10 minute read
CHASING CHIARA
by MICHAEL SHAPIRO
A brief, shining moment with a clear, bright light
My long-ago trip to Italy began with a phone call to a young woman I’d met two years prior in San Francisco. As I dialed, my hand shook. Would she remember me?
“Pronto” came the familiar voice.
“Of course I remember, the boy with the curly hair,” she said with a knowing chuckle.
“Then you must come and see me.”
A few days later, I took a train to from Milano to Vicenza, a city about an hour west of Venice. I disembarked and looked right at Chiara but for a moment didn’t recognize her. She was thinner, her hair lighter. We hugged, tentatively, more strangers than friends.
Chiara, whose name means “clear, bright” looked gorgeous. Her hazel eyes sparkled, her smile lit up the city, her naturally wavy chestnut hair cascaded over her sweatshirt, caressing her shoulders.
She took me home to meet her parents. Her mother warmly greeted me, beckoning me inside with enthusiastic arm motions; her father seemed aloof, distant, gruff; her dog, Brillo, ran toward me. I dropped my luggage in the small, dimly
lighted guestroom and just moments after we’d arrived, Chiara pulled me out of her family’s home.
Under threatening skies, we went out for a walk to see restored stone houses down by Vicenza’s main canal. Chiara took me to the Central Square; statues of griffons and war heroes stood atop pedestals 30 feet high.
At a café we drank sweet local wine, marveling at the improbability of seeing one another again. Chiara told me, without a trace of self-pity, about her sister’s problems, which had everyone in the family deeply concerned.
I was sad to hear about her sister’s challenges but encouraged by how open she was with me. The attraction I’d felt in California swept back in like the tide. I wanted to take her away from everything that troubled her: her sister on the edge, a domineering father and her exhausting night-shift job at a U.S. military base.
We ordered a pizza; I met some of her friends, so vivacious and stylish with classic Italian panache. We went to an ice-cream shop for some gelato, so much more flavorful than any ice cream I’d had in the U.S. As night began to fall, we headed back to Chiara’s home.
As if on cue, the skies opened and rain came flooding down, soaking through our clothes to the skin. We ran joyfully as distant thunder rumbled. The rain washed off Chiara’s makeup; her natural beauty emerged. She showed me to my room and left for her 11 p.m. shift at the base.
When I got up, Chiara was putting the finishing touches on our bountiful breakfast. After working all night and going to an exercise class, she brought
home fresh croissants and rolls, a jar of marmalade and, just in case I didn’t like the marmalade, another kind of jam, all served with rich coffee. She looked fresh and alive, not like someone who’d worked the graveyard shift.
Chiara needed to rest so I hopped a train to Venice and explored the Jewish ghetto, Europe’s first. It was formed in 1516 and for almost three centuries the city’s Jews were required to live there and stay within the ghetto’s bounds from 7 p.m. to sunrise. You could still see the marks in the walls from the hinges that held the ghetto’s doors.
The next day, after working another all-night shift, Chiara took me to meet two kids she babysat: Giovanni and Giuseppe. They were ages 5 and 3, adopted from Vietnam. I was startled to hear Vietnamese-born kids speak with Italian accents. Chiara shone with love for these boys and they loved her back. “She’s so good with kids,” I later wrote in my journal. “I’m sure she’ll make a wonderful mother someday.”
My feelings for Chiara kept building, but between sightseeing and her job, there didn’t seem to be an auspicious time to give words to what I felt was our deepening connection. She was just 20 years old; I was 21 and not sure what my next move should be. Don’t blow it, I thought, just enjoy the ride.
We drove about an hour from Vicenza into the foothills of the Alps. Chiara took me to a town called Marostica, where people dress up as chess pieces and masters come to direct them across a gigantic chessboard. There was no game when we visited – it’s only played once every two years during a summer festival – but I could imagine the life-size rooks, bishops, kings and queens, moving in lines “The view below us swept down for miles. As we walked through the ancient stone streets it felt like a dream—my dream of how I wanted everything to turn out two years before when I first met Chiara.”
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across the squares in the shadow of the adjacent castle, a Campanilelike tower rising above it.
The view below us swept down for miles. As we walked through the ancient stone streets it felt like a dream—my dream of how I wanted everything to turn out two years before when I first met Chiara. She walked ahead of me, looked back, her smile beckoning me forward. Occasionally she lingered a step or two behind me, lost in thought or maybe succumbing to fatigue.
In a nearby town, we hiked up a hill to a castle for another glorious view of the patchwork of homes and fields below us. At a well we tossed some coins. I wished for Chiara to escape the traps in her life, to find a place where she could feel free. As we hiked back from the castle, she began skipping and jumping down the hill. I marveled at her energy and optimism.
At the bottom, a scrawny kid was selling watermelon. He was proud to have a real American at his place, even prouder to cut the slices himself with a big sharp knife. Chiara had been moving for a day and a half without sleep.
When we got back to her family’s home, exhaustion caught up with her. We watched Star Trek in Italian and I gave her a foot massage as she fell asleep on a couch. Her father came into the living room, glowered at me and sat down with his newspaper.
It didn’t occur to me until then that a foot massage could be seen as an intimate act. Chiara’s father understood this. That meant I’d have to leave in the morning. I implored Chiara to come visit me in southern France, where I had plans to meet my parents and brother, and held her until the train blew its final whistle.
A few days later I found a payphone by the boardwalk in Nice and called Chiara— expecting the inevitable: Sorry, I’d like to meet you but just can’t get away. Just hearing her voice made my heart leap. “Yes,” she said, she’d gotten the time off work and would meet me in southern France. Yes? It took a moment to register. Yes! I told her how happy I’d be to see her and she signed off with a laughing “Ciao.”
I was sharing a hotel room with my brother and knew that wouldn’t do. I’d have to get separate accommodations for the time Chiara visited. Just beyond the tourist area of Nice, I found a cozy, whitewashed hotel with sea views. The desk clerk asked if I wanted two separate beds or “un grand lit” (one big bed).
I didn’t want to be presumptuous; Chiara and I hadn’t done anything more intimate than kiss (or maybe the foot massage). But then – almost reflexively – came my response, which would shape the next few days, four syllables that I’d never regret: “Oui, un grand lit!”
MUSIC MUSIQUE “Chiara took me to a town called
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