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CHAPTER TWO
MAREN
The dream is gone…but a new day awaits outside my window.
A new day in a new place.
I step onto the balcony and take in the early morning outside. A soft blue sky promises heat later in the day; the Mediterranean is dark blue. Native limestone buildings glow pale yellow in the slanting sunlight, and hillside terraces show burgeoning green. Short, stubby palm trees dot the horizon against the sea, and wild flowers are beginning to bloom white and purple and yellow against the ground.
This is the most exotic place I’ve ever seen. It’s beautiful.
I close my eyes against the sun and tilt my head back, sending up a wordless wish for—what? More. More life. More appreciation. More of my real self.
Somewhere nearby, a church bell begins to ring. Six peals; it’s early. The conference starts at eight, and I need a shower, breakfast with lots of coffee, and transportation to the town where the campus is located before then.
The hotel restaurant is set up for a breakfast buffet, with what looks like “the full English”—sausage links, eggs, grilled tomatoes, mushrooms, baked beans, bread for toast, and pots of hot tea—and I remember that Malta became a British protectorate around the year 1800, only receiving full independence in the 1960s. And then I listen to the hotel staff speaking Maltese to each other, and I realize that Maltese sounds a little bit like Arabic with an Italian accent. I have to ask especially for coffee, but when it comes, it’s hot and strong, almost like espresso. Delicious.
I take a taxi to the university campus, marveling at the rugged terrain and the rustic but appealing stone-built houses on the way. The conference opens with coffee and more of those pastries that the desk clerk gave me last night, and even though I’ve just eaten, I can’t resist a cheese one even though it’s sure to go straight to my substantial hips.
The other attendees are indeed multinational, representing universities from all over Europe. I meet some Canadians, some Brits, a couple of Germans, a French guy in trousers so snug I wonder how he breathes, some Italians, a Moroccan woman, an Austrian woman, two Albanians, and a cheerful, avuncular man from Belgium. There are also a handful of Americans looking impressed. The host is apparently the head of international studies at L-Università ta' Malta, a tall man with glasses, a leonine head of white hair, and an engaging smile. Apparently the conference is not simply a forum for various academics to present their own studies, but also designed to foster international relationships and introduce visitors to the glories of this island nation.
I’ve already seen a few of those natural glories, but Dr. Leo Azzopardi—“call me Leo!” he insists—has organized a bus tour of Gozo for this afternoon and tomorrow afternoon, after the academic presentations, and also some optional dinners at local restaurants. He reminds us that it is Carnival week, a time for festivals and parades before the soberness of the Lent season, and that each of the villages on Gozo will host parades and dance competitions each night. We are encouraged to attend as many of them as we like, but he says he’d like to warn us of the wild nature of the festivities in the town of Nadur, which can get, as he says, “licentious and out of hand.”
Doesn’t sound like my thing. Instead, I make note of the local sights I want to explore: the beach at Marsalforn, Calypso’s Cave (purported to be the origin of the story about this sea witch entertaining Odysseus), and the Stone Age temple located just outside the village where my hotel is, and settle down to listen to several interesting academic presentations. After a sandwich lunch, the group hops onto a bus which takes us to the touristy Xlendi Bay, where people have small boats in the dark-blue waters.
We return to the major town on Gozo, which the English call Victoria and the locals refer to as Rabat (“fortified town,” as it’s overlooked by a massive stone fortress known as the Cittadella) for dinner. I eat at a hotel restaurant with Dr. Azzopardi and a group of maybe eight other people, where we’re served a delicious pork roast served with chunky potatoes and stuffed eggplant, along with delicious local rosé wine. Toward the end of the dinner, we’ve split into small conversational groups, and I’m chatting away with the Albanians when out of the corner of my eye, I catch sight of a tall man approaching our host.
He’s got lovely wavy dark hair, pulled back behind his head, and a neatly trimmed beard, and he speaks pleasantly with Dr. Azzopardi. Sorry, with Leo. They’re speaking Maltese, and any moment I expect that Leo will introduce him.
Which he does. “My nephew,” he says. “Alessio Azzopardi, local businessman and head of Cittadella Financial, which is one of our newest economic specialities—they deal with financing, accounting, and software for Blockchain, which I do not understand well, myself, but luckily, Alessio does. He studied here on Gozo, and then went to England for his graduate degree. We’re very proud of him, of course. Ladies, he is single and the despair of my sister and my mother, who long to find him a bride.”
“Zijo,” the handsome man says quietly as he leans toward Leo, looking embarrassed but resigned, “enough, please.” He raises his head and greets the group. “Welcome to Gozo, all of you, and I hope—”
His eyes rove over mine and then come back. He blinks and pauses speaking for a fraction of a second, and in that fraction of time, something happens to me.
It feels like falling ill, all at once. My heart beats faster, my temperature rises, and I get chills and nausea.
It is, surprisingly, not altogether unpleasant. The feeling of his eyes on me is disconcerting but rather lovely. I don’t think it’s the wine.
I think it’s him.
Alessio.
“I hope,” he continues, “that you have a pleasant stay on our island.”
“Perhaps you might join us on our tours,” the Austrian woman suggests. She doesn’t quite flutter her lashes at him, but she gives him a winning smile.
His answering smile seems mechanical. “I’m afraid I am busy this week.” His eyes come back to me, and the smile grows more natural. “I might join Zijo Leo and the group if time opens up for me, of course.”
“What do you suggest we see first?” the Austrian woman says, and this time she does flutter her lashes.
“Everything on the tour is interesting,” he says. I like his voice, which is a light baritone, businesslike but holds that magnetic local accent, somewhere between BBC British and Italian. He shrugs, smiling. “It is my home.” His eyes skate over my face again. “Again, welcome. Enjoy—oh, and make sure to buy any glass articles you might want for souvenirs at the Ta’ Dbiegi crafts village at Gharb. Gozo glass is better than Malta glass. Everyone knows this.”
My body is sending me a surprising message. It is sitting loosely, relaxed in my chair, but my back is straight and my breasts feel very prominent, and there is unaccustomed heat low in my belly.
I haven’t had a boyfriend since college. I’ve been too busy. Now, all of a sudden, I want one? And it’s this one?
After he leaves, the Austrian woman—her name is Hanna, I think—immediately starts asking Leo detailed questions. I’m a little embarrassed to admit that I listen, while also applying myself to what remains of my stuffed eggplant.
Blockchain, really, how interesting. Yes, the company is doing very well. Alessio has recently bought a villa in Xaghra, plenty big enough for a family.
And never married? How old? He seems young. Early thirties, yes, and my mother is beside herself looking for the right girl for him, but it is difficult. While he was in England, he fell in love with an English girl, but she did not wish to come to Gozo to live. He has not had much interest in finding a wife since. And of course, he is very busy. He will find the right young woman. I counsel my mother that she must be patient.
So how successful is the business?
Quite so.
I drag my attention away from Leo’s mysteriously busy-and-successful (and handsome) nephew and return to talking with the Albanian couple about conditions at their university.
But I don’t forget Alessio. I’m thinking of him as I fall asleep.
