ARROW - 184. Chapter 184

Jean, Roger took Arnaud to see his angel. When he saw it, there were teas in his eyes. “It’s beautiful. I can feel the love in his eyes. Hopefully, the boys will also.”

Armand and Carl did their job and now an angel resides over another orphanage. No one noticed the arrow or bug at the bottom of the painting.

Armand and Carl flew to Madrid. Arriving they were met by Colin, “I have our train tickets. Let’s go, everyone is waiting to see the painting.”

“Carl, did you take a picture?”

“No, I thought you did.”

“I’ll call Jean or Roger and have them take a photo. You’ll have to wait to see it.”

Arriving they were met by Carlo. “Can we see the painting?”

“I’m sorry Carlo we were in such a hurry to get here, we forgot to take a picture. I will ask that our depends there take a picture then I’ll send you a copy.”

Now I was swamped with the boys and girls. “Dad, we are having dinner up the hill.”

“Dad, Pop bought us bathing suits and we were in the ocean.” Everyone had something to say, it was good to be with family.

We stayed with Carlo and his family for an additional three days. I now knew I would need to change our plane reservations.

We took the train to Barcelona. Booking into the same hotel I was surprised they remembered us. The boys wanted to go swimming, and Colin evidently told them about the pool on the roof. The girls weren’t sure about going but Anne Marie told them it would be fun. Colin went to see Alesander so I accompanied everyone to the roof. I was surprised that Richie didn’t get in the pool. “Don’t you want to get in the pool?”

“No, I’ll watch.” I knew who he was watching, Anne Marie. She was playing with the boys, dunking them. The girls were helping her.

We must have stayed there for at least two hours when Colin showed up.

“Everything okay?”

“Yes, we will have lunch there tomorrow. We should get ready for dinner, it’s almost 6.”

And so we started, “Colin, I’m getting hungry. Let’s go and see Marco. I could eat his paella.”

“That is a great idea. But maybe the swimmers aren’t ready to eat.”

“Then Tommy and Pepe picked up on it. Anne Marie said she was getting hungry. Mary Ann and Louise agreed. Colin looked at the boys, he rubbed his belly. That was enough, everyone got out of the pool, dried off, as best as they could, and headed for their rooms to dress for dinner.

We met in the lobby, Richie bought a flower for the girls to wear in their hair. I watched, I wasn’t sure about Louise. Anne Marie handled that brilliantly. She put a flower in May Ann’s hair and looked at Louise to say, you are next. At first, I thought she would say no, but with a look from Anne Maria, she acquiesce and allowed Anne Marie to put a flower in her hair. Now all three ladies had a flower.

Walking to Marco’s the boys made a fuss over the girls. How pretty they looked with flowers in their hair. I knew Tommy started that.

Marco was glad to see us. Again he had to pull the tables together to seat us. “Every time I see you your group keeps getting bigger and bigger. I am guessing you will order paella.”

“Yes, I think your mom makes the best.”

Marko/s brother brought out the wine glasses, and as I suspected everyone had a glass of wine. “I think Marco makes his own wine.”

“No, my dad makes our wine.”

“Whoever makes it, it is an excellent wine.” I watched the boys as they took a sip. Leave it to Toby to act as if he’s drunk from one sip. I watched Louise, she took a sip, and I could see she didn’t like it. Mary Ann took a sip, put her glass down, and moved it away from her plate.

The paella was as good as we remembered it. “This paella is good enough to make us stop here whenever we are traveling in Europe.”

“Don’t we have a copy of his mom’s recipe?”

“Yes, you got it last year.”

“With you and the boys fishing, we should get James to make it.” Colin took out a piece of paper, borrowed a pen from Ritchie, and made a note to himself. I smiled and wondered if James’s paella would be as good as Marco’s mom's.

Walking back to our hotel, the boys were rubbing their bellies. “Did you enjoy your dinner?” What a question.

“Dad, why don’t we have that at home?”

“Maybe we can get James to make it but you will have to go fishing to catch the lobster.”

That wasn’t a chore for the boys. You could tell they were all in favor even Ritchie, Tommy, and Pepe. I just hoped James’ paella comes close to Marco’s mother's.

The following morning we visit the old city. Another history lesson and a tour of the underground road followed by a visit to the museum.

We stopped at the church with the geese and Richie told them about how the church was named. I watched Louise as Richie told the story. It seemed to me something clicked in Louise’s head.

Leaving the old city, we stopped and looked at the La Sagrada Familia church. Richie told them all about the church and its being a National Heritage and what that meant. I think they were taken by what they saw. It is a national wonder.

Checking out of the hotel, we made arrangements for the hotel to hold our luggage. We walked to the wharf where Grandfather’s once had his boat. Ritchie and Tommy told them about fishing from here on an old boat. From there, we walked to Alesander’s place.

Grandfather no longer fished but his boat was still there. Ritchie and Tommy told the boys how they would go out to sea to fish for big tuna, Grandfather had a picture of him catching tuna on his boat. I think the boys wanted to go fishing but not the girls.

Lunch was a seafood medley, with pieces of fish, crab, and lobster all served cold over lettuce with a delicious seafood dressing. “Alesander, your mother has prepared a delicious lunch.”

“Not my mother, my girlfriend. She has created several new dishes with seafood. We also added a few meat dishes for those who don’t like seafood.”

Colin praised him for doing so well. Alesander glowed with pride. Those words from Colin meant a lot to him.

I had booked an early evening flight to Rome, so after lunch and chatting, we headed back to our hotel to pick up our luggage and head to the airport.

The boys were excited about the plane. It was much smaller than the plane we flew to Europe and there was only one class on this flight. I think we took up more than half of the seats. Flying in a small plane is quite different. You can feel every little bump during take-off and landing. I think we had almost the whole plane to ourselves. I counted 7 other passengers as compared to our fourteen.

Landing in Rome always was an exciting time for me. I was coming to my second home. We all followed Tommy and Pepe, you could tell this isn’t the first time they had been in this airport. Going through customs, gathering our luggage, we headed for the taxi stands, We ended up taking four taxis. Richie and Anne Marie took the first one and then we took the other three, four to a taxi.

Arriving in the village, it was very quiet. Richie, Tommy, and Pepe were on their way to the hostel when Geno grabs Richie. “You are late. We expected you four days ago.”

“You need to see Dad, he’ll explain it. We are taking our luggage to the Hostel.”

“I don’t think he heard you. There he goes to the second cab.”

“The other two are just behind that one.” The boys watched as Geno opened the door, and grabbed Armando in a tight hug, quietly followed by Colin.

“Why are you late?”

Before they could answer, the other taxis unloaded their occupants, residents came into the square to welcome Armand and Colin. If it seemed like a welcoming home party. It was, food was put on the table along with bottles of wine. Little Geno was in Armand’s arms while Colton was holding little Angela. Carl was looking for a certain young lady.

Somehow suitcases disappeared to the hostel, and the priest and several nuns came to welcome Armand. What no one knew, Armand had sent money to the priest on the pretense of taking care of Nonna’s and Pepe’s mother’s graves. The church needed painting on the outside and now the church shone in the setting sun, thanks to Armand. It was and still is how the parish could afford to paint the church. If you asked the priest, he would reply, “God answers all prayers.”

In the morning, Armand rebooked all of the flights home. As it turned out, their time in the village lasted almost 4 weeks.

While there, Armand received a message from Ronnie. They won’t be meeting them as Julie got ill from something she ate so they extended their vacAtion one extra week They would see them when they returned from Europe.

The flight home for the boys wasn’t as exciting as the flight to Europe. They were becoming international travelers.