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“Look up,” Marco instructed.
There was no roof.
“It was never finished?” There was a bygone grandeur in the unfinished ceiling and the simple bare walls.
“It was meant to be a monastery in the sixteenth century, but the Ottoman raids on the island halted the work and the stone that was meant for the ceiling was diverted to build new walls to protect the city.”
“It is peaceful in here.”
“It is. I have spent many afternoons in silence, sitting right over there.” He pointed to a low stone bench in the shade of a fig tree. Palms and yucca sprung from the healthy green grass covering the ground inside while violet wisteria climbed the walls.
“Then that is how we should spend this afternoon,” I said, and led him to the bench, hoping I could compel him to finally rest. “In silence.”
“Hopefully not in silence.” Once we were sitting, he wrapped an arm around my shoulders. “Or maybe some silence.” He leaned over to truly kiss me for the first time since I’d arrived. I clung to him like a newborn would cling to its mother, desperate and hungry. I grasped his arms, his neck, his waist, all of it smaller and frailer than it had been months earlier. I don’t know how long we stayed entwined like that, but we were both breathless when we finally broke apart.
“I love you, Serafina,” he said as he traced my cheekbones with his index finger.
I pulled away. “Marco,” I began. I did not have all my words ready for him. I had expected to find a dying man. I had expected to say my goodbyes, to tell him that I would soon be following my own husband to our new country. I hadn’t expected to have any reason to stay. But he kissed me again before I could continue and eventually he pulled me to my feet and into the shadows of what was meant to be a private chamber of the old forgotten church. The floor was nothing but dirt and soft leaves, and it still felt like the most luxurious mattress in all the world.
For the rest of Palermo it was merely another autumn day. For the two of us it was everything. We made love and then fell asleep in one another’s arms. When we finally wandered out of the ruins I was starving, and Marco bought me an entire rich meal prepared right in the street. He paid a half lire for two pani c’a mèusa, light and fluffy pieces of bread filled with succulent meat and peppery caciocavallo cheese grilled atop a fire perched in the gutter. We ate it with our hands, juices dribbling down our chins.
We eventually found our way back to Marco’s small quarters. Inside there was only a bed and a porcelain tub that on closer inspection I saw was filled with steaming hot water.
“The nurses fill it every night before I go to bed. It is part of Lombardo’s treatment, a bath as hot as I can stand at least once a day to sweat out the disease. Would you join me in it?” He was already gently removing my dress, kissing my bare neck and shoulders.
My skin turned pink once I was in the scalding water, but Marco wrapped his arms around me from behind. “Give it a few seconds. Let your body relax.”
Like magic, the heat stopped searing my skin and I allowed myself to sink into Marco’s embrace, closing my eyes and trying to savor the moment.
“When I thought I was dying, you were my only regret,” Marco said, twisting my damp hair between his fingers. “The fact that I didn’t wake up with you every morning and fall asleep in your arms. It was the only thing I knew I was doing wrong in my life.”
“What you want is crazy,” I murmured.
“Does it have to be?”
“You are too good a man to abandon our village, much less abandon your family.”
“But what if we found a way to make this work too? What if we could travel here to Palermo more often? You could study with the doctor. I could receive my treatments. There are ways we can be together. And it will not be long before our children are grown and there might be other options for us.”
I knew then that I had to explain that his dreams weren’t simply crazy, they were impossible.
“Gio has returned.” I said it to the wall opposite the tub, unable to turn and meet Marco’s gaze. “He has been back for nearly a month now. He says that it is time I join him with the boys.”
Marco’s grip on me tightened. I usually welcomed his touch, but this was too rough.
“My love,” I began.
“I cannot let you leave.”
I had never heard this kind of sharpness in his voice. “You do not have a choice. I do not have a choice.” I twisted out of his grasp and turned to face him, straddling my legs on top of his, drawing his face to mine.
“I almost lost you the day that I brought you here. But now we have both been given a second chance to be good, to fulfill the vows we made to our spouses in front of God. I would love nothing more than to wake up in your arms every morning of my life.” My voice cracked as I imagined what that would feel like. “But we have always known that was impossible.”
His eyes blazed with a fury so intense I worried he might strike me for merely stating the truth. I stroked his cheeks, gently kissed his lips, and tried to use my softness to defuse him. But as quickly as his anger was ignited, it began to dissipate. He sank low into the tub, the fight drained out of him, the reality of our circumstances setting in. It was as good a time as any to tell him the rest.
“Gio wants me to sell the land with the hospital on it, so that he can start a business in the new country,” I whispered.
“So that is why you came. Because your husband asked you to?” he scoffed. “Because you need money.”
