Chapter Fifteen
While the van pulled up outside our hotel, I fished around in my pocket for a twenty-euro note to give to Gino.
I knew that tour guides were really badly paid and that it was the tips that bumped up their salary and made it halfway decent.
I was pretty sure that Rosamund wouldn’t see it like this – I’d heard her berating Nick for being overly generous in the restaurant the other night.
Don’t over-tip, Nick. They’re only doing their job.
I’d spoken up for once, had told her that the waiting staff were probably only on minimum wage, which in a city like Florence wouldn’t get them very far.
Rosamund had bristled, not having any of it.
She’d even insinuated we’d all had to struggle.
I’d like to know exactly when in her life she had struggled financially but thought I’d be pushing it to ask because clearly she wouldn’t have an actual answer.
I handed Gino my tip, and I saw Aidan do the same.
Gino had spent the whole day with us and had given us loads of info we couldn’t have found in our Rough Guides.
He deserved a token of our thanks if you asked me.
Perhaps I should give the others the benefit of the doubt: after all, Aidan and I were both in the travel industry; I supposed we knew how things worked. But, then again, wasn’t it obvious?
‘Thank you for being such wonderful guests on our tour,’ gushed Gino. I could see he was chomping to get the van back so that he could keep to his precious schedule. He checked his watch.
‘We’ll let you go, Gino,’ I said. ‘And thanks again.’
We waved him off and then Aidan turned to Rosamund and Peter.
‘And very pleasant spending the afternoon with you all,’ he said. ‘I’m sure I’ll see you around the hotel.’
‘Oooh, hope so,’ smouldered Sophia.
‘Don’t forget to friend me on Facebook, will you?’ asked Rosamund, thinking she was down with the kids but not realising that kids wouldn’t be seen dead on Facebook these days. ‘Rosamund Leveson-Gower. I shouldn’t be too difficult to find.’
Aidan smiled kindly. ‘Got it.’
He glanced quickly at me and then set off down Via Tornabuoni. When I caught myself and looked away, Rosamund and the others were already halfway inside the lobby. I ran to catch them up.
As if we hadn’t had enough already, Peter insisted on buying us all a glass of Chianti Classico in the hotel bar.
I desperately wanted to go up to my room, take a shower, give myself space to think.
I imagined Aidan, standing on the bridge.
What was it he was planning to say? Might it be better to know, so that I could finally get some kind of closure on the whole thing?
‘Are you all right, darling?’ asked Nick, patting my knee.
‘Fine,’ I said, smiling at him. ‘I think I might just have a glass of water, actually.’ I poured myself some from a jug.
Luckily, Peter was dominating the conversation with a running commentary of the wine-tasting tour involving him discussing the merits (or not) of every single wine we’d tried.
He even had his tasting notes sheet out.
It made me think of Aidan and I suddenly wanted to ask him whether he’d helped me on purpose.
Perhaps he’d just been doodling bananas.
Either way, I thought that maybe he was right: we needed to talk.
Very briefly. It might feel better once we’d had it out, so to speak.
‘The weather’s lovely this afternoon,’ I said, not quite believing what was coming out of my mouth. ‘I’m just going to grab a little bit more footage and then I’ll have enough to send over to Tim and I can forget about work for the rest of the trip.’
Nick was the only one to acknowledge me. Daisy was glowering at her phone in the corner, and Rosamund and Sophia were seemingly enraptured by Peter’s self-indulgent monologue on Tuscan wines.
‘Again?’ said Nick.
‘I won’t be long,’ I assured him.
That part was true, at least. If I did – and it was a big if – swing past the Ponte Santa Trinita, then it would be for a matter of minutes.
Aidan could tell me why he’d disappeared off the face of the earth two years ago and I could tell him he could go to hell with his poor excuses and I’d walk away from him cleansed and free of the memories of the time we’d spent together that popped into my mind sometimes at the most inopportune moments.
Like when I was lying in bed next to Nick.
Or sitting at my computer at work. Or squished on the tube at rush hour.
Actually, myriad places, if I thought about it.
I stood up, looping my camera around my neck to make a point. I was actually going to shoot some footage, because otherwise it would make me a liar, which I’d always prided myself on not being.
‘See you in a bit, everyone,’ I said. ‘Just popping out for a sec. Work stuff, you know.’
Rosamund and Sophia mumbled a goodbye, but Peter was not to be interrupted.
I headed for the door, glancing over my shoulder and noticing that Sophia had moved into my seat as quick as lightning.
‘Everything all right?’ I heard her coo to Nick.
As I headed in the direction of the Ponte Santa Trinita with the scorching sun still high in the sky, I rubbed the back of my neck, realising I’d forgotten to put sunscreen on that morning.
Sometimes it was difficult to remember unless I was physically sitting on a beach ‘sunbathing’ for hours on end.
I’d always felt slightly removed from my friends when we’d been on those sorts of beach holidays, to Majorca or Corfu or Ayia Napa – when we were in our early twenties.
Sunbathe, swim, get drunk, dance and repeat.
I’d wanted to be like them, mithering about getting a tan and whether or not they’d burned.
Moving down from a factor 15 to a 5 as the holiday went on.
One of them using carrot oil and wondering why she’d come up in blisters a few hours later.
I hadn’t wanted sunburn, of course. I’d just wanted to be worried about it like everybody else.
As I crossed the road and walked onto the bridge, I saw him, right in the middle, leaning with his back against the wall.
He had sunglasses on and was looking in my direction.
It didn’t feel real that we were about to have an actual conversation, given the amount of times I’d imagined it.
Was it too late to bolt? I wondered. To turn around and go right back to the safety of the bar and Peter’s wine-obsessed drone?
