Opening
In these final chapters, Howard Mercer tells Lina Emerson the whole truth about Hadley Emerson, closing the loop on a summer shaped by Secrets and Truth. As revelations turn pain into clarity, Lina and Howard choose each other as family, and Lina fights for love—testing whether connection survives jealousy, pride, and misunderstanding—ultimately defining The Nature of Family by choice. She also faces her feelings for Lorenzo "Ren" Ferrara, risking heartbreak to claim her future.
What Happens
Chapter 26: One Day with Hadley
Howard finishes the journal and sits with Lina on the porch swing, ready to untangle the past. He explains that he never dates Adrienne; it is Matteo Rossi who cheats on Hadley with students. The cryptic story about the bull and the baker, he admits, is his clumsy attempt to warn Hadley about Matteo’s infidelity. The night Hadley catches Howard and Adrienne arguing, he is pushing Adrienne to tell Hadley the truth.
Seeing Hadley spiral into self-blame, Howard calls Matteo and threatens to expose his affairs unless he backs off. Matteo breaks up with Hadley anyway, and Howard reports him to the school—Matteo is dismissed. Howard and Hadley grow close after the devastation, sharing a brief romance the next summer. When she suddenly leaves him, he only later understands why: she is pregnant with Lina and refuses to ask him to abandon his life’s work to raise a child that isn’t his. “One day with Hadley,” Howard says, “was easily worth a lifetime in Italy.”
The confession steadies Lina and Howard’s bond. Howard reveals that the porcellino story is his way of saying he wants to be Lina’s family, no matter how odd their origin story. Lina accepts, choosing love over biology and cementing a new family. With their relationship settled, Howard gently urges her to sort things out with Ren.
Chapter 27: The Dress
Spurred by Howard’s encouragement, Lina decides to fight for Ren. He rejects her calls and, when she phones his house, brushes her off—he’s busy getting ready for a party. Lina seizes the opening: she’ll go to the party and tell him the truth. She needs “The Dress,” a transformational moment mirroring the one in Hadley’s journal, so she enlists Howard and a reluctant Sonia for a high-speed shopping mission into Florence, a scene that pulses with Love and Romance.
In the car, Lina blurts out that she’s in love with Ren. The confession snaps the team into action. After a montage of disastrous outfits, a shopkeeper—the “dress genie”—produces a pinkish‑nude lace dress that makes Lina feel like the clearest, bravest version of herself. The errand doubles as a family-bonding rite: Lina, Howard, and Sonia gel around a shared goal and a shared heart.
Dressed and dazzling, Lina heads to the lavish villa party with Thomas in a convertible, but glamour can’t distract her. Her friend Elena pulls her aside: Ren has broken up with his girlfriend, Mimi—supposedly for Lina. Hope floods in. Lina scans the crowd, determined to find him.
Chapter 28: La Notte Più Bella
The party glitters—hundreds of paper lanterns drift into the night—but Ren is nowhere. Thomas, drunk and oblivious, leans in to kiss Lina. She pushes him away and says the thing out loud: she cares about Ren. In a sharp twist, Thomas points out that Ren is standing nearby—and has seen everything. The confrontation curdles instantly, and Mimi’s presence makes it worse.
Lina and Ren retreat to a bench as fireworks begin. Lina pours out the apology and the truth, but Ren, raw and jealous from what he thinks he saw, hears only betrayal. Their misreadings collide. Accusations fly. Ren storms off. Lina, furious and heartbroken, shouts “Stronzo!” as a heart-shaped firework bursts overhead. She calls Howard for a ride; over gelato, he comforts her and shares that he and Hadley had quietly reconnected by email before she died, a quiet testament to Grief and Healing and to love that persists.
Deep in the night, coins tap Lina’s window. Ren stands below with a peace offering: a still-warm cornetta con Nutella from a secret bakery. He apologizes—he was jealous, he misread Thomas, he’s scared of losing her. They untangle the misunderstanding and admit they “maybe love” each other. Their first real kiss seals it. On the grass beneath a sky that finally matches her mood, Lina tells Ren she’s staying in Florence, completing her arc of Identity and Self-Discovery.
Character Development
These chapters close emotional loops and push each character into chosen, adult commitments.
- Lina Emerson: Moves from grief-dodging to agency. She accepts Howard as family, claims her feelings for Ren in public, and chooses Florence as home.
- Howard Mercer: Sheds mystery for radical honesty. He acts as protector in the past and present, offers unconditional love, and reframes family by devotion rather than blood.
- Lorenzo “Ren” Ferrara: Shows vulnerability beneath charm. Jealousy exposes fear, but his midnight apology and pastry-in-hand gesture prove he’s willing to grow, risk, and repair.
Themes & Symbols
Secrets and truth become liberating rather than destructive. Howard’s full account reframes Hadley’s story, releasing Lina from inherited shame and half-told narratives. Once the past is clarified, Lina can choose her present without suspicion or second-guessing, and Howard can love her openly as his daughter-by-choice.
The romance follows a classic arc—pursuit, misunderstanding, rupture, reconciliation—yet grounds itself in earned intimacy. “The Dress” functions as a talisman that connects Lina’s path to Hadley’s while allowing Lina to write a different ending: where Hadley lets love go for Lina’s sake, Lina holds love and family together. Food becomes communion and apology; the cornetta con Nutella turns a cliché window scene into something distinctly Florentine, bonding Lina and Ren through taste, place, and care.
Key Quotes
“One day with Hadley was easily worth a lifetime in Italy.”
Howard’s line captures the depth and durability of his love, while confessing the scale of his sacrifice. It reframes his life’s choices and confirms for Lina that his devotion includes her—he measures worth by people, not geography or prestige.
“Stronzo!”
Lina’s shouted insult is a pressure valve—anger, grief, and longing spill out in one raw word. The heart-shaped firework exploding at the same instant sharpens the irony: a picture-perfect symbol of love detonates just as love fractures from miscommunication.
“We ‘maybe love’ each other.”
The hedged phrasing makes vulnerability possible. Neither Lina nor Ren is fully ready to proclaim certainty, but both step across fear into commitment; the “maybe” is less doubt than a bridge from teenage bravado to honest tenderness.
“The Dress.”
Naming the outfit elevates it from clothing to symbol. It threads Lina’s story to Hadley’s, transforming a romantic wish into a successful rite of passage where courage and self-knowledge—not just appearance—win the day.
Why This Matters and Section Significance
These chapters deliver the novel’s climax and resolution: the mystery of Lina’s parentage settles, the past stops dictating the present, and love becomes a choice acted upon, not a force suffered. The emotional low of the party—jealousy, public embarrassment, the wrong kiss—makes the midnight reconciliation feel earned. By the end, the cemetery and Florence, once sites of grief and dislocation, turn into home. Lina emerges with a clear identity, a chosen family with Howard, and a partnership with Ren anchored in honesty and repair—the “gelato” sweetness promised by the title finally matched by substance.