Chapter 30
Thirty
Lexi
The two hours before dinner of scouring the neighborhoods around the Roman Forum for the temple from Mom’s painting yielded nothing except blistered feet.
After attending the opera this evening, I buy a Passito on my way home and prop my sore feet up on the balcony, a wineglass and a bowl of peaches by my side, and my mother’s two opened letters on my lap.
Below me, the city is still loud, pulsing and alive, and I like it.
Left in silence, I might sink into numbness, but Rome won’t let that happen.
I have to face my grief here, make a way through it.
Not to eradicate it, but to let it find its place in my heart.
A place where it can coexist with joy and contentment.
A place where it’s acknowledged but not consuming.
But right now, that doesn’t feel possible.
I gaze at Mom’s words until her graceful, loopy handwriting goes blurry.
She told me, at the end, when the cancer came back and we knew we had no time left, that plans fall apart sometimes, and that’s okay.
“I have a new plan, but that’s not what’s important.
” That’s when she showed me the first half-painted envelope, eyes twinkling even though her hand shook with frailty.
For as carefully as I arranged this trip over the last year, this new plan isn’t better. I need her. I need her laughter to lighten my life, her wisdom to guide the way through heart matters. I need to make memories with her here.
What are you trying to tell me, Mom?
Where is the temple?
Why couldn’t you be here with me?
How are the watercolors appearing in real life?
How do I get Mark out of my head?
I brush a stray tear from my cheek. This is another layer of grief—living with questions I know I’ll never get answers to.
I finish the wine and call Julie. At least I can take care of one question without Mom.
When I tell her I need her advice, she steps out of the store she was in and gives me her full attention.
“Mark got in the Trevi Fountain and found my mom’s lira that I threw in to make a wish.”
“What? Wait, back up. The coin on your necklace?”
So I tell her about the first letter, meeting Santino, Mark noticing that I used the coin from my necklace, finding the green scuffed doors right after making a wish, then watching Mark get escorted away from the fountain by the police.
“That is literally the sweetest, craziest thing I’ve ever heard. All the green flags. Marry him.”
My stomach clenches. “I told you—he’s marrying a girl named Katie who lives in Boston. This is why I’m calling. You need to help me get him out of my head.”
“So he’s toying with you? The jerk!”
I’m used to Julie swinging wildly from one extreme to the other, but I cringe when I hear her harsh verdict. “He’s not a jerk. Unless he is.” I groan and drop my head onto the back of the patio chair. “I don’t know. I just want to forget him and focus on Rome.”
There’s a pause, then Julie says, “Okay. I have an idea. Give me until tomorrow morning.”
After we hang up, I wonder if I’ve made a mistake. Julie’s ideas are not plans. They are opinions and emotions on five cups of coffee.
I head to bed. Even if I had an inkling of what Julie was up to—probably stalking him online and gathering all her research into a glossy Canva brochure—there would be no stopping her anyway.
Lying on the Egyptian cotton sheets, out of habit, I scroll through the Ninth King of Rome’s account on Instagram.
I spend way too much time here whenever I need inspiration or to just feel connected to Italy.
This account alone was responsible for about sixty percent of my Rome study, and eighty percent of the comfort I found from my grief all year.
The pictures aren’t the big, brilliant parts of Rome, but the quiet moments.
A shoe (Italian leather) on a cobblestone, stepping on the corner of a discarded museum ticket.
The profile of a child with a dusting of powdered sugar and chocolate on his pudgy cheek, a flaky sfogliatella pastry inches from his mouth.
The open hand of a girl in a piazza full of bold, hungry pigeons, crumbs flung in the air.
An older woman, eyes closed, nose buried in a zucchini blossom.
Rome is always there in the blurry background with its churches and ruins, the Tiber River or a painted fresco, the busy, narrow winding streets and the food, but as a setting rather than the focus.
I take a deep breath and DM the account owner, explaining the bet to see if we could post two pictures in a few days and ask his audience to vote. This is a big ask. Mark and I are ridiculous.
I chuckle again at the image of him being marched away by the police with his soaked pant leg.
So much for my attempt to get Mark out of my head.
I fall asleep with the lira necklace clutched in my hand.