets that shocked me even though I pretended not to be shocked. She told me she wasn’t allowed to travel with her mother to the United States because her father was afraid her mother wouldn’t come back. “If I stay here, he knows she’ll return.”
She also told me that her last nanny was fired because she lied for her mother. “The new one reports to my father.”
Maybe all children feel this way—malleable, victims of context. The closer I grew to Aria, the more distant I felt from my parents. Certain friends are like that. They fill you up with a world you don’t belong to, a world that seems bigger, more exciting than your own.
She told me things I couldn’t repeat: “Tomaso’s mother is in love with the headmaster, but they can’t do anything about it because his wife has MS.” And she told me rumors that would make my mother worry if she knew Aria was filling my head with them: “If my mother weren’t beautiful, she’d still be white trash. She grew up above a bowling alley.”
“She dresses like a movie star,” I said. “She even wears gloves when she picks you up at school.”
“Don’t be stupid.” Aria gave me a sour look, as if she shouldn’t have to spell everything out for me. She raised her wrist and drew her other hand across it. “It happened before I was born. She doesn’t want the scars to show.”
I felt older with Aria, but I also felt I was becoming someone else, someone my parents wouldn’t like. I could laugh at almost anything now.
The week before my father disappeared, ravens cawed from power lines. The days seemed endless—hours noosed by isolation, parachute clouds moving slowly overhead—until five o’clock, when my father stopped writing, and placing his papers in a folder, sent me to get the bottle of Prosecco chilling in the river.
My parents called it the Ping-Pong-aperitivo-hour. I played my mother first while my father sipped Prosecco nearby and cheered me on. “Great serve, Leah.” Then my parents exchanged places, and I played him. I always lost, but they made me feel a worthy opponent. When it was time for them to play each other, the games took on an intense level of competition as my parents positioned themselves three feet back from the table, the distance allowing them to return balls with spin. They hit the ball hard, each determined to win, their banter back and forth an attempt to distract each other.
“We should call the Stevens,” my father said, slamming his serve. “They’re in Genoa for the summer.”
“I’m sick of hearing about fascism.” My mother returned the ball. “He pontificates.”
My father hit a shallow shot. “He knows more about fascism in Italy than any other American scholar.”
“He’s boring.” My mother spun her return.
“That’s because you’re not an intellectual.” My father lobbed the ball high, so she would have to look into the sun. He loved to goad her with this topic, asserting that journalists were not true intellectuals.
My mother moved back, waiting to see if the ball would land on the table, and when it missed, she caught it. “My point. I’m not taking the bait.”
“Leah, stop helping your mother win.” My father winked at me, stepping back from the table to serve. “Two out of three?”
My mother nodded and crouched, readying herself for my father’s hard serve. “Remember last time they invited us?” She paused to hit the ball. “They served eel in cream sauce.”
My father spun his shot. “Tasted prehistoric.”
“You had worm breath.” My mother slammed back. “I had to sleep turned away.”
Laughing, my father hit the ball too hard, losing the match. He kissed my mother’s cheek and congratulated her, promising he’d win the next round. By the time dinner was laid on the Ping-Pong table, chairs pulled alongside, pasta and salad tossed, they’d emptied the bottle of Prosecco and opened a bottle of wine. The tensions that had built during the weeks before our trip seemed to find a momentary reprieve during the Ping-Pong-aperitivo-hour.