Salt In The Wound

The Way He Cuts Garlic

Dinner happened slowly, like everything else in Vernazza.

Matteo led her through a short hallway behind the café’s counter, and Camilla found herself in a kitchen that looked like it had seen three generations of pasta and heartbreak. Copper pots hung above a tiled counter, a bowl of lemons sat on the sill, and the back door was open just wide enough for a slice of sea breeze.

“I wasn’t kidding about making too much,” he said, lifting a deep ceramic dish covered with a towel. “Spinach and ricotta tortelloni. My sins are many, but portion control is not among them.”

Camilla smiled, leaning lightly against the frame of the doorway. “What are the others?”

Matteo flashed her a brief, crooked grin. “We’ll get to that.”

She stayed quiet as he began reheating the tortelloni in a wide pan, drizzling olive oil from a tall green bottle with a kind of reverence. Then came fresh garlic, chopped with surgical precision, the kind of finesse you don’t get unless you've done it a thousand times while thinking about something else entirely.

“You cook like someone who thinks a lot,” she said.

“I cook like someone who avoids thinking too much,” he replied.

Cam didn’t respond. There was something about the clatter of a wooden spoon in a pan that silenced the unnecessary parts of a person. He offered her a glass of wine — red, earthy, cool. She took it, sipped, and sat on a high stool just off the counter.

For a while, they said nothing. And it wasn’t awkward. Not even close.

Cam found herself watching Matteo’s hands — long fingers, lightly calloused. Hands that belonged in two worlds: one of art, and one of labor. His sleeves were still rolled, and there was a smudge of flour near his wrist. She wondered if he knew it was there. She wondered if she should tell him. Then she wondered why she was suddenly acting like a teenager noticing things she shouldn't care about.

“I’m usually better at silence,” she murmured.

“You’re doing fine,” he said without looking up.

The pasta was plated without ceremony but with unmistakable care. Two bowls. A little shaved pecorino. A drizzle of oil, again.

They sat at a small table by the open window. The sky outside was nearly black, the stars beginning to gather over the rooftops. Somewhere down by the water, someone was playing a violin, badly, but with heart.

Cam twirled her fork into the pasta, took a bite, and stopped short. It was rich but light, warm but not cloying — exactly what comfort should taste like if it had a recipe.

She didn’t say anything for a few seconds.

“That bad?” Matteo asked with a raised brow.

“No,” she said quietly. “That good.”

“Good,” he said, and for a moment his face relaxed — not just in relief, but in something older, softer. A release.

Cam leaned back in her chair, sipping wine. “So, Matteo who avoids thinking — what’s your story?”

He looked at her then, long and slow. Not in that flirtatious way men sometimes do, but in a way that felt… deliberate. Like he was choosing which version of the truth to offer.

“I was supposed to leave,” he said finally. “This was never meant to be a forever kind of life.”

“But here you are.”

“Here I am.”

She waited, but he didn’t elaborate. She understood the tactic. Say just enough to satisfy curiosity, but not enough to invite more questions. She was familiar with the move. She used it herself.

“And you?” he asked, turning the spotlight gently. “You said you don’t know what you’re doing here.”

Cam looked down at her wine. Her reflection blinked back at her in the deep garnet pool.

“I had a plan,” she said after a moment. “London. Career. Someone who loved me, or at least pretended well enough to make me forget how tired I was.”

Matteo didn’t interrupt.

“And then all of it stopped making sense. The photos felt fake. The galleries were all noise. And the person I thought I could count on…” She trailed off. “I guess I wanted to see what it felt like to be somewhere that wasn’t pretending.”

“And have you?”

She glanced around the small café kitchen, at the ivy hanging like lazy thoughts, at the spoon still resting in the pan. “I’m not sure yet. But this place… it feels like it breathes differently.”

“It does,” he said. “Most people are too loud to notice.”

They ate the rest of the meal slowly, like the food deserved reverence. And when they were finished, Matteo didn’t rush to clear the plates. Instead, he poured a little more wine and leaned back in his chair.

“You know,” he said after a long pause, “there’s a local tradition in Vernazza.”

“Oh?”

“If someone shows up unexpectedly and eats your food without insulting it, you’re required to tell them a secret.”

Cam laughed. “Is that so?”

“Ancient tradition,” he said solemnly.

“And what happens if you don’t?”

He shrugged. “Cursed with bland pasta forever.”

She narrowed her eyes, playing along. “You go first.”

He considered her, the smile fading just a little. And then, in that same soft tone he’d used all evening, he said, “I didn’t come back here for peace. I came back because I didn’t have anywhere else to go.”

Cam stilled. The intimacy of that admission — wrapped in such a quiet package — settled in her chest like a stone.

Now it was her turn. She took a breath. “I once deleted an entire exhibition’s worth of photos. Not because they were bad. Because they felt like someone else’s work, and I hated the person I had to become to make them.”

Matteo nodded slowly. “That sounds more brave than foolish.”

“It felt like both.”

“I think most honest things do.”

Outside, the wind was picking up. The white curtains swayed harder now, brushing the edge of Camilla’s arm like an invitation.

She stood slowly, her legs a little unsteady from the wine and the weight of everything they hadn’t said.

“Thank you,” she said. “For dinner. For the... peace.”

Matteo rose too, walking her to the door. “Don’t thank me. Just come back.”

Cam paused on the threshold, looking up at him. The café lights cast warm shadows across his cheekbones. There was something in his eyes — not hunger, not longing, just... knowing.

“I might,” she said.

And then she stepped into the night, the scent of lemons and salt and something unnamed following her all the way home.