Flirting in Italian (23 page)

You’re an idiot, Violet. Stop it right now
.

“Time for all of us to get going,” I say loudly. And I really try to mean it.

Hauling Paige up the long sloping drive to the wrought-iron gates, and then along the rutted dirt road to Leonardo’s jeep, is not the most fun I’ve ever had in my life. I’m really glad I didn’t wear high heels; balancing myself, as well as Paige, would have been a much more difficult task. Luckily, I’ve danced off any effect the wine I drank might have had, and Andrea, too, seems sensible and sober. As, I realize, did most people at the party. They were happy and laughing and fun, but that was about it; Italians nurse a couple of glasses of wine all evening. They don’t seem to drink to get plastered, not like English people do.

When we reach the jeep, Andrea props Paige on me like a gigantic doll while he gets in, turns on the engine, and
bumps the jeep down to the road so it’s level. No way would we have managed to heave Paige into the jeep when it was parked at such a steep tilt up the slope.

Andrea’s unlocked the back door, and Kendra and I push and shove Paige in. She flops down inside with a long sigh of relief, collapsing on the backseat.

“It wasn’t a pretty pony,” she says, desolate now. “It was all gray. My Little Pony should be pink and shiny.”

“O
-kay
,” Kendra says. “Can you shift up, Paige? ’Cause we all need to get in.”

“You sit here, Kaiindra,” Andrea says eagerly, leaning over the front passenger seat and patting the upholstery with his hand.

“Subtle,” Kelly mutters to me.

“Italians don’t seem to be subtle,” I mutter back.

“No,” she says wistfully. “When they like you, they let you know.”

And even in the moonlight I can see that she’s looking at Andrea sadly. He doesn’t even notice her or look our way: his attention’s all on Kendra, who, in turn, is totally focused on Paige. Who isn’t budging.

“Need to lie down,” she mumbles. “Not feeling too good. Need to lie down.”

“You have to sit up!” Kendra says crossly, her hands on her hips. “We all need to get in!”

“Need … to lie
down
,” Paige insists, her speech getting slower and slower.

“If you make her sit up, she might puke,” Kelly says with blistering frankness. “And no one wants that.”

Off in the paddock, one of the horses neighs as if in
agreement. It’s such a beautiful dark night, clouds scudding across the yellow moon, a faint breeze barely lifting the leaves on the trees that line the road, stars bright pricks of light in the black sky.
Really black
, I realize.
In London, because of the streetlights, it’s a mauvey pink; here, it’s so dark you can see every single star
.

Kelly’s over at the jeep now, gingerly picking up Paige’s feet with her high studded wedges dangling off them. It’s as if Kelly’s playing with a gigantic Barbie.

“I can squash in and sit down if I put her feet on my lap,” she announces. “That’s okay, I don’t mind.”

“But what about Violet?” Kendra points out. “You can’t both sit like that, there isn’t room.”

We look dubiously at the very back of the jeep, which Catia uses for loading all sorts of stuff; not just suitcases, but rubbish. It’s fenced off from the rest of the car and lined with some nasty, filthy old scraps of blanket. I’m
not
going to volunteer to climb in there and ride back in the dirt, clinging to the wire screen like a prisoner. And, to be fair, no one even suggests that I do.

“You could maybe squash into the front seat with me,” Kendra says doubtfully.

“Is not safe,” Andrea says, shaking his head.

“We could see if we could get the seat belt over both of us—”

“C’è qualche problema?”
comes a soft voice from behind us, and we all jump, startled.

He has a way of sneaking up on you like a cat
, I think savagely, annoyed at being taken so off guard. Everyone turns but me, because of course I know who it is straightaway. It’s
as if I have a special radar setting for him: I would recognize his voice anywhere.

“Luca!” Andrea says, sounding relieved, and rattles off a long stream of Italian.

I don’t want to swivel to look at Luca directly. So I step back a couple of paces, closer to the wall that borders the paddocks, widening my range, and see him leaning against one of the gateposts, looking very amused. His eyes are gleaming, his hands shoved in his pockets, as he speaks equally rapid-fire Italian at Andrea.

