What were the odds of a girl like me becoming a Pavarotti fan? Slim to zero.
“Romeo calling,” Rachel sang, leaning across her client’s head. Izzy, stationed at the middle chair, simply smiled. At sixty, Izzy didn’t get excited about much. When a client’s ex-husband once brandished his hunting rifle in the salon, Izzy famously deadpanned, “Earl Carter, put that damn thing away before you shoot off your toe.”
Earl went home.
Paolo had set his ring tone on my phone to one of the most famous Italian tenors, so I’d always know it was him. I’d grown to love Pavarotti—if not exactly for his singing, for the single fact that his voice meant that the love of my life was calling.
I’d never been lucky. Far from it. I didn’t grow out of my childhood; I survived it. So for me, meeting a sexy Italian wine master had been somewhat akin to winning the lottery while riding a unicorn with a leprechaun.
But better.
Because, well, Paolo.
With Paolo, you were pulled into celebrity orbit. Eventually everyone who was attracted to men, discreet or not, was going to check him out. Try describing that star quality and you’d come up short. Truth was, he made people feel good. Especially me. His laugh brightened a room. It wasn’t his appearance, exactly. His Roman nose was on the majestic side. His warm brown eyes were bit close together. His curly hair, despite my best attempts, was always slightly unruly. However. When he flashed his joy-seeking grin, delighting in the tiniest thing—a good meal, a beautiful sunset, a long, relaxing swim—his true beauty showed. When Paolo smiled, you noticed the warm gold flecks in his eyes, his broad shoulders, his clear brown skin. Everything else faded away.
“You gonna get that, hon?” Izzy growled, in a voice roughened by a pack-a-day habit since birth.
The professional thing to do was to not answer. I owned Twig, a three-chair salon in Chelan. Izzy and Rachel were technically my employees, although after nine years in the trenches with Izzy and six with Rachel, the lines had blurred. We’d drunk half a lake’s worth of margaritas at Señor Frog’s and been through, collectively, three divorces (Izzy), countless breakups, two cheating husbands and dozens of deadbeat boyfriends. Izzy was the one person besides Carmen I’d talked to about my childhood. It pained her. She was friends with my mother and wished we were closer. Still, I needed to set a professional standard, which was harder than it sounded. When it came to Paolo, I didn’t have much self-control. Life was uncertain. Enjoy it now. I’d learned that at nine years old.
Lonnie Bexbury, the woman sitting in my chair, studied me in the mirror with raised, perfectly groomed eyebrows. I had to stop myself from running to the phone like a lovesick teenager. There was a sharp line in my life. Before Paolo, I’d been hemmed in by the two square miles of this town. It was Saturday nights at Señor Frog’s, getting just buzzed enough to pretend that one of the men at the bar was interesting enough to talk to. It was getting all the ladies in town gussied up to look their best while wishing I had someplace nice to go.
It was a good enough life.
But then.
When Paolo smiled at me that first time, it was like a giant switch went on after a power outage. He adored my freckles, my wild reddish auburn hair, the way my skin took a while to accept the sun, forcing me to wear sunscreen until I had a tan. Most sporty men wanted a woman to join them or wait, like dogs, while they completed their paddle, swim, or half marathon. This man appreciated my curves. Paolo didn’t need us to be a matched set. If I sprawled like a cat in the sun with my mess of magazines and a cooler, he stayed and chatted. Eventually, he’d venture out in his kayak, after asking what time he needed to be back for dinner. He didn’t want a fitness freak Barbie to his Euro Ken.
He had not asked a million questions about my family history. It was a relief, not being with someone from Chelan who knew me as That Girl. With Paolo, I was perfectly normal.
So yes, although I knew I should not be checking my phone during work hours, I couldn’t help it. For once in my life, I had something more important than a client. I had a boyfriend.
Not just any old boyfriend.
Paolo.
