The Olive Grove is dedicated to my wonderful husband, who encourages my incorrigibly dirty mind.

"There is a serene and settled majesty to woodland scenerythat enters into the soul and delights and elevates it, and fills it with noble inclinations." —Washington Irving

Giovanna had been named after her grandmother, a woman whose pasta puttanesca was said to have ensnared her grandfather Eliseo after just one bite. Her name, long since shortened to Gia, and her predilection for Italian food were the only things truly Italian about her.

As a child, sitting at the dinner table with her sisters, Gia rolled her eyes every time the legendary love story of her grandparents came up. They had met during the olive harvest. He was from Rome and she was from the small hill town of Tivoli—an easy conquest, or so her grandfather thought. Nonna Giovanna saw through Eliseo's rambling ways and gave him the run-around for several years. Desperate, Eliseo would stand in the middle of the piazza, guitar in hand, and sing into the late hours of the night, begging for a chance. His voice was so terrible, the story went, that soon the entire neighborhood was pleading with nonna Giovanna to marry him just to shut him up.

It wasn't until Gia grew up that she could appreciate their story. Whether it was a tall tale or the truth, no one knew for certain, but it was the kind of feel-good yarn that inspired a wistful sigh.

At nearly thirty, Gia had yet to successfully cook pasta al dente or score a relationship that lasted for more than a few months. Striking romantic gold akin to her grandparents was seeming more and more like a fantasy. She whiled away evenings at speed-dating marathons and New Age tantric sex courses for singles. Fifteen accounts on various online dating sites had only yielded a string of men with foot fetishes, mamma's boys or divorcées looking for women half their age. In short, Gia was unlucky.

She had gone to several meditative workshops and had taken up yoga in hopes of unwinding the knot of tension in her belly but nothing had worked. Sex seemed to do the job except Gia despised one-night stands and the awkwardness that followed.

Unlike nonna, Gia lacked the olive skin and the raven tresses so prevalent in the Italian side of the family. She wasn't statuesque nor did she take after her mother, whose seductive, hazel eyes could stop a man in his tracks. Gia took after her father, a Brit, whose genetic gifts included hair the color of washed-out wheat and a pale complexion that burned easily. Curvy and slightly plump, Gia was always envious of the lithe and svelte physiques of her fellow New Yorkers. It didn't help that she worked in the fashion industry—a virtual smorgasbord of emaciated women.

Gia had always been curious about her heritage, but the trip to Italy had been an impulsive decision. It was amazing what folly an inbox of screaming clients and years of corporate enslavement could inspire.

In an unaccustomed display of self-assurance, armed with a pitiful Italian vocabulary comprised of buon giorno, arrivederci and a handful of colorful curses, Gia booked seven nights in Rome and three in Tivoli. The booking process occupied the whole morning. After maxing out three credit cards, she felt strangely elated, as if a weight had been lifted from her shoulders.

A smirk curled her lips as she mulled over the possibilities. Scenes of hot-blooded Italian men armed with accordions, wild sexual escapades in the dark corners of St. Peter's followed by quick getaways on Vespas elicited an incredulous chuckle. Who was she kidding? If she was lucky, she'd get her ass pinched by some toothless old man in a pizzeria.

In spite of her exhaustive plans, as the day of departure neared, Gia was beset by nerves. Her ten-day trip to Italy might as well have been to the moon. She packed three huge suitcases only to realize she could barely manage one. Finally, she settled on the smallest of the bags and a backpack where she could store essentials in case her luggage was lost. She liked redundancy, security and preparedness and somehow managed to stuff half her medicine cabinet in an already-bulging suitcase.

Before boarding the plane she crossed herself and said a Hail Mary asking nonna to watch over her. Sure enough, her overnight flight was uneventful. In fact, the majority of her stay in Rome was uneventful—something she came to resent. Her loose itinerary had unfolded without a hitch. People were friendly and most spoke English. She had no trouble navigating Rome and within a couple of days had settled into a delightful routine: breakfast at the rooftop terrace of Hotel Mozart, a short stroll past the Babuino on her way to the Spanish Steps or a quick left or right on Via Condotti. She hadn't bothered with the metro, choosing to explore the city on foot.

