The Last Embrace. Pam Jenoff

car, barking noisily at their feet.

      Finally an older boy unfolded himself from the front passenger seat. He had long legs and wide shoulders, hair in a neat side part but that still curled at the edges. My stomach flipped, like the time Papa had taken me on a roller coaster at the carnival.

      A family moving in. I waited for a father to appear, but the woman and the boys began unloading things and carrying them to the house. The oldest boy lifted a case from the roof of the car, his muscles flexing under his T-shirt. One of the twins hung back, head low, until his mother went to him and said something, cajoling a smile. They laughed at a joke I could not hear.

      When the boys had finished unloading the boxes, they disappeared into the house. I looked down at the street, which seemed emptier than it had before they’d come. Then the screen door to the house next door banged open and the boys appeared once more. They jostled like puppies as they pushed outside. One of the twins carried a football, which the boys began tossing among them on the thin strip of grass that separated our two houses.

      I watched the scene play out below, wanting to go down and join them. I stepped forward, starting toward the door that led downstairs. Then I stopped. But I kept watching, fascinated. The hair of the oldest boy seemed to glow gold in the morning sun. He didn’t so much run as fly, feet barely touching the ground. He leapt for the ball and his shirt pulled free, revealing a bit of midsection. I inhaled sharply at the unfamiliar sight.

      “Hey!” a voice called out. It took a second to realize that it was directed at me. The youngest boy had his head tilted upward toward the porch, hand raised to shield his eyes from the sun. I stepped back from the window, but it was too late. He waved his brothers over. “A kid.”

      The others stopped playing and gathered to peer up at me. “A girl,” the oldest brother corrected. “Don’t be shy,” he coaxed in a voice too rich and hypnotic to resist. “Come down and join us. We won’t bite.”

      “We might,” the twin without the glasses taunted. I hung back. Then, curious and struck by the kindness of the oldest boy’s eyes, I opened the door and started down the steps.

      “I’m Jack,” the twin with glasses said when I’d reached the bottom. He held out his hand. Closer I could see that he had a fuller face than his brother, splashed with freckles. Long lashes blinked behind the thick lenses.

      I opened my mouth but no sound came out. “Adelia,” I croaked finally, wishing my accent was not so obvious.

      The leaner twin cocked his head. “She must be the greenhorn from Italy that Dad mentioned.” How did they know about me? I blinked, caught off guard by the rudeness of his tone. My cheeks reddened and I started to turn. Coming downstairs had been a mistake.

      “Don’t mind Liam,” said the oldest boy, his voice low and resonant. I stared up, not answering. He was even more handsome up close, with hazel eyes and a wide smile. Bright sunlight seemed to cast a halo of gold around him. “I’m Charlie.” My breath caught. I brushed my hair from my face, trying to think of something to say that would impress him, make him take notice. He cupped his hand on the head of the youngest boy standing beside him. “And this is Robbie.”

      I smiled down at Robbie, who had wide, round cheeks that seemed to cushion his eyes, and front teeth still a bit too big. He stood very straight, trying to look taller in a way that I recognized from doing it myself. “Nice to meet you,” I said solemnly.

      “Adelia,” Charlie said, as if trying my name on for size. Hearing him say it, my insides warmed. “That’s a mouthful. Is it okay if we call you Addie?”

      I nodded, liking the short, easy sound. “Si. I mean, yes.” I blushed. My knowledge of English was not awful. Mamma had insisted that I learn other languages since I was a child. I had read as much as I could since coming here, mostly Ladies’ Home Journal and the other women’s magazines Aunt Bess loved. And I had listened to the radio programs, too. But I had not had much opportunity to practice speaking and when I was nervous it all seemed to fade away.

      “Come meet our mother.” Before I could reply, Charlie strode across the lawn, covering it in about two steps. The others followed. “Mom!” The red-haired woman emerged from the house, wiping her hands on the apron that covered her light blue shirtwaist dress. “This is Addie. She’s staying next door.”

      The woman smiled with a kindness that said she had heard about me. “Hello! We’ve been summer neighbors of your aunt and uncle for years, though we usually get here a good deal earlier. I’m Doris Connally.”

      “Where did you come from?” Robbie interjected.

      “From Trieste, in Italy. On a boat.”

      “All by yourself?” he asked. I nodded, standing straighter.

      “Well, that’s something,” Mrs. Connally said, her voice full of admiration. “I normally wouldn’t even make the trip down to the shore by myself, but my husband had to work and the boys wanted to be here for the fireworks on the Fourth.”

      “Who lives there with you?” Robbie resumed his interrogation, pointing up to the screened porch where I had stood minutes earlier.

      “Just my aunt and my uncle.”

      “No brothers or sisters? Any pets?” I shook my head twice, trying to keep up with his questions. “Boy, you’ll sure be glad to have us around!” His brothers chuckled.

      Robbie turned to his mother. “Can we keep her?”

      “Robbie, she isn’t a puppy. But I do hope you’ll join us often,” she added.

      “Because we really need more kids,” Liam said wryly. His words stung. But he did not sound as though he was trying to be mean, just truthful.

      The yellow dog I’d seen earlier bounded down the porch steps and stopped at Liam’s feet. “This is Beau,” he added, face softening.

      “Jack and Liam must be about your age,” Mrs. Connally remarked.

      “I’m sixteen.” I heard my accent again, the way my voice did not sound like theirs.

      “I’m taller,” said Liam improbably.

      “Okay,” I conceded, because it seemed to matter to him a great deal.

      “Would you like to join us for lunch?” Mrs. Connally offered. “I haven’t much ’til we get to Casel’s, just sandwiches.”

      I still could not get over the way Americans spoke so casually of food—something I would never again take for granted. “I wouldn’t want to impose.”

      Mrs. Connally smiled. “Hardly. With these boys, I’m already cooking for an army. Come on, everyone. Let’s eat.”

      Charlie lifted Robbie across his shoulders like a sack of potatoes and started for the door with the twins at his heels. Inside, the house was airy and cool. There were little touches, like the carved oak bannister and wide windows, that said the house had been built for someone to live in year-round, and not merely as a vacation home.

      As we passed through the living room, I paused to admire a chess set which sat already unpacked on a low table. “It’s lovely,” I said, fingering one of the carved wooden rooks.

      “Do you play?” Charlie asked with new interest.

      I tried to calm the fluttering in my stomach. “I did. My father taught me.” In recent years when he had become broken and withdrawn, it was my one way to still connect to him. Papa had no one to play with him now. I imagined the chessboard sitting unused by the fireplace in our apartment in Trieste. It had been my dearest possession—the one thing I might have brought with me, had I known I was going.

      I followed Charlie through the open boxes that littered the floor to the freshly scrubbed kitchen smelling of lemons. Mrs. Connally unpacked a basket of meats and cheeses and began slicing thick white bread. My stomach rumbled embarrassingly. Even after several weeks here, every meal felt as though it might be my last.

      The