Tuscany, Italy is the perfect place to fall in love. 

From the various tales Sadie March’s grandmother told her of growing up in the streets of Tuscany, she knew instantly she would spend her life there; among the rolling grass fields and cobblestone towns, the smell of roast coffee and strong vanilla in the streets. The land she wasn’t born into, the home outside of her bed in rural Mississippi. 

‘This girl will conquer the culinary world,’ Grandma Beth exclaimed on her seventeenth birthday. She snuggled in the crook of her grandmother’s neck on the dusty rose couch, the familiar and pleasant scent of lemon, and asked softly, ‘Do you think I can do it?’

Grandma Beth laughed, the crackling fire in front of them slowly dying, “If you don’t, then you I’m not sure where my granddaughter went.’

Tragically, Grandma Beth never got to see her board the boat. Never got to see her wave goodbye from the distance. Never got to see her twisted face as her mother whispered just before departure, ‘Maybe you’ll find love.’

Love. The idea of love never so much as lingered in the back of Sadie’s head. A a mindless wonder every so often. Sadie was not going to prowl the streets of Italy in hopes of finding love. She had a dream, a career off in the horizons. Love. How childish. 

~ ~ ~

Sim Ricci never put his paintbrush down. 

From the light that filtered in through his windows and the disparate yet calming scents of rose and bergamot, birds chirped on that warm summer day as strong citrus invaded his nostrils. He felt eternal peace. 

Then he looked at the piece he was working on. Drowning out the sounds of his parents cooking downstairs and the drip of a leak in the roof. 

If only I had cyan. Cyan would surely do the trick. 

Sim practically skipped at the thought of going to the market, for the third time this week, to buy new paint. The bustling crowds and the clatter were the perfect juxtaposition to his calm pastime in the attic of his parents’ house. 

Down the stairs, shouting a quick goodbye, he was swiftly out the door. Rushing through the streets, not a care in the wind, the sun illuminating his way to the shop. Turning a corner, his joy obscuring his consciousness, he didn’t realize he had run straight into another person. Both collapsed to the ground, groaning in pain, the people nearby continuing to walk. Sim placed his fingertips to his knee and felt a fleshy scrape. 

Great, now his mother would hassle him all night about what had happened. 

When he finally looked up at a voice asking him if he was okay— the world around him froze. 

Cyan.

~ ~ ~

I always thought it was quite cliché how Sadie and Sim met. I thought the kind of love that was instant at first sight only blossomed in fairytales and television. Yet when I look through the old and withered scrapbooks full of pictures in black and white, I tear up. I feel hope that love such as theirs has a presence on this earth. But also hopelessness at the idea that I will never find love like the one they share. 

I asked my mother once why she never remarried after father died. I asked her if she was happy. ‘I’m always happy with you my dear. But the love I shared with your father was as strong as Sadie and Sim’s. And the time I shared with him was worth a lifetime without.’

~ ~ ~

Sim asked Sadie on a date within a week of sending letters back and forth a street away from each other in Tuscany Italy. Sim invited her to a secluded rooftop over the twinkling lights of the town with a dish he attempted to cook himself. Of course, after thirty minutes of getting no-where, his mother had to step in and practically take over. 

It was effortless and natural talking with Sim. About her odd love of buttons and hatred towards olives. When he asked about what her dream was, she didn’t have to think twice about opening up to Sim. 

It was natural to tell Sadie these things too. He talked about his painting. About how the sounds and the smells of the world guide his every brushstroke. He admitted at one point in the night that he sounded stupid sounding all theoretical; all Sadie said was, ‘No you don’t. I think it’s cute.’

            ~ ~ ~

I wish I were able to go to Sadie and Sim’s wedding. Apparently, it was beautiful and serene and— just perfect. It was fairly small, but that didn’t matter to the newlyweds. 

What mattered was the unwritten path ahead. Sim carried his wife to the house they bought together, embraced in each other’s arms and counted the stars throughout the night. 

I still don’t know what love is. I still yearn for love, to be loved, and at every chance I push, burrow within myself until I can’t see anything. I’m waiting for that natural, fairytale ending. But natural scares me, I don’t let it happen.

~ ~ ~

Sadie constantly had the pots and pans out. Sim was never seen without his paintbrush. While Sadie danced with the spices and flavors, the kitchen somehow always smelling like lemons, Sim was around the house, wherever an empty patch of wall space was.

