Chapter Three #2
“Lily,” she says. “So nice to meet you.”
“You as well. I’ve heard a lot about you.”
At that, her cheeks get a slight pink tint to them, and she glances at the others. “Don’t listen to their lies. I’m a nice person.”
The others laugh and I say, “Well, they’ve told me you’re going to feed me better than any other woman in my life.” I realize the double entendre too late, but she seems amused by it.
“Challenge accepted.” She’s still got my hand, and I’m not even mad about it. As if suddenly realizing it, she finally breaks eye contact and lets me go, and I feel every inch of her skin that touches mine as it slides away.
What the fuck?
She addresses the group, and I take a moment to clear my throat and try to reclaim my bearings, because this woman has thrown me completely off-balance mentally.
My head feels a little fuzzy, and when I shake myself back to the present, Marina is telling us about the restaurant we’re standing in front of, how it’s been here for more than fifty years, and how its specialty is what’s called a supplì.
I have no idea what that is, but if it tastes half as good as it smells just standing outside the door, I’m in.
Marina leads us inside, through the small main dining area, and down a narrow hall through the back, nodding and saying hello to everybody she passes. The air is heavy with the scents of garlic, basil, and cooking oil. My mouth waters.
The narrow hall spills us into a small room with a table set for seven with nice plates and shiny silver utensils, and we file around it and take seats.
I’m at the end and Marina stands near me as she begins to tell us about the restaurant, the owners, and the food, and while she’s doing that, she uses a wine key to open a bottle of wine.
I barely hear what she’s saying because I’m too busy watching her hands.
Her fingers are long, her nails neatly manicured and polished black.
I’ve never liked super-dark nail polish colors on myself—black, plum, burgundy—but against Marina’s olive skin, it looks classy and perfect.
She goes around the table and fills each of our glasses, and when she gets to Sophie, she glances at Serena, who looks over at Bethany and Chris, eyebrows raised in question.
“Just a tiny bit,” Bethany says, and Sophie fist pumps with a “Yesss.”
Marina sees me watching and explains. “The drinking age in Italy is technically eighteen, but it’s not super highly enforced, and teens are usually not hassled if their parents are present and say it’s okay.”
“When did you have your first glass of wine?” I ask her.
Marina’s laugh is husky, surprisingly so, and her expression goes a little wistful. “I think I was nine or ten. My grandfather gave it to me. My mother was not happy about it.”
“I bet,” I say, as we all laugh.
Marina pours herself half a glass and holds it up. When we all join her, she says, “ Cin cin !” We cheers and sip.
“What does that even mean?” Sophie asks. “ Cin cin ? Is it, like, put your glass to your chin and drink?” She juts out her chin to emphasize her point, and Marina laughs again.
“No, but I like your definition,” she says.
“You don’t know the story? Okay, I’ll tell you.
Way, way back in Ancient Rome, people had enemies all over the place.
Nobody trusted anyone because everyone was trying to get ahead in some way.
But everybody drank wine, and they drank it often, so if you wanted to—how do you say?
— dispatch your enemy, one of the best ways to do it was to poison their wine.
Yeah?” She takes a sip of hers, and I watch her throat move as she swallows.
“Now, they didn’t have glasses like this back then.
You couldn’t see through them. They were—” She rolls her hand like she’s looking for a word again, finally coming up with it.
“Steins. Yes? With handles. So, when you’d cheer with another person, you’d say, ’ cin cin ,’ which was supposed to represent the sound of your steins hitting, and you’d do it hard.
Like, crash them together. Because if we do that, then there’s a good chance some of my wine will splash into yours and some of your wine will splash into mine.
And if you cin cin with me and then don’t drink, I will know you’ve poisoned my wine.
” She looks at Sophie. “And then we will have words, my friend.”
Laughter rolls around the table, and Sophie looks thrilled by the story.
“That’s so cool,” she says.
“Not if you’re getting poisoned,” Marina says.
Sophie sips, and I think she’s trying hard to appear as if she likes the wine, but I’m not sure that’s the truth. It’s cute, though.
Speaking of cute, Marina starts telling us about our first taste on this tour: the supplí.
She starts off by telling us that it’s a rice ball and we’re going to think it’s arancini, but it’s not and here’s why, but her words fade, I’m finding, because I’m too busy focused on everything about her.
