Margherita's Notebook by Elisabetta Flumeri, Gabriella Giacometti Read Free Book Online

voice asked her, “What am I going to do now?”
    Margherita looked him in the eye. And then she smiled. “Frankly, my dear, I don’t give a damn.”
    She turned her back and left him alone.
    Francesco stood there, shell-shocked, motionless, unable to utter a sound. That was how Armando, who had watched the scene from a safe distance, found him.
    â€œDrink this. Eighty proof. You’ll see, it’ll pick up your spirits,” he said, handing him a glass of Chianti grappa.
    â€œDid you hear what she said? She wasn’t . . . she wasn’t herself!”
    Francesco tossed down the liquor in a gulp. Armando filled his glass again.
    â€œFrancesco, I like you, you know that. But really, what did you expect?”
    His son-in-law looked at him hopelessly.
    â€œI don’t know, I was hoping she’d understand, that she’d see it my way, that . . .”
    At a loss for words, he gulped down another glass and collapsed onto the sofa.
    Armando sat down next to him, poured him a third glass of liquor, and put his hand on his shoulder.
    â€œEven Margherita’s mother, when she couldn’t stand me and my philandering anymore, would say she wanted to leave me . . .”
    â€œOh?” Francesco replied, a dazed look in his eyes.
    â€œToo many flings, too many absences . . . I could never make her feel secure.” Armando’s eyes were glistening. “When the cancer took her away from me four years ago, I felt guilty. I wasn’t a good husband.”
    This time it was Francesco who put his hand on Armando’s shoulder.
    â€œI wouldn’t say that, come on . . .” His speech was slurred.
    â€œBut it’s true!” his father-in-law replied heatedly, after pouringhimself a generous glass of grappa. “I’ve always been too shallow, even with Margherita. Yes, all right, I was good at playing games with her, at being fun, always, I was carefree, good at making her laugh, good at turning everything into a big party. But as for everything else? Terrible.”
    â€œWhat’re you saying? She idolizes you!”
    â€œYou’re right, and that’s why she went out and found a carbon copy,” Armando remarked bitterly. “But I will confess one thing, don’t take it the wrong way, I’m happy that she figured it out in time and that now she can find a man she can count on. By now she should know what she really wants in a man . . . at least, I hope so.”
    Francesco, who by this time was completely drunk, howled, “Margherita with another man!”
    This was followed by yet another glass.
    Later, when Margherita returned home in the company of Asparagio, Ratatouille, and Artusi, she found her husband on the sofa in what appeared to be a state of profound unconsciousness. Not even Artusi’s enthusiastic licks could bring him around. All he managed to do was grunt twice and utter a series of inarticulate sounds, before falling fast asleep again.
    â€œWhat did you give him, Armando?” Margherita asked her father reproachfully.
    He gave her an innocent look. “What do you think I gave him? A shot of something to pick him up.”
    Margherita turned to look at Francesco.
    â€œHe’s plastered.”
    Armando assumed a guilty air.
    â€œMaybe the grappa was a little strong,” he admitted. Then he gave her a big smile. “But he really needed it.”
    Margherita rolled her eyes. There was no point arguingwith her father, too. She looked at Francesco again, who stirred as he muttered things like, “No, Margherita, no . . . please. Yes, Meg, my Meg . . .”
    â€œClearly, he can’t drive back to Rome in this state.”
    Armando nodded.
    â€œAnd clearly I don’t intend to let him sleep in my bed.”
    â€œSo where shall we put him?”
    Margherita pointed to the sofa.
    â€œHe’ll be perfectly fine right