I just glance at him swiftly, and then away again. He’s been ignoring me all evening, and I’m not going to give him the satisfaction of staring adoringly at him now. Something on the wall catches my attention; it’s a cat, maybe the one that crossed our path before, padding along the top on velvety paws, big and confident, pausing in front of me, staring at me with flat glassy eyes that gleam orange in the dark night. I reach out tentatively to stroke it, and when it doesn’t hiss and scratch, I tickle under its chin. A purr starts up immediately, rattling deep in its chest, and it closes its eyes and shoves its head heavily into my hand, showing me exactly where it wants to be scratched next. I pull lightly on its soft silky ears, smooth down its thick fur, and distract myself so thoroughly that it’s only after quite a while that I sense eyes on me and look around to see that everyone has fallen silent and is staring at me.

“Allora?”
Luca says, a mocking edge to his voice.
“Vieni con me, Violetta?”

That can’t mean what I think it means. My heart catches in my throat. The cat, realizing that I’ve been distracted,
jumps down from the wall, landing with an audible thud, and pads off through the gate to chase food for its dinner.
Poor field mice
, I think ruefully.
Between the owl and the cat, they’ll have a miserable night of it
.

Then I look at Luca, and have the horrible suspicion that I’m a mouse and he’s the cat, playing with me, letting me run away and then reeling me back in. His eyebrows are raised, his mouth quirked in an amused smile of inquiry.

“Sorry,” I say, not to him but to Kelly and Kendra. “I missed all of that.”

“Luca’s going to take you back to the villa,” Kendra says briskly. “ ’Cause we can’t all get in the jeep.”

I panic. Stone-cold panic, bringing out sweat on my palms.
I can’t be alone with him. This isn’t fair
.

“Kelly’s coming with us too, right?” I say overloudly. “It’ll be nicer than sitting under Paige’s feet.”

Luca nods his head sideways, and for a moment I don’t get why. Then I do, and I can’t breathe. He’s indicating the line of Vespas parked by the gatepost.
He didn’t come in his car. He came on a Vespa. I’m going to ride back home on his scooter
.

This is not happening
.

“Okay!” Kendra says brightly, climbing into the jeep. “See you two back at the villa!”

“Have fun,” Kelly adds, squishing in under the recumbent Paige’s feet and leaning over to shut the door.

I grimace at her helplessly, but they’re gone. Clearly, from the tone of her voice, Kelly thought that I’d be pleased at being marooned here with Luca. She caught us in the hallway of the castello; she knows that I like him.

But I’m not pleased. I’m furious, actually. Not with them, not with Kelly and Kendra. I can see how they’d think this was an ideal solution to the problem of Paige being passed out in the back of the jeep.

No, I’m furious with Luca. I feel trapped, played with. He’s spent all his time at the party not with me, but with Elisa. And now he thinks he can stroll up here, exploit a problem we’re having, and pick me out of the group to ride off with, without even
asking
me. As if I should be
grateful
that he’s spending some time alone with me.

I’m bristling like a hedgehog.

“Andiamo?”
Luca says, pulling his hand out of his pocket, dangling a key with a black fob. Without looking to see if I’m coming, he walks over to his Vespa. It’s a faded, scraped pale blue, big and clunky, with old-fashioned dials on the front panel.

Luca is bending over, retrieving two helmets from under the seat. He puts one on, leaving the buckle loose, holding the other one out to me.

I haven’t moved. I’m still standing by the wall. I stare at the helmet, my heart pounding, words rising to my lips. I want to yell at him, to complain that he’s taking me for granted. But then I bite my lip, choking down the words, because I’d make a fool of myself if I said them. I’ve got no rights over Luca. I’m not his girlfriend, or even close to it. I’m just a girl who’s kissed him a couple of times, and from what Elisa’s said, Luca’s kissed a ton of girls. For all I know, the days I haven’t seen him, he was in Florence, or at other parties, kissing other girls, other foreigners visiting that he
can play with, avoiding long-term consequences because he knows they’ll be going back to their own countries at the end of their holidays.

No, the best thing to do is to act as if you just don’t care. As if you’ve been kissing other boys, too, every night he hasn’t seen you. As if you can barely remember his name
.

