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His eyes close for just a second, like those words mean everything.

Then he opens them again.

And smiles.

The kind of smile I know I'll remember for the rest of my life.

“I was hoping you'd say that.”

I lean forward and kiss him.

And the kiss feels different now, even though nothing about it has changed.

Maybe we have.

Seven months ago, I didn't even know he existed.

Now I can't imagine a future without him.

CHAPTER 2

Eleonora

Time is such a fragile thing. It really does move fast. Or maybe it only feels fast because I spend every day with him, because we’re happy and we fly through our days like that kind of happiness is owed to us, like we’ll have one thousand more years like this left to live and we found the secret to life.

One minute we’re sitting by the lake talking about dreams.

The next we’re sneaking kisses between classes and making out on his Vespa in the backyard while my sister yells at us to get a room.

The first time we make love, he’s home alone. His parents are on a mini vacation, and when I walk into his room, I find lit candles, roses scattered everywhere and a nervous Damiano who spends an hour convincing me that we can stop at any moment if I want to.

I remember laughing and telling him he was ruining the mood.

I remember every touch, every whispered question, every nervous laugh. I remember how terrifying and wonderful it felt to give that part of myself to him and have him trust me with the same.

And I remember lying there afterward with my head on his chest, listening to his heartbeat while he talked about all the places he wanted to take me someday.

He’d take me to my hometown in Calabria, and then he’d show me Sicily. We’d travel to Tuscany and Rome, and he’d reenact the balcony scene from Romeo and Juliet in Verona. We’d go to Paris just to see if the French were right and their cuisine really did beat Italian food, but we already knew they’d lose that debate.

We’d travel the whole world first, then we’d open Tirreno and have lots of babies.

We still didn’t know where we would open his restaurant, but we did know we’d do it together.

As he told me these things, with his heartbeat alive and warm beneath my cheek, I remember thinking I could spend the rest of my life listening to him talk.

A year later, we graduate high school together.

Damiano goes to culinary school while I enroll in college to study literature. But apparently loving one thing isn’t enough for me, because I start taking culinary classes in the evenings too.

He spends the next four years learning everything he can get his hands on.

Food science. Pastry. French techniques. Italian traditions.

Our days look different, but somehow we always end up in a kitchen together. Every night we practice recipes until our roommates threaten to ban us from the small kitchen.

Damiano calls it market research.

My roommate calls it attempted murder because of the weight she’s gaining from our cooking.