Part of me had hoped Aidan wouldn’t be here because, let’s face it, he was liable to not turn up places when he said he would.
I found myself walking towards him, anyway, coming to a stop with my hands on my hips. I was not going to let him overpower me with his confidence and his charm and his general good-looking-ness.
‘Let’s get this over with, then,’ I said. ‘What did you want to talk to me about?’
Irritatingly, Aidan flipped his sunglasses onto his head and looked at me. Really looked at me. So intensely that every part of me began to tingle. I was horrified that he was still having this effect on me and I fought to make myself stop.
I whipped my eyes away, looking out at the Ponte Vecchio.
In desperation, I turned on my camera and haphazardly shot some footage, starting with the pale lemon apartment buildings on my left which had Florence’s trademark shutters and balconies.
Then I twisted at the waist, panning the shot out across the Ponte Vecchio, with its three arches and the jewellery shops lining each side of the central street.
I’d always thought people lived in those quaint little buildings with the windows that lit up cosily at night, but apparently nobody did.
They were the back offices of the shops, then, I supposed.
Gino had told us not to bother buying jewellery there, that it was sold at a premium, but I thought there might be something romantic about choosing a special piece there.
Not that I could afford gold jewellery, obviously. But if I could.
‘Can you see the corridor on top of the bridge?’ said Aidan.
‘What corridor?’
He pointed to the three arches in the centre of the bridge, and then the three windows above them.
‘It’s called the Vasari corridor. Built by Giorgio Vasari for Cosimo the first of Medici in the fifteen hundreds.
He found it difficult to walk from the Palazzo Vecchio, where he lived, to the Palazzo Pitti, where he worked.
He wasn’t that popular and he’d be hassled by irate locals on the way.
So he arranged for this custom-built elevated passageway to be created, which stretches from one palace to the other, across the top of the Uffizi Gallery and right over the Ponte Vecchio. ’
I nodded. ‘Thank you for the running commentary. You should use that for your article.’
Aidan laughed softly.
We were silent for a while. I finally put my camera down.
‘You look great, Maddie. How have you been?’
No. I wasn’t going to let him do this. I hated him and I wasn’t about to let him forget it.
‘If you’re planning to go on a charm offensive, Aidan, please don’t bother. I’ve learned a lot these past two years, and one of them is to not believe a word you say.’
Aidan had the audacity to look shocked. ‘I’ve never said anything to you I didn’t mean.’
He couldn’t be serious?
I looked straight at him. ‘Oh, really? What about I’ve never felt like this about anyone in my entire life? Or I know it’s early days, but I literally can’t imagine my future without you?’
It hurt to say it out loud, even after all this time. And it was also slightly mortifying that I’d recounted it word for word. It was like his declarations were etched in my brain, no matter how hard I’d tried to forget about them.
‘I meant all of that,’ he said.
‘You didn’t,’ I replied, turning away from him. ‘You couldn’t have done.’
I might have guessed he’d try to deny everything.
We stood in silence for a moment or two. I wondered why I’d come, what I’d been hoping for; whether I should just leave.
‘You’re actually planning to marry that guy, Nick, then?’ said Aidan.
‘Yes. I am. And I’ve got no idea why you just said it like that.’
I allowed myself a quick sideways glance at him. From this angle, I could see his lashes, long and dark. I used to run the pad of my thumb over them sometimes.
‘How long have you been together?’ he asked.
I sighed. Why did he care about all of this? ‘Two years.’
‘Two years,’ said Aidan, looking thoughtful as though he was mulling it over; working something out. ‘I bet he’s the romantic type. I bet he buys you huge bouquets of flowers,’ he remarked, his eyes fixed on the Ponte Vecchio. ‘Doesn’t he?’
What was he talking about? I mean, Nick did buy me embarrassingly large bunches of flowers that probably cost more than a week’s rent in the studio apartment I had been living in when we’d first met, but what did it matter to Aidan?
‘Whether Nick buys me flowers or not is completely irrelevant,’ I snapped. ‘Nick shows up. Nick wants to spend the rest of his life with me and he doesn’t just say it, he actually means it. So can you please just get to the point of us being here? You said you wanted to talk.’
Aidan leaned on the bridge, resting his stomach on the stone slabs. For a second, I remembered the abs he used to have (and probably still did have, looking at him), how well-defined they were, how I’d run my fingers over them when we were lying in bed together, or on the sofa, or in the park.
‘It was never my intention to hurt you,’ he said. ‘Just so we’re clear. In fact, when I was with you, I was the happiest I’d ever been.’
Did he think I was born yesterday?
‘Tell me what happened,’ I said, my voice sounding strained.
Aidan cleared his throat. He seemed to be struggling to put things into words. Good, I thought. It should be difficult for him.
‘That deep connection we had? I felt it too, and I’ve never felt it with anyone else since,’ he said.
There was a ‘but’ coming, wasn’t there, there had to be? He’d probably met someone else. I could handle that, I’d already imagined that a thousand times over. Or he found me acutely annoying in the end? That’s what I’d assumed.
I opened my mouth to speak, but nothing came out. For God’s sake!
I tried again. ‘So why didn’t you meet me, that night in my office? You sent me one text and then nothing. My calls went straight to voicemail, my texts went unanswered. You ghosted me, basically, and I’ve still got no idea what I did wrong.’
‘You didn’t do anything wrong, Maddie,’ said Aidan, his voice cracking.
I swallowed hard. This was harder than I thought it would be.
It was bringing it all back. The shock, the disbelief.
The embarrassment. I’d told everybody. Everybody!
About this wonderful man I’d met who actually seemed to like me, was falling in love with me, even.
And then, with no explanation, he was gone.