Page 76 of Winter With You

‘I didn’t say that.’

‘Which bit?’

‘Steffi, I said I was going to see him. You and Mom wanted me to go see him,’ Luca reminded her.

‘But not like this.’

‘Like what?’

‘Like it’s an ending not a beginning.’

His sister’s emotional tone obviously touched him, but he had heard it before. He also needed to remember that in some things they had a difference of opinion and that should be OK. Except, with this, with family, it wasn’t easy.

He let go of his coffee mug and reached for her hands.

‘No,’ Steffi said, moving them off the table and folding her arms across her chest.

‘Steffi, come on, I thought you’d be happy,’ Luca said.

‘Why? Because me and Mom have finally gotten on to you so much you’ve given in?’

‘You don’t understand, Steffi,’ Luca said, shaking his head.

‘Because you don’t tell me anything. Because you think I can’t handle it. Which is pretty fucked up seeing as I’m a Marcello.’

‘Keep your voice down,’ Luca hissed before he had thought it through.

‘Keep my voice down?’ Steffi exclaimed, now sounding outraged. ‘I’m not ashamed of who I am.’

‘I get that,’ Luca said. ‘And you shouldn’t be. But I am ashamed of who Dad is.’ He didn’t say it loudly, but he asserted it as much as possible.

‘Then why are you gonna waste your time seeing him?’ Steffi asked, jolting her leg up and down under the table. ‘If you’re so weighed down in life, carrying all that shame around with you.’

Steffi was right. How could he expect her to understand? But telling her what Ronnie had done, what he had threatened to do to her? He couldn’t do that to her either.

‘Steffi, I know this has all been hard on you,’ he said, more gently. ‘But it’s been hard on me too.’

‘Then, if it’s so freaking hard, don’t go to see Dad. Because you will get his hopes up that something has changed and nothing will have changed at all.’

‘His hopes?’ Luca asked. ‘His hopes for what?’

Steffi shook her head. ‘It’s not for me to tell you.’

‘Tell me what?’ Now there was panic taking hold of his chest. There was an agenda and Steffi knew about it.

‘Just go and see him,’ Steffi stated as she finally unfolded her arms and put her fingertips to the table, cautious. ‘But why not go with an open mind?’

‘The next thing you’ll be saying is go there waving an olive branch.’ That was never going to happen.

‘Well, why not?’ Steffi asked.

Luca was shaking his head before he even realised it. ‘Steffi, if anyone should be waving an olive branch, it’s Dad.’

‘But we both know that’s never going to happen.’

‘Yeah, exactly my point.’

‘Why are you so impossible?’ she asked him. ‘Just go there and listen to what he wants to say with no preconceived opinion. Can you at least do that? If not for you then for me and Mom.’