Lonnie Bexbury wasn’t a woman used to waiting. She was one of those high-maintenance blondes whose life revolved around looking good. Yoga. Pilates. Eating clean. Regular facials and skin peels. She’d made a big deal of explaining to me what her stylist in Seattle did to get her hair looking so fabulous. She’d described a balayage as if Lake Chelan wasn’t stuffed with women just like her, terrified that a local hairstylist was going to butcher her expensively highlighted mane and turn it into an over-processed mullet. (So, so, so tempting.) She’d stated she was a taking a “huge risk” with me, but Taylor in Madison Park couldn’t fit her in before the Seattle Tennis Club’s fall luncheon. She was taking her life in her hands, sitting in my chair.
Summer people were like that. Living on the edge. Words like “luncheon” were said with a straight face. They were disappointed when I wasn’t impressed that they belonged to the Seattle Tennis Club.
Nope.
Yes, I did know what it meant.
Lady, if I cared less, I’d be dead.
I gave Lonnie a “one sec,” holding out my finger, green eyes wide, trying for apologetic. Lonnie would close up her summer house and disappear from my life for nine months. She could wait two minutes.
Izzy gave me an amused grin. Attitude was her middle name.
“Ciao, bella Stella, I am just leaving work.” Paolo’s voice always knocked me out. If someone had told me a year ago that listening to my boyfriend on the phone would turn my brain into mush, I would have said, “Yeah. Not that girl.” He’d lived in the United States for a little under a year. His voice made me feel like crawling into my phone, pinging off a satellite and launching myself at him like a heat-seeking missile. I was so entranced by the melody of his accent, it took a while for the actual meaning of his words to filter through. “The lake is bountiful.”
I cradled the phone on my shoulder, turning to glance outside at the ridiculously blue sky. It was an Indian summer. The kind that made me want to ditch Lonnie, run to my car, change into my bikini and sit on the dock, watching Paolo swim. Paolo swimming was a piece of performance art.
I didn’t want anyone to see the goofy grin on my face. “You mean beautiful.” Paolo, whose English was very good, occasionally messed up, just to make me smile. “She cuts the hairs,” he said, when asked about my business.
“No, bountiful. The sun, the grapes, the wine. It’s like gold.” I pictured him shifting on the hot leather Jeep seats, driving from the Hollister Estate, anticipating a mind-clearing dive into the deep blue of Lake Chelan. Work. Home. Dive. Cook. The man was a living, breathing miracle. “I have a surprise.”
“Yay. What are you cooking?” When he had time, Paolo surprised me with meals from his native Lombardy region. Fresh fish, berries baked into lemon-soaked pastries and, always, pasta. We would eat on the dock until it grew chilly. September was a glorious month in Lake Chelan. The August heat had faded, leaving the lake warm, clear and turquoise blue. Crimson aspen leaves rippled in the hills. Tourists packed up.
“Not a meal. Something else,” he said.
“I can’t cook.”
“True.”
“I’m still working.” I turned to face Lonnie, who impatiently tapped her limited-edition gold Apple Watch.
Paolo groaned with frustration. “Ah, I forgot the late night. Come home at seven. No stops, per favore.”
Lonnie gave me the stink eye. She still needed a trim, but wait up—a what? “A surprise? Wait, what’s the surprise?”
“Meet me at the dock.”
It was probably a kite board. The man was an overgrown teenager when it came to water sports. “Okay.”
“Sì. Ti amo. Ciao.”
“Ciao.”
When I apologized, Lonnie took it like a sulky summer person: a subtle I forgive you mixed with don’t ever let it happen again. She eyed me with curiosity, as I trimmed the fringe framing her tan face. “You know Italian?”
I’d seen this look a thousand times. Summer people expected locals to stick to a certain script. Sailing little boats, fine. Crewing a sailboat team? No. We were small-town people and should act as such.
“I know one Italian. My boyfriend.” What an idiot, still thrilled by saying Italian and boyfriend in the same sentence. “And he’s got a surprise.” I sang it, a tinge of excitement blossoming.