Sometimes I think I’m too proud, too self-protective, but then I see other girls making idiots of themselves over boys and I change my mind. I’d rather be too proud than make a laughingstock of myself. I think of how my mum acted when my dad left her for the awful Sif: no matter how upset Mum was, she never threw scenes, never begged him to stay. Maybe she lavished too much attention on me after he went, kept me a little too close, but I really admired how she behaved through the separation and divorce. Dad admired her too, I know. I’ve never been prouder of her. And I want to be like her. I won’t chase after a man; I won’t seem desperate or needy. I’ll be as cool as my mum.

So I smile as best I can, saunter over to the Vespa, take the helmet, and say casually as I put it on:

“
Grazie!
I’ve never been on one of these before.”

Luca promptly paralyzes me by leaning down, pulling the helmet strap tight, and fastening the buckle under my chin. His aftershave smells like seawater, cool aquamarine, fresh and light; his breath on my face is warm and touched lightly with wine.

“Ecco,”
he says softly. His fingertips touch my skin. “It must be tight.”

He wheels away from me and swings one long leg over
the seat, putting the key in the ignition. Over his shoulder he says:

“You must hold on to my waist. And when I lean, you must lean with me. Okay?”

He’s waiting for me to get on. I mustn’t hesitate, or I’ll look as if I’m scared; I hike my skirt up and climb onto the back. The little scooter’s revving up, rattling noisily and cheerfully, like the cat purring on the wall; Luca looks back and says,
“Aspetta.”

Quickly, he shrugs off his jacket and hands it to me. It’s leather, butter-soft, like fabric in my hands.

“Put it on. It is not cold, but there is wind when we drive,” he says.

I slip it on, my head spinning. The collar smells of him, as if he’s wrapped around me. And then, in turn, I wrap my arms around his narrow waist, I feel his warm skin beneath the light cotton of his shirt. He’s just lean muscle over bone, almost skinny, but as the scooter kicks into motion, I can instantly tell how strong he is, because he controls it with small, seemingly effortless flexes of his muscles. His shoulders bunch lightly, taking the strain of bouncing an old Vespa with two people on it over a road that suddenly feels much more rutted and potholed when you’re not traveling in a jeep with good suspension.

Dust kicks up from the Vespa wheels, white dust that scatters up to the banks of trees on either side, adding to the pale traces that are already there. It’s like a ghost road, a sliver of moon gleaming through the dark branches, everything black and white but for the yellow headlight of the Vespa swiveling back and forth as we bump down
the road, a cone of light showing our way. If I had any idea about not holding on too tightly to Luca, that vanished the instant the scooter shot off; from the first jolt, I clung on for dear life. It’s like we’re the same body, leaning in unison against the curves, my head tilted into his shoulder so our helmets don’t bump, his chest rising and falling with his even breathing, his shoulders flexing with the strain of holding the Vespa steady, keeping us safe.

Being so close to Luca, pressed so tightly against him, synchronized with him, is so heady and intoxicating that it would be enough, on its own, to make me dizzy; but the extra factor of having to hold on to him so tightly as we bounce over ruts and swerve to avoid potholes makes me feel as if we’re in a bubble together, isolated from the rest of the world.

We pull onto the asphalt road, and the ride becomes instantly smoother, faster, the scooter puttering along, cars occasionally whipping past; to me they seem terrifyingly close, but Luca doesn’t tense up, doesn’t flinch in any way, which is hugely reassuring. The yellow cone of light from the headlight is tiny on the black road, and I can barely see anything until we rattle through a village with some streetlights. All the shops are shuttered up, the bar is closed, not a soul about, barely any lights on in the houses. It’s very late, I realize, and a wave of tiredness hits me, a reaction to the excitement of the party, the adrenaline rush of dancing, and the thrill of being on a Vespa with Luca. My body sags, and I find myself relaxing against him, my head nudging more comfortably into the curve of his shoulder.

As if we knew each other really well, as if he were my long-term
boyfriend taking me home from a party, our bodies familiar and cozy with each other
, I think. It’s a dream. A silly, impossible fantasy. But I’m tired, and it’s late at night, and I let myself indulge in it for the rest of the ride. I rest my head against his helmet and I close my eyes, the scent of him and his aftershave and the petrol fumes from the exhaust all mingling in an oddly intoxicating haze.

The Vespa turns and starts to bump up a gravel drive. I know this means we’re back at Villa Barbiano, but I’m in denial. I keep my eyes shut, my head down, even when the scooter crunches to a halt beside the jeep, and Luca’s leg shoots out to kick down the stand.