Luca

Luca, the two-year-old son of Rob and Leah and nephew of Marco, is a lively presence whose unruly energy brings both comedy and tenderness to the family scenes. First mistaken by Maggie for Marco’s son, he is instead the child through whom she notices Marco’s instinctive attentiveness; later, his baptism and exuberant play in the snow place him at the heart of the family’s Christmas gathering.

Identity and Introduction

Luca is described as a chubby-faced child with deep brown curls, about two years old and very much at the stage of running, falling over, or sleeping. Maggie’s wry description of him as a handful captures the gap between a toddler’s ordinary energy and the exhausting possibilities imagined by adults watching from the school gate. The book makes that energy concrete: Luca moves between playground equipment, and his falls and sudden dashes require an adult close by.

When Maggie first sees him in an Oxford playground on a grey, frosty day in early December, she assumes that the handsome man keeping pace with him is his father. Luca’s name, spoken by the man in an American accent, adds to the scene’s glamour in Maggie’s eyes. Her first impression of Luca is inseparable from the care around him: the man stays near enough to catch him, brush mud from his jeans, and swing him around until the child’s laughter spreads to those nearby. That man is Marco, Luca’s uncle, not his father.

Marco’s Care and Luca’s Family

Luca’s relationship with Marco is marked by practical, playful attentiveness. At Maggie’s home, Luca approaches a small Christmas tree decorated with white silk and taffeta, its ornaments dusted with glitter. His hands are grubby from a chocolatey treat, and Marco gently but firmly steers him away before he can touch the decorations. The moment echoes the watchfulness Maggie had seen at the playground: Marco lets Luca play, but is ready to intervene when needed. His joking warning that Luca must be decontaminated before approaching the tree turns ordinary supervision into a comic exchange.

Leah describes Luca as a happy accident and, with amused conviction, calls him the most adorable little boy in the world. When Maggie’s call interrupts the family’s plans to return to Scotland, Luca is left in Marco’s flat under the care of the landlady. Leah says that Luca regards the woman as nearly as bad as Cruella de Vil; the landlady has looked after him before, but Leah had to invoke ambulances and emergency operations to persuade her to do it again. The episode supplies a brief glimpse of Luca’s opinions and of the practical complications of caring for a small child, without displacing the affection with which his parents talk about him.

The Christening

At Luca’s christening, a tiny chapel is crowded with Rob and Leah’s friends and family. Leah holds Luca’s pudgy hand beside the font, anticipating his desire to bolt. The service soon confirms her concern: when the priest reaches for him, Luca pulls free, his suited body ready to dash down the aisle. Rob, evidently familiar with the chase, catches him and whispers to him until he settles, though Luca keeps a surly expression and leans toward the priest as if he might bite.

The baptism turns that resistance into a comic sequence. The priest trickles water over Luca’s curly dark head, and Luca protests by calling him a bad man and objecting to being wet. At the next sprinkling, his scream nearly shatters the stained glass; at the final one, he attempts to bite the priest, who snatches his fingers away in time. Maggie suspects this is not the first such attempt. She suppresses her laughter, as does Dorothea, Rob and Marco’s elegant mother, while Marco gives Maggie a wink as the family returns to its seats on his crutches. The scene makes Luca’s wilfulness part of the occasion rather than an interruption that can be tidied away: the ceremony proceeds, but unmistakably on toddler terms.

Marco is Luca’s godfather, and Morag, the owner of the holiday cottage where Rob and Leah first met, is his godmother. The setting joins Luca’s family role to the place associated with his parents’ beginnings. The ceremony takes place on Christmas Eve in Scotland, amid snow, as a gathering that is both a religious rite and a family occasion.

Luca at Christmas

Later, Luca is among the children who turn Marco into the target of a snowball assault. Sitting on a car bonnet and waving his crutches like toy machine guns, Marco faces Luca and several other children as they advance, throw snowballs, and squeal with delight when they hit him. His hat is soaked and plastered to his head, yet he looks as happy as the children around him. Luca’s play helps make visible how naturally Marco belongs among them: the uncle who once chased, caught, and entertained him now joins the children’s game despite his crutches.

Watching from inside, Maggie sees Marco at home among screaming children and thinks of the children she cannot give him. Luca is therefore more than a source of family comedy. His presence connects Marco’s care for his nephew with Maggie’s fear that infertility makes her unable to offer Marco the future he deserves. The book does not give Luca responsibility for that conflict; instead, his ordinary place in the family—held by Leah, caught by Rob, cared for by Marco, and welcomed into the Christmas gathering—makes the contrast in Maggie’s thoughts especially sharp.