Part 4
Questions 16-20
Five sentences have been removed from the text below. For each question, choose the correct answer (A-H). There are three extra sentences which you do not need to use.
Unpacking Memories
My aunt Rosa never talked much about her past. She was a warm and generous person, but there were certain subjects she would gently steer the conversation away from. One of those subjects was the years she spent living abroad as a young woman. 16 . She just preferred to focus on the present.
Last winter, my aunt’s health began to decline, and she moved into a smaller flat. My mother and I offered to clear out the old house. The attic was the last room we tackled. It was full of dusty boxes, old clothes, and furniture that had not been used for decades. 17 . It was tucked behind a stack of paintings my aunt had done years ago.
We pulled the suitcase into the light and opened it. Inside, there was no jewellery or money. Instead, we found letters, dozens of them, all written in Italian and tied together with a blue ribbon. There were also black-and-white photographs of a young woman standing outside a café, a small notebook filled with handwritten recipes, and a scarf made of pale yellow silk. 18 . She said my aunt had never mentioned a single detail about this part of her life to anyone in the family.
I took the letters home with me. My Italian is not perfect, but with some patience and a dictionary, I began to piece together a story. The letters were from someone called Luca. He wrote about the weather in Rome, about his job in a bookshop, and about how much he missed the person he was writing to. 19 . They were full of affection and everyday details that felt strangely intimate to read.
I never got the chance to ask my aunt about Luca. She passed away a few weeks after we found the suitcase. But I think about those letters often. They reminded me that the people we love sometimes have whole chapters of their lives that we know nothing about. 20 .
A. My mother was as surprised as I was.
B. That does not mean those chapters did not matter.
C. I asked her directly once, and she changed the topic almost immediately.
D. They were not dramatic letters, and there were no great secrets in them.
E. The suitcase itself was old and made of brown leather, with brass locks that had gone green.
F. I had always imagined my aunt as someone who had never left our town, so this was hard to believe.
G. Right at the back, under an old blanket, I spotted a small brown suitcase.
H. My mother thought we should throw the letters away, but I refused.
For this task: Answers with explanations :: Vocabulary