Lonnie’s face lit up as she played with a glittery diamond sandwiched between two elegant pavé bands. “Oh my, that sounds promising.”
My face flushed. “Uh, no. It’s probably another kayak.”
The ring sparkled on her manicured hand. “How long have you been dating?”
None of your business. “A while.”
My fingers trembled slightly. Could I skirt this conversation as skillfully as I danced around Paolo’s questions about my childhood? With him, it was easier. He wasn’t a busybody. He didn’t pry.
“Aren’t you two coming up on one year?” Rachel chirped, turning to Lonnie with breathless enthusiasm. “He’s just crazy about her. Sometimes he packs her lunch and it looks like something you’d get in a really fancy restaurant.”
Lonnie’s Botoxed brow struggled to lift. “Oh my! What kind of a ring do you want?”
In the last year, I’d discovered that Paolo’s father had taught him everything about making Italian wine. He’d grown up with long family meals. A bookish sister, Emilia. Chickens, dogs, outdoor cats, and plenty of love. My throat tightened whenever he asked, gently, about my family. “You know, usual family stuff,” I’d say, employing a bag of tricks I’d learned in grade school when a teacher had asked, with great concern, how I was doing.
Distraction. Question. Subterfuge.
Lie.
I hadn’t lied outright to Paolo. Not intentionally.
I’d just never told him the truth about my family.
That marriage, for me, was a bond that pulled you both under when you were sinking. Ties that bound until you couldn’t breathe. Love? Yes. Forever? Maybe “till death do us part” worked for some but for me? Too dangerous. Loved ones could slip away and leave you forever. I wouldn’t risk it. Couldn’t.
Suddenly, the thought of Paolo’s surprise seemed less promising. A ring? A proposal? Not now. Eventually.
People like me didn’t do therapy. We freaked out. Thanks for nothing, Lonnie Bexbury, because I’m pretty sure I’m exhibiting three out of five symptoms of a panic attack right now. Which I’m going to google after I finish your stupid haircut.
Picking distraction, I steadied my shaking hand. “How long do you want your bangs?”
“What the hell?” Lonnie Bexbury shot daggers at me, furiously blinking.
Oh no. I’d accidentally snipped one of her lash extensions. Her eyelids dragged the half-snipped extensions up and down, tiny black crow feathers. Izzy was trying not to bust up laughing. Rachel asked if I wanted any help.
My hand was over my mouth. “Oh. Sorry,” I blurted.
That was a first.
Lonnie Bexbury would not be a repeat customer.
Paolo and I had been together nearly a year, living together for close to two months. The first week after moving in with him, I’d left my salon exactly as I’d done for the previous nine years. I’d locked the door, tossed the keys in my purse and crossed the street, passing Local Myth Pizza with its line of people already outside, waiting for one of the twelve tables, salivating at the aroma coming from the wood-fired ovens. I’d continued across the bridge which spanned the tail end of Lake Chelan, where it turned into a lazy green-tinted river. Busy thinking about nothing, I’d ignored the paddle boarders, the tourists eating ice cream in the riverside park. I’d gotten as far as the garden gate, when I saw my former landlady grinning at me in the garden, asking me, with obvious delight, if I was moving back in.
Mrs. Fennelly, a widow with a gap-toothed grin whose dentures clicked as she talked, missed me. Said she’d kick out the current tenants if I wanted. I’d felt compelled to stay for a glass of lemonade, explaining to Mrs. Fennelly that no, I’d just been absentminded. It made her feel better, seeing a girl my age forgetting something as important as where I lived.
Today, I couldn’t forget. Ever since the phone call with Paolo, my mind had been spinning on itself like a wind sculpture. I’d shooed Lonnie Bexbury out of the salon with her flapping eyelashes, not charging her a cent, even though the cost of the balayage and cut exceeded what she’d spent on her lash extensions.
I needed time to think.
