Chapter 39
Ava
It’s not that I’m not ecstatic that Tammy is here. Because I am. Ecstatic. Sitting beside her in the piazza, sipping aperitivi after class, watching the college students mingle with the locals and tourists—it’s like having a missing piece of me here to soak up any moments I may have missed. Sharing this with her is everything. But the timing—well, the timing is not stellar.
I spend hours with James every day, listening to him speak, studying the way his eyes light up when he discusses some small piece of unknown art that is housed in Urbino. Unfortunately, these hours with him are shared with seventy-some college kids who also get to hang on his every word and study his impeccable bone structure. And I’m tired of sharing.
Even the evenings have proven impossible. I can’t complain about being surrounded with friends and family at the dinner table every night, but stolen kisses in the hall beside the bathroom are not cutting it—even if they were mind-blowing, spectacular kisses. I’d like a kiss that isn’t interrupted by the voyeur, Maso, or an unlucky passerby.
James did try to sneak out to the pool house on Monday night, but Verga went nuts, barking and growling like Cujo until he realized who it was tapping on the glass door. And by that time every light in the villa had turned on, and Nina’s smiling face had popped out of the upstairs window. Ultimate cockblock.
Friday cannot come soon enough.
I have fantasized about Venice since my mother and I read The Thief Lord together in fourth grade. The magic of the city—the secret pathways, the endless bridges—the romance of it all pulled me in so wholly that I’m sometimes convinced I’ve been there before.
Imagining James beside me in that setting sends so many signals through my body that I have to shut down the thoughts or I’ll melt beneath this bistro chair.
The Piazza della Repubblica is bustling with the afternoon rush. It’s as if everyone in Urbino has showed up for the Italian equivalent of happy hour. Luckily, James and Aldo are tight with the bar owner, who has been kind enough to save us a table by the fountain for the past three days.
“Have you told James that you stalked your mom’s old lover?” Tammy asks from behind the rim of her Aperol Spritz. She’s channeling a Hepburn today—Audrey, I believe—with a silk scarf, a shift dress, and a pair of Jimmy Choos that even the Italian women are admiring.
I look up at the underside of the white umbrella hanging overhead. I have not told James about looking up Professore Genaro’s actual address. He heard what Leo told me on Sunday, but I just haven’t broached the subject again. I don’t want him to think that this trip is only about my insane need for answers about my mother’s secrets.
“It hasn’t come up,” I say, just as our waitress stops by to ask us if we need another drink.
We both say yes at the same time and she inclines her head and turns down her lips—a gesture I’ve learned means “of course.”
“Well, I doubt James is just going to randomly ask if you stalked your mom’s lover,” Tammy says when the waitress heads back into the bar. “So I’d say ball’s in your court there. Based on everything I witnessed, I’d say James would have no issue tagging along—”
The table of students beside us breaks out into raucous laughter, and I smile and nod at a girl named Lily who sits in the front row of James’s—our—class and Tammy hammers on.
“—in fact, I think James would do anything you asked. He’s clearly in—”
I put a hand up.
“Please don’t finish that thought,” I tell her before taking a long sip of prosecco.
“The two of you are going to have to come to terms with what’s going on here,” she says.
I avoid her eyes and count the bubbles in my glass. Coming to terms is the last thing I want to do. Coming to terms sounds terrifying.
“Why don’t you push your flight back?” she asks.
I already did. I meet her stare and swallow down a huge gulp of prosecco. Tammy leans back in her chair.
“You did already, didn’t you!?” She laughs and smiles, shaking her head. “Good for you, Ava. Good. For. You.”
“It’s just a few days,” I say, sounding defensive, but knowing damn well I don’t need to defend myself to Tammy. It’s the voice in my head I need to defend myself from.
Her phone pings on the table for the thousandth time, and she lifts the screen and starts hammering away, her eyebrows pulled together making an angry little V as her thumbs fly.
“What does he want?” I ask, knowing that it’s Ethan texting her like crazy. At least they are speaking again.
She puts the phone down with a sigh.
“Don’t worry about what he wants. He’s thousands of miles away. Worry about what you want,” she says.
What do I want? Tammy watches me closely, awaiting a reply. She sees right through me to the other side of the piazza. Maybe she can tell me what I want.
“Did you accept the position at Grant and Stanley yet?” she asks.
“I did. What about you? Any news from the Brits?”
“Nothing yet. When does your job start?”
“September fifteenth,” I say.
She nods. Presses her lips together. And I know she’s holding back.
“What aren’t you saying?” I ask.
She lets out a long breath and swirls the ice in her glass with the straw.
“Don’t take this the wrong way, but I don’t want you to come home,” she says, and I laugh at the absurdity of the comment. “I’m serious, Aves. You’re different here. Lighter somehow.”
“Of course I am. I’m on vacation,” I shoot back.
“No you aren’t. You are a TA in a major university. You just enjoy what you are doing and who you are doing it with,” she says.
“I enjoy what I do at home too.”
“Do you?” she asks.
“Yeah. I do,” I say. “I love my classes.”
She nods. “But that’s school. What about in practice?”
She’s just trying to help. I know that. But my quills are up and out and my tone is suddenly too snappy.
“What exactly are you trying to accomplish here? I just busted my ass the last three years. And you want me to do what? Throw that away and move to Italy to be a what?”
“You could teach here,” she says, sending me back to sophomore year in college. Teaching is not a thing I can do now. I left that path behind when I chose to leave school to be with my mom. Going back would be too hard for so many reasons.
“Tammy, stop.”
All of my uncertainty and fear amplifies the volume of that sentence. Tammy’s shoulders fall an inch and she looks toward the fountain at the center of the piazza, as if the water flowing from the simple marble chalice at the center holds all the answers. Guilt slides beneath my rib cage and sinks its claws into my heart.
“I just want you to be happy,” she says softly.
And I deflate. Why am I lashing out at her? I know she’s just looking out for me—like she always has.
“I know. I will be. I have a plan, remember?”
“That’s what I’m scared of,” she murmurs. “None of this was part of the plan and look how happy you are.”
She gestures around us and I follow with my gaze, studying the columned archways where I broke down beneath the pay phones a few weeks ago, and the neon sign in front of Aldo’s where my mother’s friends have now become mine. I look around at the people passing by, the tourists and the locals and the students all mixed and mashed into one glorious culture, brought together by the simple pursuit of beauty and joy.
It’s going to hurt like hell to leave this place.
And then I think of Nina and Leo. Of Maso and Verga. Of James.
The pain I feel at the thought of leaving them drills a hole straight into my chest. I felt this pain before. And the only way through it is forward—to grab back control from life and hold onto the reins.
I lift my prosecco to my lips and look anywhere but at Tammy’s knowing stare.