The View From Lake Como

Angelo moved to Milan a month ago, and he invites Jess and Laura to visit. Jess decides to be spontaneous and agrees to go. They take a train, and Laura has worn herself out, just like Phil, so she sleeps while Jess nurses her guilt at not being home for Christmas to be her family’s “workhorse.” She usually does the tree, the shopping, the gift-wrapping, and the cookies. Jess considers sending a card, but she is serious about changing things, and she doesn’t want to fall back into old patterns. Conor texts to tell her that Googs was sentenced to two years in prison. She came to Italy for a “better life,” and she doesn’t want to crawl back into her parents’ cellar ever again.

When Laura wakes up, they talk about Angelo. Laura tells Jess that she had multiple pregnancy losses prior to delivering Angelo, and Jess admits that she, too, lost a pregnancy. Jess says it destroyed her, even though it was so early in the pregnancy, and she never told her mother or sister about it. She didn’t even get to tell Bobby she was pregnant before the pregnancy loss occurred. He was understanding, but he didn’t know how to help Jess.