On the drive home, I pulled into the parking lot of the Red Apple market and bought myself a tall can of Arizona iced tea, heading to the city park. Across an expanse of ridiculously green grass going dry in straw-colored patches. I found a bench near the lake and watched some kids throwing French fries at seagulls big enough to knock the littlest kid over. I called Carmen. My lifeline.
I’d say Carmen was like a sister to me, except that most women who came into the salon complained about their sisters. A lot. There were a whole lot of, “You know, I love my sister, but—”
Yes, Carmen was occasionally annoying. Since she’d moved back from Seattle and begun working for the family winery, she’d become even more of a workaholic. She couldn’t help it. The girl had stayed up all night in fourth grade making sure her Alexander Hamilton diorama was so perfect that Mrs. Marsden had accused her of hiring it out. But I knew that if I was stranded on a rock in the middle of the Pacific, surrounded by circling sharks, she’d swim to me if she had to. Everyone needs a person like that in their lives.
When she answered, I was shocked. Carmen usually let everything go right to voicemail, so I didn’t waste a second. The winery always needed her immediately. I launched right in. “Car, he’s got a surprise and he sounded very excited about it. It worries me. I googled the signs of a panic attack. I have three of them. Maybe four, although this iced tea has a lot of caffeine, so maybe that’s why my heart is racing.”
“You’re not having a panic attack,” Carmen said.
“How do you know?”
“If you were having a panic attack, you wouldn’t admit it. You’d be like, me? Have a panic attack? No way. In the middle of a panic attack. That’s how I know. Remember in high school when your foot was pointing in the wrong direction and I said your leg is broken? And you insisted that feet just do that sometimes?”
“Oh. You’re right.”
“Also, you do like surprises and by he, you mean Paolo?”
The seagull made a run for the littlest kid. He started screaming bloody murder, then tripped. The seagull made its move on the French fries.
I strolled down to the water. “I like fun surprises, like spontaneous day drinking and picnics, and that helicopter ride was amazing, but this feels scarier.”
“Scarier than a helicopter ride? What are you worried about?”
I crossed the lawn, slightly crisp with fall approaching. Late season campers strolled around the Chelan City camping ground to the north, lighting their barbecues. The scents of lighter fluid and charcoal wafted in the cooling air. Shimmering in the late day sun, the lake was a deep turquoise ribbon, running the length of the sage foothills of the North Cascades. “You know what I’m worried about.”
Carmen sighed impatiently. “You’re being ridiculous.”
“In the immortal words of Bobby Brown, that’s my prerogative.”
“Bobbi Brown, the make-up artist?”
“The singer. You know the song.” I sang a few bars, trying to capture the singer’s disco dance beat, shimmying a bit. Teenagers on the deck of the Lakeside Drive Thru shook their heads. At their age, I would also have thought a thirty-something dancing on her own in a park was epically tragic. I would have told Carmen, “Please shoot me dead if I ever do that.” What I found tragic now, though, was my best friend forgetting a great song.
Carmen was silent, patiently waiting for my solo to end. My voice left a lot to be desired. Tone. Pitch. Melody. “I don’t get you,” she said, when I’d finished. “You fell for him so hard. So fast. What was it, a month after laying eyes on him, you dropped the ‘L’ word? I’ve never seen you like this. Ever.”
“I know. Most guys make me wish I was the other ‘L’ word.” Living with Paolo this summer had been like inhabiting someone else’s glamorous Instagram feed. He’d come home from work, drop his bag in the hallway, disappear into the bedroom and reappear seconds later in his swim trunks. Paolo in swim trunks was something to behold. Like a professional soccer player, without the tattoos and side-shaved haircut. Arms muscled from all the kayaking and paddle boarding. Every single time he walked toward me down the narrow hallway, I thought, This has to be someone else’s life.
After kissing me, he’d open the sliding glass door, stroll barefoot down the dock and dive. Never paused, just threw himself into the lake. That was Paolo, no hesitation. Pure movement. The same way he’d come across an ad for a winery manager in an international online trade journal, googled Lake Chelan and immediately called Evan Hollister.
