*****
Rosetta had anticipated this night more than anything else in recent memory. It reminded her of how nervous, eager, and surprised she had been to learn that she had graduated as valedictorian of her high school class. The speech she had given that fateful graduation day had mentioned what a struggle it had been to maintain grades, friendships, and family tensions. It had not mentioned the hunger, the sorrow, and the grief that had never really healed. She had delivered words of a bright future while simultaneously bleeding from the wounds of her past. The wonderful thing was, standing at the edge of those high school years and preparing to make the leap into a life that was completely and totally her own, she had finally started allowing herself to believe that the future might be even minutely brighter than the vast destruction and hurt that lurked behind in the wake of her life.
It was nearly time to meet Luka, and Rosetta felt like the moon was hanging a little lower in the sky just to get a better view of the magic that would almost certainly ensue. She was finally ready. Ready to let go of her fears and let herself fall completely, unabashedly, irrevocably in love. Ready to look hardship right in its ugly, dead eyes and dare it to take away from her the opulence of passion.
Oh, yes, she was ready. Still, though, whispery fears came to call whenever her excitement was not loud enough to drown them out, which made her attempts to quiet her mind as she prepared to separate body and soul once again extremely inconvenient.
Eventually, she managed to find a sense of calm that was so relieving after the many minutes of trying, she jolted from her body as if shocked by electricity. Finding Luka was second nature now—she had no reason to stay still, pondering what to think of in order to see him. She simply allowed everything he meant to her overcome every other thought in her mind for a brief instant, and that was enough.
She was standing before him.
The place where he had chosen to wait for her was familiar to her somehow. The leafy garments cloaking all the trees were green, but she recognized their shapes, thick and round and hanging low as if they hoped to kiss the ground. She recognized the way the roots pumped through the earth like veins beneath her feet, the way the blue sky was barely visible through the trees, even the sounds of the birds singing in the distance. It was the very grove of cherry blossoms wherein she had first laid eyes on him, the same place where she had heard his voice singing lithe, lyrical melodies for the very first time. The blossoms were not pink anymore, though; instead, a forest of light greens and faded browns whispered with the wind that blew through them. Luca’s eyes, which looked like dark gems as they glimmered intensely beneath the shade of the trees, were full of hope and sorrow. She saw him much more clearly now, and it was sad. She could no longer be ignorant of the fact that, beneath his weathered T-shirt, his ribs were jutting out from his skin, the hallmark of a creature left in want. She could no longer be unaware of the slight shadows under his eyes that all but disappeared when he smiled—and he smiled often when he was with her—that proved a good night's sleep was as far from him as the east was from the west. Whether it was discomfort or nightmares that kept him up at night, she could not tell. Perhaps both, at least sometimes. But, even though she saw him for exactly what he was—a saddened soul in search of redemption—she loved him all the more and was happy.
"Hey," she said. Her throat was tight. She suddenly felt horribly overwhelmed, and all the lovely things she had pictured herself saying flew from her mind like butterflies, flitting their wings lightly and detaching from her memory. She was left with nothing but the rawness of her heart and a warm open space inside where fear used to reside.
"It is good to see you," Luka said, "Fiore."
"I like it when you call me that," she replied, unsure of how to continue. Tears that were full of joy and relief and healing burned at the backs of her eyes. She wondered if souls could cry. She did not want to find out in front of Luka.
"I am glad," he said quietly. "Rosetta, I am sorry, I am so sorry. I know you said you did not hate me, but I am consumed by guilt. I know I have hurt you, and I feel so wrong for it. You have been wronged enough in your lifetime. I am ashamed to have brought more trouble into your life."
