Chapter 8
Chapter 8
It was an attitude, a style; Lena learned to adopt it. When you walked into a bar, you ignored people looking at you askance because you were a woman alone—you were not Italian, you were American, you were apart , you were someone to be reckoned with . You sent scathingly sympathetic looks to the men who stared at you— ah, no, this is not for you, my lad . You crossed your legs elegantly when you sat and did not tug down your skirt. You acted as if everyone in the place watched your every move. You ordered Negronis when they expected you to order an Americano, no, no soda for you, thank you, nothing to take the edge off pure liquor. You smoked as if the cigarette were an extension of your erotic dreams. You danced the mamba with an extra twist of your hips and moved to jazz as if the music had taken possession of your soul, and you stared into Julia’s eyes with an expression that made the mouth of every man water because he imagined you might be lovers.
Lena did her best work in Rome. Her teachers loved her. She loved the world. She wanted to stay forever. Julia had taught her how to be the woman Lena wished to be. She would have done anything for her.
She had just come from another tabaccheria near the Monumento a Vittorio Emanuele, after picking up “Muratti’s in a pink box”—also nonexistent—and was on her way to La Grotta to drop it off. By the time Lena got off the sweaty, crowded tram, she felt nauseated. She was near the Via Veneto. Since the Veneto catered to tourists, it stayed open in the heat of the afternoon, and crowds sat at the tables of the sidewalk cafés, and the wealthy went in and out of the doors of the Excelsior, and expensive cars dropped off elegantly dressed people with expensive luggage, and everyone strained for a glimpse of a movie star, though why any stars would be there at this time of day was anyone’s guess.
Still, Lena slowed her step, as always, on the lookout for one, curious to see what they would be wearing. If she were a movie star, she would come here to soak up the adulation. She’d sit there, at that table near the door of Strega. She’d wear big sunglasses and a hat and pretend she didn’t want to be recognized. Like that woman there, at the far table, talking with a man in a leather coat who looked a little like a blond Tyrone Power.
Then Lena realized that the woman was Julia.
She started toward her, then stopped. What was Julia doing here, and with this man? And this Julia ... this woman, while undeniably Julia, was a Julia Lena did not know. There was a haughty chill in Julia’s manner that Lena had never noted before. Everything about the scene felt furtive. The way the man kept his head bowed so you couldn’t really see his face. The way Julia kept looking about.
Was it her, really? Lena couldn’t help herself, she had to be sure. She stepped forward, into Julia’s line of vision. She noted the moment Julia saw her, the way Julia froze, and then ... then the frown, the quick wave, undeniable in its message.
Go away.
It was odd, and it stung. Not the Julia she knew, not the smile of welcome, but clear frustration and irritation. Lena pulled back into the shade of a cluster of umbrella-ed tables, and then stepped farther down the street until she was certain Julia could no longer see her. But she didn’t leave. She stood and watched Julia and the man argue until the man nodded abruptly. He put an envelope on the table, which Julia immediately covered with her hand. She smiled, the man grimaced and left.
Julia glanced around, seemingly casually, but Lena knew her well enough to see her tension. Julia rose and left the table, and Lena remained in the shadows. She didn’t like what she saw. There was something wrong, or even ... ominous about this. Lena hesitated, wondering what to do.
Make the delivery was the obvious answer, and so she made her way to La Grotta, which of course was closed.
Lena pounded on the door until Tony answered. “What is it, Lena?”
“Where’s Petra?”
He opened the door wider to let her in. There were a couple people in the small kitchen behind the bar, Marco drinking coffee and Paolo gnawing on a sandwich.
“She’s in the back,” Tony said. “You want espresso?”
Lena shook her head and went through the curtain and out a narrow door into what could hardly be called a courtyard, just a narrow fenced-in brick square in the alley with the trash bins and a grill Tony sometimes used. Petra sat in a chair she had angled back against the railing, her eyes closed. Petra’s hair, as usual, was artfully piled on her head, looking ready to fall at any moment.
“Hey,” Lena said. “I’ve got something for you.”
