Her family and six brothers and sisters had gotten a sizable sum for her marital commitment (Bunko nights are quite revealing) and the then-nineteen-year-old had been desperate to start a new life in the United States, even if it meant marrying a slightly overweight CPA twice her age.
It might be easy to rush to judgment on a man that would resort to such drastic measures to find a mate, but I understood his desperation. If I hadn't met Joel, I often wondered if I'd still be searching for my soul mate. Donald had tried for twenty years the traditional way with no luck. At least I'd had one true love, more than most people ever get.
I slung my arm through three plastic bags and watched Zoya maneuver the heavy groceries in her platform heels and skin-tight ankle pants. Her dark hair swung down to her hips, the sides pushed up in clips. She was exotic, though not quite beautiful, and Donald kept her happy with all the American luxuries: a red sports car, designer clothes and weekly spa appointments.
“Bunko. I don't think so,” I told her. “I have company.” Sort of company.
Zoya smacked her gum and shut the trunk with one overly braceleted arm. “You got the man in the backyard. Very handsome man.”
I nodded, fighting the temptation to correct her broken English. My vow was once they left my class not to put on my teacher hat again. “He's a student from Italy. Needed a place to stay.”
Zoya eyed me suspiciously, then added, “We have you all over for dinner tonight. You, the Italian, and your boys.”
“Thanks for the offer, Zoya, but we're working around the kids' schedules so things are crazy. But we'll do it another time. Are things okay between you and Donald?”
She shrugged, her long silver earrings brushing her collarbone. “Husband trying to impregnate me.” Zoya, much like Anh, never held back. I don't think it was lost in translation, either.
“Oh. Do you not want a child yet?”
Zoya raised her Prada sunglasses to stare at me as if I should know better. “If I get with child, this body goes kaput. Same goes my mother and three sisters. One day thin and beautiful, after baby like a big Russian housewife.”
I suppressed a laugh. I could tell from Zoya's attire that being attractive was very important to her. Unlike me, she did work out to Get Up and Move It, Texas! every morning. “Well, I'm sure Donald just wants a child before he gets too old,” I said. “And lots of people get their bodies back after they have children.” Just not me.
As if a light bulb went off, Zoya pulled out a National Enquirer from her bag. “Like article in newspaper. Angelina Jolie gets body back after baby. Zoya too get body back?”
“Yes,” I nodded, the grocery bags' handles digging red marks into my forearm. “Zoya gets her body back.”
Pleased with this, Zoya waved her long manicured nails through the air and said over her shoulder, “Donald will get baby then. But still want to meet Italian.”
As I entered the house I instinctively sang, “I'm home,” as I'd done for ten years upon returning from the grocery store. Because the boys asked for everything in the store, they stayed home with Joel, yet in the last two years, it was hard to break the habit. My announcement echoed through the laundry room, my heart sinking when I didn't hear the familiar “It's about time” from my husband. To my surprise, another voice echoed back.
“I'm home,” da Vinci said. As if my heart were on an escalator, it rose again from the bottom floor. Besides my class, da Vinci was learning by repeating everything I said and trying to discern its meaning.
He rushed to greet me, wearing soccer shorts and a T-shirt. He'd joined the Panchal soccer league immediately, and I'd told the boys we'd go watch his first game. His muscular thighs and calves drew my eyes down the length of his body, but I quickly rebounded to his large smile. He took the bags from my arms and together we put them away, going item by item for da Vinci to learn their names. A hundred items, the only embarrassing one being tampons. “Tampon for woman,” he said, not embarrassed in the least. Well, he did have a family full of females in Italy.
The TV was paused on my own sister in a downward lunge, her boobs front and center. The escalator dropped a few stories again. Bradley had taught da Vinci how to use the TiVo (and T V, as he didn't have it in his village), and obviously da Vinci found programming that he liked. We spoke in Italian.
“Did you work out to my sister?”
“Half of the program.”
“Do you like her?”
“I'm sure she's very nice.”
“But do you think she's pretty?”
Da Vinci nodded. “She smiles too much. Her voice is irritating.”
We laughed. Da Vinci: handsome and smart.
Together we set aside the ingredients for the lasagna da Vinci would make us for dinner-his mother's recipe, he had said, starting to tear up at the mention of her name. A handsome Italian cooking me dinner every night? This I could get used to.
When Cecelia had found out da Vinci was living in the studio, she had passed along da Vinci's skills sheet to assess job opportunities at the temp agency also owned by Panchal.
“Have you ever seen anything like it?” Cecelia had asked as we reviewed the sheet. More than a hundred items on the sheet and da Vinci had checked more than half of them.
“He says he's very good with his hands,” I had told her.
Cecelia, who looked like a church lady but gossiped like a desperate housewife, had chewed on the end of her glasses and shook her chest. “Oh, I bet he is. Do share with me if you find out, will you?”
Zoe and her father Michael met us at the soccer field because Zoe was staying with him the rest of the week while Rachel flew to San Diego to give a motivational speech to women who had lost their husbands in the Iraq War. If she became as iconic as Richard Simmons, I was going to throw up. At least I had a sympathetic ear in Michael, whose own reputation had been sacrificed for the sake of his ex-wife's career. Rachel's motivational speeches began with the “woe-is-me, my husband cheated, I thought my life was over, I took control, lost forty pounds, and wham-bam, look at me now, I've got my own TV show and get to meet fabulous people like you” spiel.
If I were in the audience (which I swear I won't be), I would raise my hand and ask my sister how she can ever compare a cheating husband to a dead husband, especially a good dead husband, but she would find a way. She always does. The audience would eat her up like an irresistible confection. Pretty, sweet girls have few enemies. At least Michael, da Vinci and I all agreed she smiles too much. It was a start.
Michael, who frequently got dirty looks when he went in public and had bigger hurdles than most guys back in the dating pool, wore his business suit sans jacket, and Zoe, sans mega hair bow, sat between her nephews. She wanted to play soccer, but her mother said she didn't have time with dance/cheer/gymnastics/pageants. So tonight she was skipping one of them because Michael had to exert power in the relationship whenever he could. Besides, Zoe agreed she didn't feel well (she learned quickly) so Rachel wouldn't tear into Michael.
My feeling sorry for Michael (and his mutual sorrow about my loss) had made us much better friends than we ever were when he and Rachel were married. It was probably because he had been Rachel's whipping boy while they'd been married, and I couldn't stand how he never stood up for himself. I was in the small minority who believed Rachel had pushed him into the arms of another woman, but I had only told Joel this and he quickly agreed. He had liked Michael, too, and a friend of Joel's would always be a friend of mine. The other thing about grief is that you divide the universe into two parts: those who knew your dearly departed and those who don't. I'm not sure which is easier, but whenever I meet someone who tells me they knew Joel (a classmate, a client, an associate), I latch on to them and make them tell me anything I may not have known about my husband. You think you know everything about your mate until they die. Some days I feel like I'll never know.