Along the way, she had befriended a few tourists and developed a crush on Valentino, a Vatican Museum guide who ushered her through thousands of years of history in forty-five minutes, but none had offered romantic possibility. While Valentino had doted on her questions, suggestively grazed against her, smiling and flirting, there had been a definite wedding band on his finger. The universe, of late, was proving to have a quite a sense of humor. Valentino! No one that good-looking, named after the god of love, should be married!

The Eternal City offered more than the meager seven days allowed. To compensate, Gia spent days checking off must-see sights from her never-ending list of tourist attractions. In the evening, she returned to the hotel exhausted. It was a good kind of tiredness, the type that beckoned her to a hearty meal in the rooftop terrace followed by curled, peaceful slumber in the cramped coziness of her room. By the fifth day, she had toured the splendors of Trevi, the Pantheon, Navona, the Capitoline, Borghese, the Vatican and even made her way to obscure corners like Caracalla and La Boca della Verita. It was a rigorous schedule that left her very little time for eating, shopping or relaxing.

On the day of departure, Gia was so tired she overslept and missed the first bus to Tivoli. Relegated to the Hotel Lobby for two long hours, she took the time to plan the last three days of her journey. Seventeen miles away, Tivoli was a renowned retreat from the harried life of Rome. Popes and emperors had built fantastic gardens and sprawling villas, all of which wound up on Gia's ambitious agenda. With corporate efficiency, Gia plotted her itinerary, making sure to include savory places to eat and ample time to visit her grandmother's ancestral home.

Tivoli unfolded before her like a dream and the awful, winding traffic leading up to its summit—a nightmare. What should have taken half an hour stretched into a grueling two-hour commute. Contrary to her pep talk, Gia arrived drained. Upon check-in, she settled for a walk around the town, stopping briefly at the house where her grandmother had lived.

The ancestral home was dilapidated and in serious need of attention. A desiccated garden barred by a lopsided gate faced the small piazza where Gia imagined her grandfather had embarrassed himself long ago. The home was still in her family's name but no one had lived in it for a generation. Even the old caretakers had moved on, leaving behind an impersonal real estate agent responsible for running the heat in the winter.

The creaky gate gave way to a short, cobbled path. The stucco had cracked and fallen from the walls. Gripped by sadness, Gia neared the entryway, approaching as one would a shrine. Above her head, a balcony jutted from the masonry—still regal in its decay. A peek through grimy panes revealed the entrails of what was once a happy home, brimming with laughter and love. Gia had come to Italy hoping to find the joy of her heritage but as she looked at the ramshackle remains of her grandmother's home there was no joy—only regret. No one in her family had taken any interest in the home and soon there would be nothing left.

She walked away with a new weight on her shoulders. As the gate closed behind her, Gia knew that she would return. Somehow, some day she would right the wrong. She would find the paperwork and—. The thought was cut short by the impossibility of the task. Gia smiled, taking a look at the home one last time, realizing that she was kidding herself. Under the Tuscan Sun was a fiction—people didn't really move across the world on a whim to fix up old houses. Or did they?

The growl in her stomach was the only answer to be had. Gia was useless on an empty stomach. A short walk resulted in a lovely bistro overlooking terraced olive groves and a decent bottle of Frascati Superiore. The alcohol muted the loneliness and the thoughts that clamored for attention. Illusions of bathing in fountains, restoring old homes, falling in love and living La Dolce Vita coalesced splendidly into a dark mood. In the evening, Gia wandered the old town, indulging her blues in the winding, cobbled streets. It was the first time during her trip that Gia had slowed down and she was unsure it was a good idea. The next few days, she vowed, would be decidedly different. She would take her time, linger and enjoy–shake the gloom.

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-Narcisse Navarre