Petra opened her eyes lazily. She held out her hand so languid and smooth it was as if she hadn’t moved at all.
Lena reached into her purse and took out the cigarettes, then placed them into Petra’s palm.
Petra made a face. “I told her American cigarettes. I’m not smoking these.” But she slipped the carton into her pocket. “Do you have any Camels?”
“Marlboros. Who’s Tony selling the hash in there to?”
Petra wiggled her fingers in request and Lena took out her pack and gave Petra one. Petra lit it, inhaled, and said, “Hash? Is that what Julia told you?”
“Isn’t that what it is?”
Petra laughed lightly. “She doesn’t trust you.”
Another sting. This time a confusing one. “Why do you say that? She says I’m her right hand.”
“Does she?” Petra shrugged. “Okay.”
“I saw her today at Strega. With some blond guy.”
“Mmm. Mr. Bon Bon. Very good to her, that one is.”
“Who is he?”
“A mystery man.” Petra widened her dark eyes dramatically. “Ask her yourself, Lena, but don’t tell her I said anything. And give me another one of those, sì ? For later.”
Petra would give her no more answers. Lena went back to the Augusta and knocked on Julia’s bedroom door. “It’s me.”
The door opened. Julia had changed into a lounging pajama set with flared legs and a top that tied around her neck and left her arms bare. “Did you get the cigarettes to Petra?”
“She complained that they weren’t American.” Lena sagged against the doorjamb. Then, because she couldn’t help herself, she teased, “Then she threw them away.”
Julia’s expression went immediately concerned.
“She put the pack in her pocket,” Lena corrected. “But you looked worried there for a minute. What else was in there besides cigarettes?”
“Hashish, as usual.” Julia walked back into her bedroom, trailing the scent of talc and marijuana.
Lena followed her. “That’s not what Petra said.”
Julia raised her brows in question. “What did Petra say?”
“That you don’t trust me.”
“Petra likes to cause trouble. You know that’s not true.” Julia sat on her bed with a bounce and leaned back against the headboard.
Lena hesitated, then ... “Are you going to tell me what you were doing with that guy at Strega today? You looked so ... different. It was like you were a stranger.”
Julia reached for the reefer in the ashtray on the bedside table and lit it, then she offered it to Lena. “Want some?”
Lena took it. “Who was he?”
“He’s a customer,” Julia said.
“What does that mean, exactly?”
Julia tilted her head, considering. “Are you jealous?”
Lena had been in the middle of a deep drag. She choked on a laugh. “Jealous? That’s ridiculous.” But she felt a niggling discomfort. She pushed it away and handed Julia the reefer.
“Is it?” Julia met her gaze straight on. “You know what Petra thinks, Lena? She thinks you’re in love with me.”
Now it was Lena’s turn to say nothing. She had no idea what to say. The discomfort was back and something in Julia’s expression unsettled her. The marijuana was having an effect, too; along with her discomfort came a fullness. She was tender; she was soft. Was she in love with Julia? How else to explain this intensity of feeling, this wish to be part of Julia, to be ... inside her? But then ... no. It was more elemental than that. It wasn’t that she was in love with Julia so much as that she wanted to be Julia.
“It’s okay if you are,” Julia said.
Now Lena felt hot. It was impossible to describe how she felt. Not love, and yet, how fierce it was, how undeniable. “No. I told you. I—I’m married.”
“What does that matter? What does that even mean?”
“To a man. I’m not ... I’m mean I’m not ...”
“Really?” Julia tilted her head, a little smile, a knowing that crept into Lena in a strangely confusing way.
“Yes, really.”
Julia rose from the bed. She handed Lena the marijuana and went to the record player and flipped the switch, picked up the stylus and put the needle to the record on the turntable. “Nature Boy”—Petra’s song, the song from that night at La Grotta—began its eerie tune. Lena wondered if the choice of song was to remind her of that night, Julia’s enigmatic smile.
“It’s like I said, Lena. Petra likes to cause trouble. That man is no one. A client. He has nothing to do with us.”