"Luka, no," Rosetta hushed him. She discovered in that instant that souls could cry. Hot tears slid down, drawing parallel lines of anguish down her cheeks. Her hand reached out, purely by instinct, to cup the side of his face. He closed his eyes and shifted slightly, as if to press into her touch. She felt nothing. Her fingers were brushing against nothing but air. They could not trace the angle of his cheekbone or feel a pulse thudding just shy of his jawline or feel the warmth of his breath, no matter how close she got. It was a fate as cold as a midwinter night, because she had never before felt so inclined to touch another human being just to prove, if nothing else, that he was there, that he was with her, and that he would not be carried off by the wind. But she could not. He was inches from her, and yet the distance between them was truly incalculable. The wind surged through their very skin and whistled between their bones as they stood still, unconscious, immobile, on opposite ends of the planet, dreaming of one another and what the future could bring about for the pair of them. Her fingers itched to interlock with his, to find the curves of his spine and shoulder blades in the midst of a hug that had the potential of never ending, to pepper the blessed space of the universe that he occupied with gentle touches so that she could replicate the shape in her imagination later. "Of course it hurt to find out you had kept something from me. But you've done so much more…" She cut herself off, realizing that she had nearly let "Darling" slip out of her mouth. It was such an obscure, archaic term of endearment that she had not even consciously associated it with him, and yet, there it was, now growing stale between her teeth as she debated whether or not to let it be made known. "You make me think about things in new ways. Amazing ways. And I'm so much better because of it. I'm so much happier," she continued, "just because I know you." At last, she drew her hand away to wrap it over her middle, hugging herself and wondering briefly if she had been wrong to make herself so vulnerable.
Luka's eyes were wide, and Rosetta had never seen him look so appalled. He was bearing the image of a man who had just seen an angel. For an unbearably long moment he stared at her with his lips half-parted, as though whatever he was going to say got lost in his surprise. At last, he spoke. "Fiore," he spoke in a reverent, secretive tone, "do you mean that?"
"I do mean it, with everything that I am," she promised. The words lacked any jaded caution or fear she could have tacked onto them to make them feel safer. Without a doubt, Luka had succeeded in his quest to show her that she did not need to surround herself with shielded phrases and avoidant glances when she was with him. "Now, what was it you were going to say to me? The thing that you mentioned last time, at the top of the tower."
Luka smiled shyly. "I am flattered, truly, and I…I am not sure what to say anymore," he admitted. "But, sì, I suppose that since you are here, you must be curious. My apologies; it was not my intent to be so cryptic. The timing back there…it just felt wrong."
"I didn't just come for that," Rosetta protested gently. "I came because I wanted to see you. Still, though, it would be nice to know."
"But of course," Luka nodded in understanding. "You see, Fiore, I have great amounts of time to think when I am in Vogogna. Truly, it is all I have to pass the time on a regular day." The tone was light, but it was still spiny and dangerous with truth, the way most dark jests with truth behind them ended up—happy words tumbling out of bruised lips like barbed wire. "But I think in lyrics, mostly. Lyrics and musical notes. What I mean to say is, I wrote you a lullaby. It is even in English, and I did my best to make it rhyme! Do you want to hear it?"
Rosetta was taken aback. He had laid out all the proudest points of his musical creation before her as quickly as a child would explain a treasured project to a disinterested parent, and he had delivered the inquiry with such quiet hesitance that it cracked her
heart a bit. Affection seeped through the fracture like water through a crack in a porcelain vase.
"Yes, of course I do," she said eagerly.
"Grazie," he said with a smile and a dip of his head. "It is short, but…"
"It'll be perfect," she encouraged. "Go on."
He assumed the stance he had had when she first saw him sing. His eyes turned heavenward, as if he could see through the leafy canopy, the clouds, even the vast blue sky, and look straight into heaven, drawing the effervescence of his voice from somewhere purer than the earth had to offer.
My dearest flower, my purest star,
Draw near to me at the midnight hour.
My distant galaxy, my next-door butterfly,
What is it that causes you to cry?
My dearest friend, most special gem,
Is it the thought that every book must end?
Rosetta was choking up, though she did not particularly want to cry again. Her eyes were still stinging from the tears she had shed moments ago. The words he used for her—flower, star, galaxy, butterflies—were both big and small, minuscule and insurmountable, with all sorts of beauty woven into them. They did not sound like the words she might attribute to herself, and she knew why. They were not adjectives. They were not labels. They were tangible, beautiful, lovely things that people dreamt of across the world each night. Things that shone like luxurious, opulent diamonds and things that exhibited the dull, drab, everyday sort of loveliness that made living in a polluted world bearable. That was what his song was saying, she realized: to him, she was like those things; to him, she was everything.
