Work in Progress

In Chapter Two of ‘Work in Progress’, Chloë has gone on vacation with a relatively new boyfriend, Eddie. On the beach waiting for him to join her, she remembers another beach and her first real love, Luca.

Carm di Angelo hummed a bit of The Eagles’ song, ‘Take It Easy’ as she turned off the Open sign in the window. The neon sputtered a bit before taking its leave. “Need to get a new one,” she thought.

Take It Easy. Exactly. That’s what she was hoping to do. If she could clear all the tables, count the receipts and put the place back in order quickly, she might just have time to sit and relax when she got home.

It wasn’t a long trip. The di Angelo s lived in the house next to their Italian restaurant. Mr. di Angelo – Luigi, Gino for short – had bought the restaurant two years after the family had moved into the house. It had been a homestyle cooking diner that the di Angelos often frequented. When the owner had mentioned to Gino that he was putting the business up for sale, Mr. di Angelo rushed to tell Mrs. di Angelo the good news. He had worked in a restaurant for years before he and Carm emigrated from Florence to Canada. This was just the opportunity Gino wanted and, after telling his wife what he was planning, he booked an appointment with the bank manager to discuss a business loan.

Carm was horrified. After her children were old enough to care for themselves, she had found herself a plum job as a buyer for an upscale clothing store, whose assistant manager was highly impressed with the experience she’d acquired in selling high-end dresses and suits at L’Adoro in Florence. She had only worked there a bit more than a year when the family’s financial situation in Italy began to look bleak. Gino had a cousin in Oshawa, near Toronto and contacted him to help with immigration plans. Enzo worked in the city’s large auto plant and assured Gino there would be work aplenty for him should the family move to Canada.

In a matter of months, Gino and Carm had packed up their three children – all under 6 – and their belongings, and made the trip to Ontario. Carm had been less than enthusiastic about the idea of emigrating from the country she loved, but her parents were dead and her siblings had long ago emigrated to the UK and Australia, so there weren’t really any ties holding her in Italy. Somewhat reluctantly she agreed to the move on the condition that, if they weren’t financially stable and happy in five years, they would return to Florence.

The family did well in Canada, and were able to send their children to university. Gino’s job was a mundane one, but paid well, and Carm had been a full-time mother to her three little ones. They were happy, and had made plenty of friends through Enzo and his family so, contentedly, they put down roots in their new country.

Carm eventually made the transition to a full-time job outside the home, where she settled in and was already in line for a promotion. Because Gino worked shifts, the couple often missed each other when their work hours overlapped. It wasn’t a perfect situation but they made it work, and were about to celebrate their 15th year in Oshawa.

But Gino was restless. His job was anything but stimulating and he missed working in the dining and entertainment environment. When the family moved into the house beside the diner, he had already planned that, should the opportunity arise, he and Carm would buy the business and he would cook his way to a successful Italian restaurant.

He neglected to tell Carm about his plans. There would be lots of time for that. It wasn’t like the diner was failing. It was a popular spot for families and young people who wanted to eat well but inexpensively, and it became a go-to eatery for many residents of Oshawa. Gino quickly befriended the owner and made himself available for cooking or greeting at the restaurant should staff be unable to make their shifts.

It was one of Gino’s most exciting days in Canada or, indeed, Italy before that when Dave Collins, the restaurant owner, told him he was going to put the diner up for sale. Gino was overjoyed and couldn’t wait to tell Carm the good news. Sadly, he hadn’t prepared her for this stroke of luck as he saw it.

Carm was livid. She had no intentions of slaving away in a restaurant, with hours of opening from the tip of the day to well into the night. And she was not about to leave a job she loved where she stood in line for imminent promotion. To say Gino was deflated would be an understatement. To him, owning an Italian restaurant was just the thing to hark back to the country they loved and he was confident in both his chef and business management skills. He had brought them to Canada with him, and wanted to put them to work.

After a few weeks of bickering and comparing how each saw the future, Carm decided that a family business – though a risky venture – if successful, could truly benefit not only them but their children and grandchildren. Over a third glass of Prosecco Franciacorta, she finally relented but, just as she’d demanded conditions in their move to Canada, so she wanted assurance that, if the business became too much for them to manage or didn’t achieve sufficient success in the first five years, they’d sell it and return to the lives with which they were familiar.

Ristorante di Angelo opened three months later. It was harder work than Gino had imagined, but his family were all involved in some way, so the load was more or less shared. The di Angelo children were proud of their heritage and fully believed that in the restaurant was the soul of generations past.

Gino was the sole chef in the early days. Carm looked after the bookkeeping and accounts, and the three kids waited tables and helped with dishwashing when their regular staff missed a shift. Income was sporadic at the beginning, worrying Carm who wondered how they’d ever pay off the business loan from the bank. Six months in, however, the restaurant began to turn a profit, one that grew as word of Ristorante di Angelo and its exceptional Italian cooking filtered to the community. Gino was able to hire both a full-time and a part-time cook to give him some time off, and getting wait staff was easy since the restaurant was well-known for the good tips they’d earn.

Of the three children, Enzo was the least keen on involving himself with the business. As soon as he turned 16, he got a part-time job at the auto plant his father had left. It was very good money, especially for a young first-time employee, and his hours didn’t conflict with either school or the time he allocated to helping in the restaurant. He was an excellent student, with grades nearly the highest in his class, so his new job didn’t interfere with his academic performance.

Like his siblings before him, Enzo sailed through the university admission process and was accepted in all, but chose one that had a full-fledged champion soccer team. He’d had to abandon the sport when work and school took up virtually all of his time but, now, he would be right on campus and close to the soccer field. He didn’t worry too much about what first-year courses he would take. He had his usual confidence that he’d excel whatever route he took.

With all her children in university, and their sights set on future success, Carm had achieved what she’d worked toward for so many years. Their success was her success, and she believed herself fortunate to have such hardworking and diligent children. Francesca and Leo had their sights set on typically lucrative professions. Francesca was in her first year of medical school and Leo was set to take the bar exam in a few months. Luca had yet to decide on a major, but had all of first year to sample the various disciplines that interested him.

Carm was happy for all of them and, as Gino had predicted, their investment in the restaurant was sufficiently profitable not only to put their children through higher education, but to live a comfortable life. They wanted for nothing. And though none of her children were even close to settling down, Carm began to fantasize about the day she would become a grandmother.