“Julia, I’m not—”
Julia laughed. It was light and free. She gave Lena a look that filled her with relief. “Oh my God, Lena, you’re so funny. The look on your face. I’m kidding. Really. Dance with me.” Julia closed her eyes and swayed. “I’m a little drunk. Come and dance.”
Lena felt strange. Relieved, yes, but also confused at Julia’s strange mood. Still, she went to dance with her friend. Julia opened her eyes and opened her arms and Lena walked into them, that smell of talc and marijuana all around her, the silkiness of Julia’s hair, the warm smoothness of her bare arms, just being surrounded, bathed, cloaked in Julia’s essence. Julia pressed her lips to the corner of Lena’s mouth and then slid away, elusive, there and not, so Lena wasn’t sure if it had happened and was left only with the shock of it, and Julia swaying against her.
The music spun on. They swayed to the winding song, the seductive words, and when the song ended, Julia sighed as if it was the saddest thing in the world and pulled away. She grabbed the half-drunk glass of wine. “We are so good together, Lena. Don’t you feel it?”
Lena wasn’t sure what to say—how was it possible to feel both abandoned and wanting to be gone?
“Together we can do so much,” Julia went on. “All you have to do is admit that you want more than what the world wants to give a woman.”
“I don’t know what you mean,” Lena said warily.
“Yes you do,” Julia went on softly. “You walked away from Walter. You just walked away. That was amazing. You got the scholarship here. You’re a woman and you won the scholarship. You’re willing to take risks, but you have to choose well. Here they only see one direction for a woman. If you’re not careful they’ll direct you right into designing for little boutiques and stupid tiny ateliers. For God’s sake. You’re better than Coco Chanel. You could be bigger.”
Lena laughed quietly. Julia’s words were so alluring.
“I see what’s really inside you. But it’s so easy to give in to what the world wants, isn’t it? You can be so daring. But you can’t be afraid. It’s not a game to us. Once you start, you can’t stop. Not ever.”
“What do you mean?”
“What do fashion designers do? Usually? What’s your plan?”
Lena shrugged. “Learn everything I can. Get a job at a fashion house—”
“Not start your own?”
“No one just starts their own atelier, Julia.”
“No? So it’s years of sweat for nothing?”
“Not for nothing. You move up. Then one day, hopefully, you become a designer for a house like Chanel, or Dior or Balenciaga.”
Julia regarded her, tilting her head, considering. “What about the movies?”
“What about them?”
“Why not become a costume designer for a studio like Cinecittà? You could stay here in Rome. Think of it”—Julia looked into the distance, obviously imagining Lena’s future—“your designs, on a big screen, influencing every girl in the world. Like what’s his name—Flavio. You could be the Flavio of Italian movies. And then ... who knows? Maybe you could eventually go back to LA. You could be bigger than Flavio. What do you think?”
To stay in Rome. To work for the movies. Lena thought of all the times she’d sat in a darkened theater, the movie star paper dolls she’d designed for as a child. Cinecittà. But mostly, she wanted to stay in Rome.
“I know people at Cinecittà,” Julia went on, gently persuading. “I can help you. Or ... I would. But to do that you have to trust me. We have to trust each other. Can you do that?”
Can you trust me?
Lena understood what Julia didn’t say. No more questions, not about her life, Mr. Bon Bon, or anything else, and though there was a part of Lena that protested, Julia’s imaginings fed Lena’s own longings, her passions. Julia thought so big, she created vistas easy for Lena to see. The choice was no real choice: go to Cinecittà when her internship was over and stay in Rome with Julia, or go home to LA and continue to toil on at Chouinard? Hadn’t Lena promised herself to make something of Rome? Here it was, the opportunity she’d wished for.
“You’d do that? You can get me to Cinecittà?”
“I can and I will. But that means you have to stop listening to people like Petra. It means you don’t let anyone come between us.”
“Why does Petra want to make trouble? I thought you were friends.”
“See? That’s what I mean. Petra doesn’t matter. None of them matter, Lena. It’s just you and me. Yes? Or no.”
Julia had given Lena everything; she had made Lena. Not only that, but Julia was the closest friend Lena had ever had.
“Yes,” Lena said.