I cannot bring you much, my flower,
But what I have, I give: a fortune of compassion
For as long as we both may live.
I would offer everything I have, my dear,
But I simply cannot, I fear. I cannot give you to yourself,
And I doubt you would accept, but still, my love...
He paused for a moment before letting the two tiny, far-from-insignificant words soar from his mouth into the air and float past her ears as gently as dandelion seeds.
…I offer you the little I have,
and I pray you don't forget.
So now, fragrant flower, curl your petals, go to sleep,
and in your peaceful slumber, therein we shall plan to meet.
The silence that followed the end of the soft ballad was deafening as he searched her, looking perhaps for approval, or maybe he was, instead, on the lookout for an offended grimace that would cue him to apologize. Rosetta knew he would find no such negativity in her. There were not words to describe what the song meant to her, but perhaps the tears she had failed to stop and were now dripping down from her chin like rain running off of a rooftop. Before Luka could apologize for making her cry, she forced herself to say something, anything, to convey her gratitude.
"Luka, that was beautiful," she croaked, her voice thick with emotion. "Thank you. Thank you. I don't know what else to say, except that I…I love you, too." In that moment, she became acutely aware that the lullaby was as much a confession as it was a song. A confession of affection, of respect, of love. A confession that he was just as astounded by the magnitude and complexity and darkness and beauty of her soul as she was with him. A confession that he saw that magnitude, complexity, darkness, and beauty in the first thing. He was handing her his heart, she knew, and he was saying, "I trust you not to hurt it."
You can have mine, too, Luka, she thought without a trace of doubt or regret. It was the most confident she had been in her entire lifetime. I trust you not to hurt it. And even if you do, I believe that it will be worth it. Because that's what love is, isn't it? It's a risk. It can hurt. It can be stronger than steel or fragile as glass, and the shards can pierce your heart when they scatter after one person doesn't feel it anymore, but love doesn't focus on that. Love sees it all, spins it into poetry, and tries anyway. Because sometimes there's someone who will be worth it in every parallel universe, every iteration of reality, every possible version of our world. And you're worth it, Luka. I'm glad you think I'm worth it, too.
"Il mio Fiore," Luka whispered, "I hope you know—regarding the song, I mean—when I say 'my' the intent is not to claim ownership of you. I merely think—no, I am certain—that you are a precious thing, and I do not want to lose you."
She had figured as much without him saying so. The word had not remotely parroted a possessive claim or vicious seizure, like ripping a daisy at the center of its stem and pressing it into a book in order to force it to maintain the beauty on its surface even in death. There was no harshness to his tone; it entirely lacked demand and insistence. Instead, it was much more like a gentle vow of attendance, to water the daisy and watch it flourish, standing by its side all the time as it turned its petals to catch the sunlight.
"I know," Rosetta assured him. "I don't think you could lose me if you tried. I love you." Perhaps those three words were getting redundant, but Rosetta honestly did not care. She was still testing them out, relishing the sweetness she could taste when she spoke them, and they made her blood run hot like liquid gold.
"Ti amo così tanto. Così tanto, Rosetta," Luka spoke in his mother tongue, and though she could not translate the words on her own, she was perfectly capable of picking apart the way he said them to find their meaning. She made mental notes about the way he said her name, like it was some secret place that could only be found by the pure of heart beneath the light of the moon, and the ragged, hushed breath he took before he spoke, and the fireworks that were exploding in his eyes as they peered deep into her own honey-hued irises.
