Chasing Daisy

me?’
    ‘No, this one. Luis. He likes you.’
    I scoff. ‘No, he doesn’t.’
    She eyes me shrewdly over the rim of her coffee cup. ‘Yes, he does.’
    I don’t say anything for a moment, then a thought comes to me.
    ‘Nonna. . .’
    ‘Yes?’
    ‘I thought Nonno died of a heart attack?’
    She shrugs. ‘He did.’
    ‘But you told both Will and Luis that he died on the mountain roads.’
    ‘They wouldn’t have stayed otherwise.’
    ‘But Nonna, that’s so sneaky!’ I exclaim.
    ‘A girl’s gotta do what a girl’s gotta do,’ she casually replies. I can’t believe she’s speaking like this. At her age! She’s eighty-two!
    ‘Anyway, why would you want them to stay?’ I ask.
    ‘To give them more time with you, of course.’
    ‘But why ?’
    ‘You need a man!’ she erupts.
    ‘ What? Nonna, what are you going on about? We don’t live in the dark ages!’
    ‘Don’t patronise me, young lady. I know what’s good for you.’
    ‘Well, Will had a girlfriend ,’ I pedantically point out.
    ‘Oh, I know that,’ she waves me away.
    ‘How did you know that?’ I ask, confused. I never told her.
    ‘It was obvious,’ she replies. ‘But you can’t let things like that stand in your way.’
    ‘Nonna!’ I’m outraged. ‘I would have never allowed myself to be the other woman.’ But even as I say it, a little shred of doubt niggles away at me. I glance down at my fingernails.
    ‘Did you know Nonno was set to be engaged to another girl when I met him?’
    ‘No?’ I sit up in my seat.
    ‘Yes,’ she replies. ‘But they weren’t in love. I could see it. It was to be a marriage of convenience. To please their parents. When Carlo and I set eyes on each other . . .’ Her voice trails off as she becomes lost in her thoughts. She turns back to me. ‘It was meant to be, your grandfather and me. You can’t always wait for fate, you have to step in.’
    ‘Is that what you did?’ I ask.
    ‘Yes,’ she says firmly.
    I don’t really like the idea of my grandmother stealing another woman’s man, but she doesn’t seem at all repentant. And I guess I wouldn’t be here if she hadn’t.
    ‘Well, it’s all in the past now,’ I say sadly, thinking of Will.
    ‘No,’ she says bluntly. ‘There’s still Luis.’
    ‘Nonna, I couldn’t be interested in Luis!’
    ‘Why not? He’s better suited to you than the other one.’
    ‘No, he’s not! Anyway, I’m still in love with Will, so I can’t think about anyone else.’
    ‘Give it time,’ she says wisely. ‘Give it time.’
    I roll my eyes, but let it be.
    She stands up and leaves the kitchen, bringing back a couple of pots and pans from last night. Water swishes around inside them as she takes them to the sink and pours out the contents.
    ‘Nonna, why won’t you let my mother help you fix the walls?’ I follow her back through to the sitting room and help retrieve the remaining pots.
    ‘No,’ she says bluntly, returning to the kitchen sink and tipping the water down the plughole.
    ‘Why do you have to be so stubborn?’ I complain and she shoots me a ferocious look over her shoulder before sitting down again.
    I join her back at the table. ‘My mother told me something in New York,’ I start. ‘About my father.’ I’ll leave the subject of house maintenance alone for the time being.
    ‘Yes?’
    ‘About Andrea. . .’
    ‘Andrea?’ she barks.
    ‘Well, I don’t know if he’s my real father or not. . .’
    Nonna’s eyes widen.
    ‘And neither does my mother.’
    Cue a knowing look. ‘I see.’
    ‘Did she not tell you? Did you ever suspect it?’
    She pauses before answering. ‘She didn’t tell me, but I did suspect it, yes. She spent a lot of time with Andrea when she left your father and returned home. And she fell pregnant very soon after she went back to him. I thought it was too soon.’
    ‘Did you ever say anything?’
    ‘What could I say? I told her not to go back to your father, to stay with me and your grandfather, but she chose not to.’
    ‘And what about Andrea? Did he know that my mother was pregnant?’
    Nonna looks down at the table. ‘Yes.’
    ‘And he didn’t think to chase after her? To find out if the baby – if I – was his?’
    My grandmother doesn’t answer.
    ‘I guess not.’ I’m disappointed in my father, whoever he is, then.
    ‘He would have been too proud to run after her,’ Nonna says finally. ‘And Stellan was a very daunting man.’
    ‘What happened to Andrea?’
    ‘He got