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Authors: Alyson Richman
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shoulders and knotted it above her head.
When she arrived at the store, she stood outside the window and stared at the display of carefully arranged books. She noticed her reflection cast in the glass. It was as if she saw herself as an apparition that could vanish at any second, no one ever noticing she had been there, floating against the display of the more permanent books.
She wondered what was happening inside the store, and whether Luca would ask Lena why Elodie wasn’t there. She imagined Lena looking at him coyly and saying some witty remark about Elodie being overdressed. She tried to push the scene out of her head, embarrassed by her folly. She could always return next week, she convinced herself. She would put the dress back into her mother’s closet and return to her normal uniform. There would be no more walks through town in pale yellow chiffon. “That’s the color of my parents’ love story,” she told herself. “Perhaps gray and blue will be mine.” Elodie picked up her instrument and turned in the direction of home.
NINE
Portofino, Italy
O CTOBER 1943
In his house, Angelo now has yet another stranger. He picks up one of his books while Elodie’s in the bath and begins to read, hoping to find a comfort there. Looking at the novel, he knows that when he learns her story, it will be more complex, more heartbreaking than what is on the pages between his hands.
While she bathes, he takes the opportunity to examine the old wound to his foot. He leans over and unlaces his black shoes, rolls down his left sock, and sees the four toes and the small nub where the other one was blown off. An injury not from this war but from the one in Africa—Mussolini’s quest for Ethiopia, which took place eight years earlier. He knows what it’s like to carry hidden wounds. His is a wretched, blue stump covered by a cotton sock. At night it throbs. He feels the nerves of the toe that is no longer there. Like the heart, it continues to beat despite all the sadness and loss it endures.
After she has bathed and changed into clothes, Elodie returns to the room.
She sits down. Her hair is damp and she has now pinned it upward. She is all bones and angles, while his wife had been an abundance of curves.
“You like to read,” she says. It’s not said as a question, but as an observation.
“Yes, very much,” he answers.
“Will you read to me?” she asks softly.
The question startles him at first. It’s not something he had expected her to ask, but it pleases him.
He picks up the book he had just placed down and opens it. He begins to read.
The words are as much a comfort to him as to her. They fill the space with sound. These two people who know nothing about each other are now entwined in a story that has nothing to do with either of them.
His voice, his inflection, even his pauses, all become a musical score.
He reads for nearly an hour, and Elodie inhales his words like air. She gets lost in Angelo’s voice, the rhythm of his speech. She does not notice that his eyes are now weary, and that he rubs them in between turning the pages. It is only when she
hears
the fatigue slipping into his voice that she looks up and realizes how tired he has grown.
“You should stop now,” she says, and as she speaks, he is struck by the first note of kindness in her voice. “It must be exhausting to read aloud for so long.”
“I don’t mind,” he tells her. “It is nice to have an audience again.”
She smiles, and a memory flashes through her mind of all the audiences she once played for. She sees the men and women in the crowd, their programs on their laps, their eyes focused on the stage. She remembers the sound of their clapping, like a distant thunder. Something from a lifetime ago.
She wishes she could tell him how much his words calm her. That they are like a verbal embrace. But she remains silent, thinking back to the last time she was read to when she was in Verona. When books were so much in
When she arrived at the store, she stood outside the window and stared at the display of carefully arranged books. She noticed her reflection cast in the glass. It was as if she saw herself as an apparition that could vanish at any second, no one ever noticing she had been there, floating against the display of the more permanent books.
She wondered what was happening inside the store, and whether Luca would ask Lena why Elodie wasn’t there. She imagined Lena looking at him coyly and saying some witty remark about Elodie being overdressed. She tried to push the scene out of her head, embarrassed by her folly. She could always return next week, she convinced herself. She would put the dress back into her mother’s closet and return to her normal uniform. There would be no more walks through town in pale yellow chiffon. “That’s the color of my parents’ love story,” she told herself. “Perhaps gray and blue will be mine.” Elodie picked up her instrument and turned in the direction of home.
NINE
Portofino, Italy
O CTOBER 1943
In his house, Angelo now has yet another stranger. He picks up one of his books while Elodie’s in the bath and begins to read, hoping to find a comfort there. Looking at the novel, he knows that when he learns her story, it will be more complex, more heartbreaking than what is on the pages between his hands.
While she bathes, he takes the opportunity to examine the old wound to his foot. He leans over and unlaces his black shoes, rolls down his left sock, and sees the four toes and the small nub where the other one was blown off. An injury not from this war but from the one in Africa—Mussolini’s quest for Ethiopia, which took place eight years earlier. He knows what it’s like to carry hidden wounds. His is a wretched, blue stump covered by a cotton sock. At night it throbs. He feels the nerves of the toe that is no longer there. Like the heart, it continues to beat despite all the sadness and loss it endures.
After she has bathed and changed into clothes, Elodie returns to the room.
She sits down. Her hair is damp and she has now pinned it upward. She is all bones and angles, while his wife had been an abundance of curves.
“You like to read,” she says. It’s not said as a question, but as an observation.
“Yes, very much,” he answers.
“Will you read to me?” she asks softly.
The question startles him at first. It’s not something he had expected her to ask, but it pleases him.
He picks up the book he had just placed down and opens it. He begins to read.
The words are as much a comfort to him as to her. They fill the space with sound. These two people who know nothing about each other are now entwined in a story that has nothing to do with either of them.
His voice, his inflection, even his pauses, all become a musical score.
He reads for nearly an hour, and Elodie inhales his words like air. She gets lost in Angelo’s voice, the rhythm of his speech. She does not notice that his eyes are now weary, and that he rubs them in between turning the pages. It is only when she
hears
the fatigue slipping into his voice that she looks up and realizes how tired he has grown.
“You should stop now,” she says, and as she speaks, he is struck by the first note of kindness in her voice. “It must be exhausting to read aloud for so long.”
“I don’t mind,” he tells her. “It is nice to have an audience again.”
She smiles, and a memory flashes through her mind of all the audiences she once played for. She sees the men and women in the crowd, their programs on their laps, their eyes focused on the stage. She remembers the sound of their clapping, like a distant thunder. Something from a lifetime ago.
She wishes she could tell him how much his words calm her. That they are like a verbal embrace. But she remains silent, thinking back to the last time she was read to when she was in Verona. When books were so much in
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