As Sarah served Costas baklava on a blue-flowered plate, he said, “Have you heard? The Italians are out. The Nazis got them. And the destruction is terrible, especially on Corfu. It’s such a shame. Such a crying shame.”

Sarah’s body went rigid. Of course, they’d heard the bomber planes. They’d crouched under the table with their hands over their heads. But she didn’t know the Nazis had won. She’d thought the Italians strong, powerful, capable. But apparently they too had toppled like dominoes.

“They’ve killed all the Italian soldiers. From the generals on down.”

“All…all of them?” Sarah thought of the general she’d helped bargain in the market—how he’d given her strawberries to take home to her family.

“Yes. The Nazis are here too, you know.”

“Here?” Sarah whispered.

“Yes, they’ve got all our Ionian islands now.” Costas shook his head. Over the yammer of her heart, Sarah noticed how his hair should have moved but didn’t because it was so shellacked into place. “But their main objective is the Jews, and as you know, no Jews reside on Lefkada. I fear for the Jews of Corfu. I fear for them deeply.”

“For the Jews of Corfu?” Sarah didn’t feel her tongue form the words, but she heard them emit from her mouth.

“Yes. They’ve made all the Jews in Corfu register. Nothing good comes from that, I tell you. Why do the Nazis need a registry? To invite the Jews to a party? No, it’s a sinister thing, a list. Mark my words. I wish there was something we could do. I just need to do something.” He lowered his voice. “Stop these German animals. It reminds me how powerless we are, this thing called war. Don’t you think, Sarah? I mean, tell me, have you ever felt so powerless?”

And somehow Sarah’s head managed a small shake in reply, because it was quite true that she hadn’t.

Chapter Twenty

Joey

Florida
2019

In her thirty-four years, Joey had attended many bridal showers, but none had involved barefoot guests sitting on poufs on the floor. And to Joey’s knowledge at least, none had been hosted by the bride’s mother who’d been recently exposed as a lying adulteress.

“Joey loves Indian food,” her mother was explaining into a microphone to the thirty or so guests who had gathered to shower her.

“I also love sushi,” Joey whispered to her best friend of over twenty years, Siya, who occupied a yellow pouf to her right. “I mean, I do like Indian food. I like your mom’s, obviously.”

“My mom’s rasmalai is better,” said Siya as she ate the dessert on which she and Joey had grown up, made of ricotta cheese soaked in condensed milk and flavored with pistachio nuts and saffron. “Or it used to be.”