Joe and Danny drove on, having been relieved of escort duty, and Jake enjoyed the new company; the boys’ perky questions, the coy shyness of the little girls, the teasing good humour that flashed around all of them. It was obvious that Merlina was a favourite with her nieces and nephews. He noticed she wasn’t bored by them. They weren’t a nuisance to her. And she didn’t talk down to them, treating everything they said to her with natural interest, drawing them out and giving responses that gave them pleasure or made them laugh.
It struck Jake that she would be a good mother, which jolted him into remembering she wanted children of her own. That was part of the marriage deal for her and he hadn’t given it a thought. He started studying the children milling around him, trying to imagine himself as a father. Was it a role he wanted to play?
His own father had absconded to Europe after his mother had divorced him and Jake hadn’t seen him since. He’d envied the kids at school who had dads come to watch their sporting events. A father should be there, Jake thought, taking an interest, giving encouragement and approval. No one should have children unless they were prepared to do that. Which meant giving a lot of time to them.
A little girl—was it three-year-old Rosa?—tugged at his jeans to gain his attention, looking up at him with big, imploring eyes. ‘My legs are tired,’ she said woefully. ‘Will you carry me on your shoulders, Jake?’
‘I sure will.’ He hoisted her up and she dug her fingers into his hair to hold on. He’d never carried a child like this but she obviously trusted him to do it right and knew how to balance herself. Her father must have made her feel confident about it.
‘If you’re so tired, Rosa, you won’t be able to play soccer after dinner,’ one of the boys remarked.
‘Oh, yes I will,’ she said with emphatic determination. ‘I just need a little rest, that’s all.’
‘You never score a goal anyway,’ he tossed back.
‘I’m going to have Jake on my side tonight,’ she retaliated. ‘He won’t let you take the ball off me.’
‘I think you’ve just been elected Rosa’s champion,’ Merlina said, giving him a rueful smile.
He raised his eyebrows in an appeal for help. ‘What does that mean?’
Everyone rushed in to explain. Poppa had set up a junior soccer field for them behind the house. The adults could play but they were only allowed to trap and pass the soccer ball on to the children, not score a goal. They always had a game after a family barbecue. The two smallest children picked their teams, so Rosa was one captain and four-year-old Genarro was the other. The women didn’t play. They sat on the veranda and cheered on the teams.
‘A bit of discrimination here?’ Jake tilted at Merlina.
She rolled her eyes. ‘You can’t beat family tradition.’
‘You played when you were a kid?’
‘I have the record for most goals scored by a girl.’
He laughed. ‘I bet you were a tiger on the field.’
‘It was a challenge.’
‘And you took it on in your usual tenacious manner, refusing to be defeated.’
She gave him an ironic look. ‘You know me too well.’
‘No. But I’m getting there.’
Like learning about where she’d come from; this huge family community, which actually had traditions passed down from generation to generation, a world with different values to those he was familiar with. He’d moved himself past the sense of having been cheated of a family life when he was a boy, yet he was feeling it again now, very strongly, so strongly it stirred a long-suppressed anger at the parental neglect that had left him deprived of all this.
Merlina was right.
He didn’t fit.
All his bearings ran along different tracks.
But something in him longed to fit.
Being here was like looking over a fence at what should have been. It hurt in ways he hadn’t anticipated. The fence was uncrossable. Or was it? He couldn’t change his past but he could determine his future. Maybe, if he had children with Merlina, he could climb over to the other side, sharing it with them.
He turned his gaze to the big sprawling house they were approaching. It was a country house, wide verandas running all around it, trees providing shade and handy branches for children to climb. Garden beds were a profusion of colour with petunias and geraniums mixed in with the greenery of shrubs. It was not a show-place. It looked very much lived in—a real family home.
To one side of it was a huge shed with a row of vehicles parked in front of it; pick-up trucks, four-wheel drives, station wagons, a couple of sedans, nothing that screamed status class. It wasn’t for a lack of money, Jake thought. Properties like this were probably worth a fortune. Any other symbols of prosperity were simply irrelevant. These people weren’t out to impress. They were who they were—the Rossi family.
Merlina’s family.
Joe and Danny were leaning on the veranda railing near the front door, watching their approach. They were joined by another brother.
‘That’s Mario, the father of the new baby,’ Merlina informed him.
Her father emerged from the house, standing at the top of the front steps to welcome them. ‘All you children scoot off and play now,’ he commanded. ‘I’ll be taking Jake and Merlina in to Nonna.’
He was instantly obeyed. No back-chat. Jake lifted Rosa down from his shoulders. The little girl thanked him and skipped off after the others, her legs in good working order again.
‘I see my daughter has you twined around her finger already, Jake,’ Danny commented with a wide grin.
Angelo Rossi laughed as he grasped Jake’s hand in greeting. ‘Our little Rosa is a cute one. But wait until you see my new grandson. You’ll be wanting a boy just like him.’
‘Papa, we’re not even married yet,’ Merlina protested.
‘So? What is marriage without children? The two of you will make beautiful bambinos.’
It was expected of him, and not just by Merlina, Jake thought. Was he up for it? Seriously? This whole family thing was part and parcel of marrying her. She had warned him and he could feel her tension mounting as he was introduced to Mario and did his best to warmly congratulate him on his new son.
Angelo steered him inside and down a long hallway to a huge kitchen at the end of it—the biggest kitchen Jake had ever seen with copper pots and pans hanging everywhere and a long table in the centre of it, laden with bowls of salads and baskets of bread. The room seemed crowded with women—big women—all of them looking him over with avid interest.