Her hair, her mouth, her hands, the way her ass looks in her jeans…
I clear my throat and try to focus on her voice as two waiters bring us plates of supplì.
They’re balls of rice and mozzarella, rolled together and fried, and when I push my fork through mine and the cheese oozes out, my entire mouth fills with saliva.
I take a bite. “Oh, my God,” I mutter without realizing it, and Marina’s dark eyes are suddenly on me.
“Pretty wonderful, yes?”
“Beyond. Way beyond wonderful.” I take a second bite. “Holy crap.”
Marina’s smile feels like it’s made of light.
The table is now quiet, aside from all the humming and moaning as we eat, and as we each look around, I think we realize that and suddenly start laughing.
I like these people.
“So, Lily,” Marina says as she refills all our glasses except Sophie’s. “I know Serena now, and I’ve met the others a couple times, but you’re new. How do you know Serena?”
“Well, we just met this week. I’m staying at the hotel next door to her house.”
Serena sends a smile down the table at me. “Lily was walking her adorable dog and saw me struggling with my groceries and stopped to help me. It was the start of a beautiful friendship.”
I hold up my wine and Serena does the same.
“I didn’t know your place was next to a hotel,” Marina says.
“Mm-hmm. It’s very unobtrusive, though,” Serena tells her. “If you’re not looking for it, you’ll walk right by it. The Cavatassi.”
“No,” Marina says, and her eyes go wide for a split second. She turns to me. “My family owns that hotel.”
“What?” I say, surprised.
“Yes.” She’s grinning. “You’ve met Marco?”
“At the front desk?” I think of the well-groomed gentleman who always says hello to me. “I see him every day.”
Marina points a finger at her own chest. “My brother.” And the second she says it, I can see the resemblance. It’s all in the eyes, the shape and tilt and placement.
“I had no idea,” Serena says, obviously just as surprised as I am.
Marina nods. “It’s been in my family for four generations. My mother’s grandfather opened it in…” She shakes her head. “I don’t even remember what year. It’s been passed down and the family always works it.”
“Do you work there, too?” I ask, clearly unable to filter my questions before asking them.
She shakes her head. “Much to my parents’ dismay, no. I do not.”
Well, that’s a bummer. I picture myself coming out of the elevator in the morning to see that face of hers smiling at me. What a way to start a day.
“But now,” she says to Serena, “I know exactly where you live.”
“Uh-oh,” Robert says with a sly grin.
“And I know where you are, too,” she says, turning to me. Her dark eyes capture mine, and I couldn’t look away if I wanted to. Which I absolutely do not. “How long are you in Rome?”
“I don’t know yet,” I say truthfully.
“Huh.” She nods and our gazes hold for what feels like a really long time. God, she’s beautiful. Then she claps her hands once and says, “Okay. How was the supplì? Ready for our next stop?”
The strangest thing starts to happen as the food tour goes on…
Creativity strikes.
It’s happened to me like this before, but not for a long, long time.
Back when I was very young and writing for the fun and pleasure of it, I’d write when an idea or a spark of creativity hit.
Then it became my career, which meant I lost the luxury of waiting for an idea to pop up in my head.
I had to start forcing them, coming up with them on my own, even if I wasn’t “feeling it,” as my friend Jessie would say.
She’s also a writer and one of the few people in my life I can talk to about such things because she gets it.
While I write romance, Jessie writes horror, so it’s not unlike her to text me in the wee hours and ask me if something scares me. It usually does.
I try not to focus on why creativity has chosen this moment to strike, but rather just roll with it.
We’re finishing up at the wine bar, having stuffed ourselves with the most amazing charcuterie I’ve ever had in my life, when I pull a small notebook out of my bag and begin jotting the things that have appeared in my mind.
They are tweaks to the current plot I’m working on, and also some changes to my main characters, ways to enhance the chemistry, and I scribble down everything in my head so I don’t forget it all.
“New story?” Sophie asks as her parents and grandparents chat with Serena and Marina is filling glasses.
“Current story,” I tell her, finishing my notes. “That’s why I’m here. In Italy. I’m trying to finish a book.” I frown and correct myself. “Well, I’m trying to write a book. Can’t really finish something I haven’t quite written yet.”
Sophie sighs like her fourteen years of life have given her endless experience, and she gets it. “Blocked, huh?” and she grimaces with sympathy. I really like this kid.
“Like I’m behind a brick wall,” I say.