Paolo had a talent for taking the plunge.
With long, sure strokes, he’d swim down the length of lake until I couldn’t spot him. I’d either hang out on the dock and relax in an Adirondack chair or go inside and take a shower. Half an hour or so later he’d emerge, wrap himself a towel, shake the water from his dark curls and tell me what he had planned for dinner.
It was the perfect life.
He was going to mess it up.
Reaching the end of the park, I spun around on the path. Sun glimmered on the rippling lake like a shattered mirror.
“But Paolo? Every day I wake up, look over at him and think, Stella Gallagher, this is your life. Can you believe it?”
“And?” Carmen’s impatience was palpable.
“And we’re in a serious relationship. Serious. A word normally associated with heart attacks and cancer. I don’t do serious.”
A mother duck and her babies paddled past, churning their tiny feet furiously in the waves. A visible reminder that while the rest of the world paired up, produced offspring, I did not. The party wasn’t over. Not yet. I paced the water’s edge, keeping to the path in my wedge heels. The crying kid had been soothed. The seagulls had moved on to other victims at the Lakeside Drive Thru.
Carmen whispered to someone, “Bring another case of rosé out of the cave.” Back again, she said, “He’s not going to propose.”
“Why not? I’m a catch.”
Another heavy sigh. “Where are you? You sound out of breath.”
“At the city park, avoiding emotions. It’s my hobby. I’m very good at it.”
“Go home, Stella. Even if he does propose, you can say no. It’s a perfectly acceptable answer for a thirty-one-year-old when the love of your life pops the question.”
“Thanks for nothing.”
“If Evan proposed, I would not be on the phone complaining.”
“You’re ready. You had a happy family life. You came from a normal family.”
“All right, I get it. But again, what is wrong with saying no?”
“Once a proposal is on the table, there is no going back. You aren’t dating, you’re the one saying ‘no.’ You’re living in limbo.”
“What’s wrong with that?”
“It’s a relationship killer. He’ll have put his heart on the table and I’m like, nope, no thanks. I’ll pass.”
“You can’t hide in the park forever. Go home. Stop being such a baby.”
“Wow, someone’s crabby.”
“Hang on. I’m going outside.”
I sipped the last of my iced tea as I crossed the street back to Red Apple parking lot.
“Guess who signed up for the fall wine tasting dinner at Blue Hills?” Thanks to Carmen and her sisters, the winery did a lot more than sell wine.
“Beyoncé?”
“I wish.”
“Pete Carroll?”
“Who’s that?”
I tossed the iced tea can into the recycling bin outside the store. “Seriously? The head coach for the Seahawks.”
“Right. Evan’s parents. They’re in town between a safari and a Scottish golfing trip. They didn’t even call Evan. Didn’t say, ‘Oh, hey, I heard your girlfriend has the winery next door and maybe we could have dinner sometime and meet her.’ Lola saw their name on the reservation list and wondered if they were related to Evan.”
“Weird.”
“Right? I can’t say no. They signed up. Paid a lot of money.”
“If I can say no, you can. Just say no. Both of us. You don’t have to meet his parents and I don’t have to get married.”
“You’re being paranoid.”
“He said we’d make beautiful babies.”
“Wow. Okay. That’s a new one. What did you say?”
Sliding into the seat of my car, I tossed my purse on the passenger seat. “I dropped my sandwich in the lake.”
“Brilliant move.”
“Prosciutto, tomato and fresh basil. He baked the bread.” One of Paolo’s many, many charms.
“Of course he did. Anyway, I want to meet Evan’s parents. Just not while I’m working. I’m going to feel like the help.”
“You want me to work at the fall wine dinner? I’m very good at drinking wine and telling people what to do.”
“Yeah, ’cause that’s what running a winery is all about. Listen, I have to go back inside.”
“Thanks for totally not reassuring me.”
“Any time. But Stell, would marrying him actually be the worst thing in the world?”
I started the car, giving myself a look in the rearview mirror. Carm. . .
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