He offered his hand, and she pretended that she could take it, pretended that she could feel his coarse fingertips entwining with her own slender ones, pretended that he could brush his thumb over hers just as a reminder to them both that they were alive, together, and timeless, pretended that all of this was just as real as the body and responsibility weighing her bed down back in Albany. They walked, and, at first, Rosetta thought they were traveling to nowhere in particular, journeying into the spaces of the world that neither one of them had seen, half-scared to get lost and half-hopeful that they would, because if they did, perhaps they would forget how to go back to their shells and instead roam as souls together forever. However, Luka had a destination in mind, and that became apparent once Rosetta realized they were standing beside the lake she had admired for a fraction of a minute the first time she had been there. It was just as glassy as before and would have been a perfect mirror for the landscape, if only mirrors had such a layer of abysmal darkness behind them. Mirrors held nothing of the sort, save in rare instances, since some of the people who looked into them held such murkiness in the depths of themselves. Often, even those people could not see the scorched blackness within their bright, shining, sequined skin. Or perhaps they did not want to. Still, the lake was lovely in spite of its darker underside, and Rosetta thought people could be like that, too. After all, sometimes, that very darkness was not so frightening, if you only took the time to see it for what it really was—a veil to conceal misunderstood emotions and artifacts from days long-since forgotten by the rest of the world. There was just as much meaning to hurt as there was to heal, and Rosetta felt glad. She was glad that Luka saw both in her and, even more importantly, brought out the very best in her. He admired her most complicated, intricate, inexplicable scars and stories like artwork. Perhaps that was what they were, in all reality, as they slashed across the canvas of her life like gashes. Though they bore the vengeance of cuts from a dagger, perhaps they were brushstrokes intending to set her character and personality alight with pastel colors. Perhaps painful pasts led to the prettiest futures when the sun finally rose and banished the nightmares.
"The very place we first met," Luka pointed out. "This is a very special place, Fiore. It was the place where I first laid eyes on you."
Rosetta blushed and tipped her head bashfully, letting her curls fall in f
ront of her eyes. "Luka..." Everything felt so vividly surreal. All the colors of the world around them seemed to burst with intensity, and there was Luka, standing next to her with his head turned so he could look at her instead of their beautiful surroundings, and he was more captivating than anything else Rosetta could think of in that moment. Maybe it was silly, pretending to hold hands, pretending that they were really together, pretending that she could see her reflection in the water that lapped the ground just shy of their feet, but she did not care. The one thing that mattered was not pretend; se loved him with every cell of her being, every strand of soul, every piece of her existence—even the damaged ones. That was real.
"I mean it," Luka continued in the face of her uncharacteristic bashfulness. "If all were right with the world, this place would be sacred, because your soul touched down here, of all places. So few corners of creation can boast of such a feat, to claim that Rosetta has visited them. I am a lucky man to have seen so many new places with you, don't you think?"
Rosetta rubbed a hand against the side of her neck and smiled slightly. "Oh, I don't know about that. It could be argued that I'm the lucky one."
Luka appeared to be flattered, but he shook his head. "When I first saw you, and you saw me—that first indescribable moment when our eyes met—I thought you must have been an angel. After all, what other creature could be so beautiful and could see me in a dream?"
"It's not really a dream," Rosetta interrupted. She was not sure why she felt so compelled to say so, but she wondered if it had something to do with the fact that every whim of her emotions was now threaded into this astral plane, and she desperately craved confirmation that it was all real. "You know that, right?"
"Certainly," Luka said, "but it feels like a dream. Floating around and forgetting that anything but you and the things you can see in that moment is real. A happy, carefree dream, it would seem. Anyway," he continued brusquely, "I realized shortly after you disappeared that it was a silver cord, just like mine, that had drawn you back. Angels are beings of spirit in their entirety, but you had something real to you. Something to be drawn back to. Your beauty that day was indescribable, Fiore. You looked like a perfect diamond, a collection of stardust all wrapped up in binding like that of a beautiful, timeless book. I was changed after that day. Your eyes had looked at my very soul, the part of my existence I thought would be most abhorred, because surely it would be nothing but the color of bruises and blood. A mist, like every other soul we've seen pass by, and an ugly one, too."
Rosetta's throat was tight. Empathy gripped its iron fingers around her neck and plunged its razor-sharp aura deep into her heart. "No," she choked out. She did not know what else she could possibly say to console, to assure, to simulate the feeling of pulling him into her arms and holding him until such pungent thoughts were purged from his mind. It pained her to think that a person like him could have so many beautiful things to say and sing, a person that could feel so deeply and be so gentle and unassuming, a person that could treat others with such kindness that it would make one's head spin, and yet still regard themselves as something ugly.
"But, somehow, you saw me as something more," Luka said. His features were full of gratitude. "I do not know how it came to be that you can see me for exactly as I am, nothing more and nothing less, and still stay here, allowing me the utmost pleasure of your company. When you came back and we watched the sun rise in Vogogna, I was shocked. I was glad."
