Broken String

CLXXVII

"You made it!"
Anita's beaming smile beckons them through the large, green wooden door into a spacious hallway with marble floors. Her eyes shoot to his back and widen.
"Wait. You have instruments?"
"Yup." he laughs. "Don't look so surprised. You do know I'm a violinist, right?"
"I know that very well." she grins, as she steps back to let him and his violin past. "And I also know what the rest of you are. I wasn't aware you needed instruments to eat pasta."
He waggles his eyebrows at her, Todd style, and evades. He's not telling her his plan, not yet.
"You don't. We were thinking maybe some after dinner tunes."
"Well, I'm sure the family will love them. Come on in! Dinner is ready!"

It's so funny to see her like this, this lady he's known for over two years but never really saw before stupid dreams, this guardian angel who helped him through some of his darkest minutes. Now she's a real Italian mum, running around the kitchen, twirling pasta around a two pronged huge metal thingy, serving this on a plate, that in a glass. They are sitting at a huge wooden table by large, French doors that open into a garden that has flowers and herbs everywhere. Does she tend to it herself? Seeing her now, busying herself like this, adding something to this, sniffing that, he can suddenly picture her like that, sleeves rolled up, wellie boots, fingers caked with mud.
"That smells divine, Anita." Todd says from his place near the French doors. "Have I told you yet I love blue cheese?"
"You haven't, but how could you not?" she quips mildly. "Matches the colour of your soul."
"What, rotten, you mean? How apt!"
Everyone bursts out laughing, Eddy included.
"How do you know him so well just in passing!" Brett jibes. "You must be an excellent judge of character."
"You have no idea, Brett Yang." She waves the wooden ladle in hand at him, peering over what Eddy guesses are reading glasses. "Anyway. Mangiamo."

Eddy is not sure he's ever seen so much European food laden on a table before. He stifles a grin as he thinks of his mum, who is so similar about food in many ways, just with a different cuisine. Eat this! Try that! You will not leave any house of mine hungry! He smiles gratefully at Anita as she puts a huge plate of cheesy pasta in front of him. Then he picks up his fork and tries not to give it bombastic side eye.
Yeah. He can't very well ask her if she has any chopsticks for him to eat with, can he? He surreptitiously looks over to Todd in his place by the door. He is digging in with great gusto, and Eddy tries to copy how he twirls the pasta around his fork. Oh God. Is he about to make a fool of himself? He tries though, one twirl, two twirls and shit, he's got actually got some caught. He takes the bite to his mouth as if the fork isn't difficult at all, smiles around the table and chews.
God, it's good.

Dinner flows by in a stream of jokes, serious music conversation, and bite after bite of luscious pasta. Eddy doesn't think he's been this full this year, but once everyone has shoved their plates away and rubbed their bellies with a contented sigh, Anita gets up with a proud smile and produces a large oven dish from the American sized fridge, with something he's guessing is tiramisu.
"Anita." Todd says in a half groan. "Are you trying to kill us with food?"
She chuckles lightly.
"Just paying the after dinner tunes up front."

Suddenly his heart is in his throat.
After dinner tunes.
He has a plan. One he thinks is of vital importance. And he's discussed his plan with the rest, of course he has and they like it, but they don't know her like he does. Will she even go for it? Will she like it? Or will it...
Shit, he won't hurt her, will he?
But he owes it to her to try. He owes it to her because of arms around shoulders as he sat and hyperventilated in an auditorium. He owes it to her for saving him, for caring about him like some surrogate Italian mum.
So once the plates have all been cleared away he takes a deep breath and gets up.
"Right. Let's make some music."