I narrow my eyes and lean into the screen as if I’m looking at a Magic Eye until my hungover brain can make out exactly what I’m seeing on the dance floor. I put my thumb and pointer finger to the screen and open them, trying to enlarge the picture until I realize I’m not on an iPhone and I’ve just smeared grease all over the monitor. I can’t tear my gaze away from the gorgeous redhead in the emerald green dress with her hands linked behind Ethan’s neck. It’s just a dance. Surely Ethan danced with dozens of women at the gala. Even when he and I attended together I’d had to lend him out like a library book. But something in my pizza-filled stomach twists. I’ve met this woman before—Eleanor or Eliza—something old school like that. She’s a resident at Jefferson—her father is the chief of something—very important. Very influential. Very worthy.
I start clicking like a woman possessed, trying to find more photos, and sure enough there she is again in the background of a photo of Tammy and Olivia. She’s laughing at something Ethan has said, her fingers wrapped around his bicep. The bicep my hand belongs around. And another one of Tammy at the table; Ethan isn’t looking at the camera, he’s twisted in his chair. His full attention on Eli-whatever’s face like she’s giving him the secrets on how to rule the world. I hit the plus button in the corner, zooming in until the image is so pixelated the blurring hurts my eyes. There—Itouch the screen again—right beneath the white tablecloth, this woman’s bare knee is pressed right up against his.
What the actual fuck, Ethan? Is this what Tammy wanted to talk about?If you have oats to sow… His voice floods my head. Was this all part of his plan? Oh God. Was he seeing her—before? My heart drops into my pelvic floor, and the last bite of pizza slides from my plate. And when I see the delicious cheese hit the floor, that’s when I get really pissed.
QUINDICI
James
It’s one of those beautiful crisp nights that fools your body into getting excited for fall too early—makes you crave open fires and warm sweaters in the middle of August. I spent the earlier part of my afternoon at the museum, looking over the newest acquisitions that Silvia, the curator at the Galleria, managed to obtain from Firenze on lease. She’s masterful. And now we have four portraits by our own Raffaello di Sanzio to display for the fall, with two more on the way. There’s something so fulfilling about art finding its way back to Urbino—the city that shaped and nurtured the work’s creator.
The later part of my afternoon was almost as satisfying, playing Massimo one-on-one at soccer while Nina refereed from where she milked the sheep. I’ve been schooling the kid since he was in diapers, same mop of black curly hair and huge white chicklet smile. Though I hate to admit it, it might not be long until the tablesare turned. Maso’s getting stronger—the ball tighter to his foot every time we play. I’ve got a year—maybe two—to keep him in his place. And then we are all in trouble.
“Gi, could you let Ava know we are leaving?” Nina yells out the window.
I stop rocking in my favorite chair on the porch and watch my peaceful afternoon drift into the past. There’s no point in saying no to Nina. And besides, the more I contest their obvious meddling, the more she and Leo see reason to meddle.
I take my time around the side of the house, replaying our conversation from this morning. “I have a boyfriend. A serious one.” Right. No wiggle room there. No blurred lines. Just a big red stop sign and a shitload of attitude. Why didn’t I tell her I’m not interested? Or that her presence is nothing but a splinter just beneath the skin?
The low-hanging sun reflects off of the glass of the guest house doors and I knock twice, even though I can tell she’s not inside. A small, silly pang of worry strikes me as I remember her brow knitted together in confusion this afternoon when I saw her last. What if she got lost searching for a sally port?
More likely, she’s out cataloguing artwork or creating some sort of checklist for her time here, her ridiculous planner tucked under her arm. Or maybe she’s working on the details of her absurd relationship arrangement with the jackass. Either way, her whereabouts do not—should not—concern me, so I step to the side of the guest house and take my time with my camera and the view, letting the pressure beneath my finger give way to the satisfying click of a moment captured. Sunsets like this make me crave watercolors, but I know my brush could never re-create that shade of orange, the way it burns the underbelly of the soft pink clouds above it. Only the camera can get that right.
Massimo destroys my moment of peace by yelling at me from where he is walking out of view along the driveway behind the cypress trees. At least his voice cracks a little, so I can smile as I sigh. I lower the camera and focus on the screen, clicking through my recent images while I try to close the distance between me and my family as they make their way toward the city walls for dinner.
There’s no doubt that the best pictures on the reel are those I’ve taken of Ava, and it’s not just my knack for portraiture. As a subject, her range makes the series of photographs fascinating. There is constant transformation—the Ava that she wants the world to see, and the Ava that is hidden underneath. The dichotomy makes the work impossible to ignore. And she’s stunning—lit from within.
Which just makes her all the more infuriating.
“Oh, Gi. That’s gorgeous. She will want that,” Nina says, leaning in to see the picture I’m studying of Ava looking down into Urbino’s streets from the hill beyond the wall. Her eyes are wide, the green popping with the grass on the hillside, and her lips are slightly parted in awe.
“A Mortal’s Glimpse of Olympus,” Zio Leo says. He has a habit of naming all of my work. And doing it well. Which makes him insufferable. “You should send that to Signore Davenport.”
“Zio, per favore,” I plead.
Since he “accidentally” opened an email from Greer Davenport, the owner ofThe Post, who wants me to sign with his magazine, Leo has been unrelenting. The arrangement requires me to live locally in London, and I’m not interested in leaving Urbino—leaving my family and my career.
“There is an entire world out there, Gi—”
I put up my hand. “I’ve seen enough.”
“You can never see enough,” he counters.
“Leo,” Nina warns.
Time to change the subject to the only thing they like talking about more than meddling in my professional life.
“The American must have left without us,” I tell them, ignoring their shared glance.
“No,” Massimo says. “She never came home. I kept an eye out.”
“You kept an eye out while I was embarrassing you at calcio? Maybe you should get a job, Maso. So you have less time to—you know—stalk guests?” I punch him in the arm and he points at my camera.
“I’m the stalker?”
Little shit.
I lift the camera. “This is art. Not creepy puberty hormones.”