They loved each other, that was for sure. They would walk the colorful streets of Tuscany, lay blankets out in the fields under a setting sun. Just live. Sim reminded her constantly of how he loved her eyes. Twinkling blue and her smile so bright. Sadie would tousle his hair at every chance she had. Curling it between her fingertips. But they knew the other shared that love with their passions and dreams as well. 

Sim never stopped Sadie from reaching for the stars, for her dream. She worked day and night, perfecting her recipes, preparing to open a restaurant. Sim helped Sadie in any way he could. When she took the reins though, he knew to stay back and do his thing. The perfect dynamic. 

Eventually, Sadie did open her restaurant. Decked in flowers and plants, the constant scent of lemon, and the most perfect view of the town from any window. Sadie couldn’t ask for more. When the two stood outside of the completed restaurant, arms wrapped around each other, Sadie said, ‘I couldn’t have done this without you. You’re my everything.’ 

Sim kissed her in the street. Joy overwhelmed his senses. 

The restaurant, simply called SS Tuscany, was the thing on everyone’s lips. The business flourished, and Sadie and Sim knew they were the happiest people in the entire country. The entire planet. 

Each night when they returned home, they would look up at the stars together, smiling and laughing. This happiness they felt, the everlasting content, baffled the two. They held this happiness close, this love, and promised to never let go. 

~ ~ ~

I forget how old Sadie and Sim were when they passed. Tragic, but at least forever together. About thirty years after opening SS Tuscany, they sold it and moved from the restless streets of the town into a small cottage in the field. They would sit together in the front law, a field of lemon trees on the horizon, in peaceful contentment. Sadie would cook until her legs couldn’t hold her: crisp bread loaves, every pasta dish imaginable, and on days she was feeling fancy, a tomato basil pizza. 

Sim was sure to cover the cottage in doodles and masterpieces. Always leaving the windows open, the sounds of birds chirping a constant melody. Together in perfect solitude. 

I never got to visit the cottage. Mother did but only once. She told me it brought back too many memories. I can only imagine her face as she crossed the threshold into her childhood home. A ghostly reminder of the joyous days she spent with Sadie and Sim. 

I wonder what it would be like to live under the wing of two people who carry so much love in their hearts. I wonder why Sadie and Sim got that. Why my parents did, but their time cut short. Why do humans love? Must I love?

~ ~ ~

Sadie and Sim never really talked about having kids. Sadie brought it up once a little after the restaurant opened, but they were both so busy that the thought was a skip on a record. Once they moved to the cottage, Sadie realized neither her mind nor body was ready to deliver a baby. While this fact saddened the two, they at least had each other. 

One night, rain pattering against the rooftop, there was a frantic knock at their door. They scurried out of bed and opened the door to find a small child, no more than seven standing in mere rags. With chestnut hair and lifeless brown eyes. 

Sadie and Sim took the child in as if she were their own. Promising to love and console her. Promising to be there for her. It took her a while to adjust, for she came from an incredibly abusive household. Sadie and Sim didn’t hear the full story until a year after the child arrived. 

Eventually she settled in. Helping Sadie out in the kitchen, dancing to the music constantly playing on the record player. She would pick lemons with Sim, doodle in her sketchbook, and swim in the small lake behind the cottage. Sadie and Sim loved her unconditionally. Right up to their very last breath. 

~ ~ ~

My mother was twenty when Sadie and Sim passed away. She decided to pack up and leave for the United States. Looking for opportunity. Looking to start over yet again. In the restless streets of New York City she found a job at a publishing company and worked next to a very kind… very handsome employee. My father. 

They built a life together. A dawn chorus of endless love that brought me into the world. And just like my mother was seven when her heart was crushed to pieces, my father past days after my seventh birthday. Sorrow and dread, like an overflowing swamp engulfed my mother and I. 

Love. It’s fascinating how its grip on you can bring the greatest joys or the most dreaded sorrows. How it can stem from the most embarrassing or the most eventful moments. How it can sneak up around corners or appear right on your doorstep. 

Love binds my family together. Love keeps us alive even when we feel like spiraling.

Love is real. 

I suggested to my mother that we close the chapter on gloomy New York City and go back to where love is prominent. Where Sadie and Sim found love. Where my mother found love. Where love has brought my family happiness and peace. 

I can already see the difference in my mother’s eyes as we walk the streets of Tuscany Italy. The memories rush through her like watching an old film. Citizens stop and wave to her. She smiles and gleams under the sun. We eat at SS Tuscany, still alive and flourishing. 

Tuscany, Italy is the perfect place to fall in love. I won’t push, mother won't spiral, Sadie and Sim live on. 

Love, is not so childish.