"I think there's something about us," Rosetta said, "that's different. Special. But not just me. I know you think that you're worth so little, just because the world hasn't been kind to you, but that isn't true. Luka, I've lost more than I can even tell you. I had times when getting out of bed was the hardest thing in the world, and the only reason I did it was because my sister didn't know how to fix her own breakfast, and I decided that caring for anything as deeply as I care for you was nothing but a danger, a way to set myself up for failure. And now, here you are, and here I am, and I don't just care for you, I love you in a way that I have never loved anyone else." She had to stop for a moment. Emotions were running high and wild in her mind and in her blood, causing her skin to prickle with the intensity of it all. I fell in love with your soul. Don't you understand? she wondered, frustratingly unable to adequately translate everything she thought and felt into speakable language. "You helped me see that believing in something isn't a bad thing. It's not weak, it's not even unnecessary. Sometimes trusting in something is the one way to learn that you're capable of trusting anything at all. And I trust you, Luka."
Luka said nothing. He was beaming, but his eyes were shimmering with moisture that he was rapidly trying to blink back.
"But you have to trust me, too, okay? You're not worthless. I don't care if you don't have somewhere fancy to live, or that your corner of the world has rejected you, because I'm not going to do that. The one thing I do care about is you. I want you safe. I want you happy. I don't know how much I have that I can give you, but I'll always listen to you, and I will never, not ever, think of you as less than you are."
"What exactly is it," Luka sniffled, "that you think I am?"
Rosetta paused, searching for how to put everything she regarded him as in a single word. Luka hated labels. She did not want to try to dilute the magnificence that he was into inadequate phrases. They stared at each other for a moment as Rosetta searched her mind for something—anything—she could say to explain it all to him. Her gaze did not so much as falter when she finally said, "You're a daydream." Luka looked taken aback, and she quickly delved deeper, spinning her intent into speech as if it were straw being spun to gold. "The kind that gets people through bad days. The kind people think of when they're staring out of windows and wondering when their lives will really start, instead of being merely dull routines that repeat day in and day out. The kind that people think of when they wish on stars and catch a clock when its hands are pointing to 11:11. And you're not just any daydream, Luka. You're my daydream. Call it what you will—an aspiration, a desire, the fantasy of someone who didn't know she was a hopeless romantic. I don't care. Whatever the future may hold, when I think about it, I always think of you, too."
The moment that followed was as quiet as Rosetta imagined the farthest, most obscure corners of space would be.
Then, at last, Luka spoke. "I am coming to see you, Rosetta," he said. Rosetta shook her head slightly, as if to dispel the static buzzing between her ears and ensure that she had not misheard him.
"You're...what?" she gasped.
"The small portion of money I had in my possession...I've used it to buy a plane ticket, Rosetta. A one-way trip to the United States. A one-way trip to you, and to a new life," he explained. "My father always said that your country was a land of opportunity. Before, I never had anything to prompt me to leave Vogogna. I could never bring myself to leave the city of my childhood if there was nothing for me to hold onto when I left. Now, though, things are so different, because I...I have you, sì?"
"Of course," she confirmed without hesitation. "Always. You're really coming? To New York? To me?" Excitement was churning within her, fizzing like champagne. She could see him, have him, hold him, touch him, kiss him, be with him. She could realize this dream, make it as tangible and believable as any other part of her life. She was beyond excited. She was, in fact, ecstatic, burning inside with the insatiable desire to shout from the rooftops that she was to see Luka Allegri. "When?"
"In a week's time," he answered, smiling at her schoolgirlish glee. "That is, I will, if you truly will allow me to be a part of your future."
"Allow you?" Rosetta repeated, laughing a bit at the absurdity of the notion. "Luka, I want that more than anything."
"Perfect," Luka beamed.
In that moment, he looked at her with such loving admiration that she thought she must have reddened from the tip of her nose to her toes with a flattered blush.
"I will see you soon, then, my flower."
"Fio
re," Rosetta corrected. "I think I like it better when you say it that way."
"As you wish," Luka's voice was warm and thick, flowing like maple syrup, viscous with precision of the words he chose and sweet with affection, "…Mio Fiore."