Joseph was hoping that she would invite him in after he delivered Anna's purse to her, but she did not. He drove home depressed and agonized. Was it his look, age, or bald head that made this strange woman not to show even a little interest? To think of it, he always had bad luck with women. Had he known Anna's past life, perhaps he would find a little hope in his resilient and persuasive mind. He was a man that never gave up. But how could he know about this woman that had captured him on the first sight. Even though, before leaving his house, he had planned to work on his book, he felt so heavy- hearted to do anything when he got home.
He, a successful, educated, self-made man, who had survived two disastrous divorces, felt a poisonous knot in his throat. This woman was different; somehow he knew it. she seemed and looked different. The aura around her made him to believe that she had suffered a lot just as he had. Suddenly he thought: "Why did she lie about her nationality?" But quickly he recalled that her Italian grandparents had told him about the time of the prejudice against Italian, when Italy and Germany were allies in the war. As a child he had witnessed many of those. It bothered him a lot because he loved his grandparents beyond measure. While his parents were busy to take care of their drug store, it was his Italian grandparents who had taken care of him, and introduced him to all those magnificent Italian food. They did not speak English at home. His grandmother refused to learn English; she did not have to. There were many Italian immigrants in Troy, New York, who ran all kind of stores. She never bought anything from anyone but Italians. Joseph, being the only child, had learned to entertain himself; however his best friends were their house cats. He grew up with all those cats and gradually became an absolute cat lover. He understood their language and they understood his.
Even though his mother and grandmother never got along, they both endured each other for the sake of his father and grandfather. After his grandfather's last heart attack, his father being their only son, asked his parents to move in with them. That move enabled his mother to help more at their drug store because she knew her in-laws would take care of her only son, Joseph.
Joseph always identified with his Italian side of family more than his British side. Carrying an Italian last name aroused questions throughout his school years. "Are you Italian?" First he would answer no and insist that he was born right there in Troy and that even his parents were from America. But gradually he began to believe he was Italian. When his first wife once asked him to change his name, he confidently said: "No, I am proud of my name. I am going to make it with this name." And he did. Even though right after graduating from Pharmacy College he was drafted to the army, which cost him some years of delay, he slowly continued his education and finally got his Ph.D. Nonetheless getting his Ph.D. cost his marriage. His wife could not stand his studying. She used to tell him: "You have your head in books all the times." But he had his eyes on one spot which was finishing his education and becoming a teacher and a writer.
His second marriage ended in a divorce after two years because Shanda could not stand his staying in the study and writing for hours. At the beginning marrying a professor and writer sounded exciting; however, later it was boring.
Joseph finally came to the conclusion to forget about marriage. nevertheless, he was a man that needed woman not only for closeness but for warmth and companionship. He did not like dating because it interfered with his writing; but not having a woman inconvenienced his writing, too.
*
After two weeks of continuous call of Joseph, Anna, at last, accepted his invitation. Going to a nice club and dance sounded exciting to her. Besides Melisa, her therapist, insisted on her accepting the date.
*
The beautiful, sunny bedroom was changed to a dreadful, horrible hole. In that dark abyss, they were joined till death by a bond that was more solid than love; a common prick of conscience. The suffering of these two people were for different reason; but even the clash of their reckoning, somehow in the middle, where the strength of the enlightened the powerlessness of the other, came together and became one, a similar and joint woe. They both wondered in fright how they had gotten to that abyss of desertion.
Furthermore, more than anything else, it was the exhaustion and endless weariness that brought both, in different condition, to the same state of mind, desperation, a pure hopelessness for a decision, an ultimate one to make. To comply with Joseph's wish, Anna began one of her first cry.
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