Chapter 6 - The Price of Knowing Everything
Maya did not answer Luca’s calls the next day.
Or the next.
She still visited Enzo.
Just not when Luca was there.
Dr. Shah arranged the schedule without comment.
That embarrassed Luca more than anger would have.
On the third evening, Rosa Romano arrived at the medical center.
Maya recognized her from a photograph.
Elegant.
Silver hair.
Black coat.
Eyes like Luca’s, but warmer.
“You’re Maya.”
Maya stood.
“Yes.”
Rosa held out one hand.
“Thank you for feeding my husband.”
Maya’s anger disappeared for a moment.
“You’re welcome.”
Rosa sat.
“Luca told me he ruined everything.”
Maya blinked.
“He said that?”
“He said, ‘I made a mistake.’ In Luca language, that is approximately a confession, apology, and public breakdown.”
Maya laughed despite herself.
Rosa smiled.
“He has always believed knowing everything means he can prevent pain.”
“That sounds exhausting.”
“It is.”
“For everyone.”
Rosa nodded.
They watched Enzo sleep.
After a while, Rosa said, “I left him twelve years ago.”
Maya turned.
“What?”
“We never divorced. But we stopped living together.”
“Why?”
“Because he refused to let anyone see his memory failing.”
Rosa’s eyes filled.
“He would forget where he put something, then accuse staff. Forget conversations, then call people liars. He became frightened and proud.”
Maya listened.
“I moved into a townhouse because I thought distance might force him to get help.”
“Did it?”
“No.”
Rosa looked toward Enzo.
“Then he disappeared.”
There was no clean villain in that part.
Only fear.
Pride.
Mistakes.
Seven years of consequence.
Rosa continued.
“Luca blamed himself. I blamed myself. Carlo made money. Daniel made worse choices. Enzo ran. Everybody found a way to turn grief into something useful.”
“What did you turn it into?”
“Control.”
Rosa smiled sadly.
“Same family illness.”
Maya understood Luca better after that.
Not enough to excuse him.
Enough to answer his call that evening.
“I’m sorry,” he said immediately.
Good start.
“For investigating you beyond what was necessary. For offering money like it could settle what you did for my father. For treating your life like a problem I had authority to solve.”
Maya sat on her couch.
“That was specific.”
“I rehearsed.”
“Rosa?”
“My mother is a traitor.”
Maya smiled.
Luca continued.
“I want to ask you something.”
“Ask.”
“What do you actually want?”
The question surprised her.
“Right now?”
“Yes.”
Maya thought.
“I want to finish my degree.”
“In what?”
“Social work.”
Luca said nothing.
“I started community college after high school. My mother got sick. I stopped. Then she died and I kept telling myself I’d go back.”
“Why social work?”
Maya looked at the dark window.
“Because people disappear in plain sight.”
Luca understood.
She continued.
“I don’t want you paying for it.”
“I know.”
That answer mattered.
“I want fewer shifts.”
“I can’t control your employer.”
“You own the café company.”
“Right.”
Maya laughed.
“See the problem?”
“Yes.”
“Let me solve it.”
“How?”
“I apply for financial aid. I ask Denise to cut me to four days. I take classes.”
“And if you need help?”
“I decide whether to ask.”
Luca was quiet.
Then, “Okay.”
A week later, Maya enrolled in two evening classes.
No secret tuition payment appeared.
No mysterious scholarship.
She checked.
Twice.
Luca respected the boundary.
He did one thing without asking.
He changed the Romano Hospitality policy for all employees.
Every hourly employee received a tuition-assistance option through an outside education fund with published eligibility rules.
Not just Maya.
When she found out, she confronted him.
“You said you wouldn’t pay my tuition.”
“I’m not.”
“You created a company program.”
“For fourteen thousand employees.”
“Because of me.”
“Partly.”
Maya tried to stay angry.
Failed.
“That is annoyingly acceptable.”
Luca smiled.
Progress.
Meanwhile, Enzo stabilized physically.
His memory did not.
Some days he knew Luca.
Some days he called him Anthony, his own dead brother.
Some days he thought Maya was a waitress from a diner he worked at in 1968.
One afternoon, he was clear.
Painfully clear.
Luca sat beside him.
Maya arrived halfway through.
Enzo looked between them.
“You two fighting?”
Maya froze.
Luca laughed.
“Sometimes.”
Enzo nodded.
“Good.”
“Good?” Maya asked.
“People who never fight are hiding.”
Then he looked at Luca.
“Carlo.”
Luca leaned forward.
“What about him?”
Enzo’s eyes sharpened.
“Don’t spend your life punishing him.”
Luca’s jaw tightened.
“He stole from you.”
“Yes.”
“He used your illness.”
“Yes.”
“He kept me from finding you.”
Enzo shook his head.
“No.”
Luca stopped.
Enzo struggled for words.
“I left. He lied after. But I left.”
He touched Luca’s hand.
“My shame. Not yours.”
Luca’s eyes filled.
Enzo continued.
“You became hard.”
“Yes.”
“Too hard.”
“Yes.”
“Maya?”
She stepped closer.
Enzo looked at her.
“Tell him.”
“Tell him what?”
“Kindness.”
Then the clarity began slipping.
His face clouded.
“Where’s my coat?”
Luca closed his eyes.
The moment was gone.
But the message stayed.
That evening, Luca did not call anyone about Carlo.
He sat beside the lake alone.
Maya joined him.
No security within earshot.
“He remembered.”
“For ten minutes.”
“That is ten minutes you didn’t have yesterday.”
Luca looked at her.
“You always do that.”
“What?”
“Make less feel like enough.”
Maya shook her head.
“No.”
She looked at the water.
“I make enough stop feeling like failure.”
Maya’s first semester back at school did not become magically easy because Luca respected her boundaries.
She failed a statistics quiz.
Missed a bus.
Worked a closing shift before an eight-o’clock class and fell asleep over a reading assignment.
Once, she almost called Luca and asked him to solve everything.
Instead she called him and said, “Tell me something useless.”
He thought for a moment.
“Marco is afraid of geese.”
Maya laughed so hard she woke her neighbor.
That became another kind of help.
Not rescue.
Company.
Luca learned to ask, “Do you want advice, money, a ride, or just someone to listen?”
Maya made fun of the wording.
Then admitted it worked.
The distinction changed them.
It allowed her to need him without feeling purchased.
May you like
It allowed him to care without turning care into control.
For two people raised around very different forms of scarcity, that was no small thing.
