My ability to coordinate my feet goes wonky, and we bump hips awkwardly for a few steps. I think we’re heading for the main attraction—the Fountain of the Four Rivers—with its muscly statues representing different continents. I mean, this thing even has an obelisk sticking out of it. But Giulio steers us down a side street instead. A few turns later, we stop in front of … a broken statue? I eye the crumbling torso and its vague face—my brain sifting through all the Roman trivia Ma’s spouted over the years. And come up blank.
Giulio bows. “Livia, meet Pasquino. Pasquino,ti presentoLivia.”
I fold my arms and shift my weight onto one leg.“You think some old statue is going to cheer us up? Save the bar?”
“Pasquino isn’t any old statue. He’s a talking statue.”
“Aaand?” I make a rolling motion with my hand, inviting him to keep talking until he makes sense.
“Think of him as the comments section on social media.”
“Nope. Still nothing.”
He points to the base of the statue, and the scraps of paper crammed into its cracks and even stuck on with … urgh … chewing gum.
“This is where the little people come when they have no voice of their own. Notes, protests, complaints—especially about those in power … Romans have been doing it for centuries. In fact, I bet a few of those are Nina’s.”
“Wait—this is one of her spots?” I look closer at the jumble of notes.
One reads:Politicians line their pockets while we struggle to pay our rent.
Another declares:The buses are never on time! How can we work when public transport fails us?Underneath, someone’s drawn an angry face, and another has taped a notice of a transport strike tomorrow.
“Wow,” I murmur. “It really is like an ancient social media feed.”
Giulio points to a bright yellow note taped to the other side of the base. “Hey, why didn’t you tell me you’d been here already?”
I blink. “What? I haven’t.”
He taps the note, and I peer in to read it.
I fell for you, but I didn’t tell you. And now it’s too late.
That stomach flip evolves into a full-on somersault, and I let out a tiny squeak.
“Looks like someone’s mistaken old Pasquino here for Cupid,” Giulio jokes. “Although … I suppose we both fell last night. And it’s not too late.”
Ommioddio.He’s talking about last night. He’sactuallybringing it up. I can almost feel my cheeksturning scarlet and have to resist the urge to dash over to the Fountain of the Four Rivers to plunge my head in it.
But as much as I want to disappear into the ground, I’m just as desperate for him to say more. I freeze, waiting—still crouched, my big nose a mere centimeter away from the note, like I’m a pointer dog drawing attention to it.
Then Giulio’s phone buzzes in his pocket.“Pronto?”
A girl’s voice floats faintly from the speaker, just loud enough to make my breath catch. And while it’s over ninety-five degrees outside, a chill chases through me when Giulio takes a few steps away.
And just like that, whatever spell I was under breaks. I pretend to study Pasquino and the notes. But the only letters I can make out are the ones spelling the name on his phone screen—Flaminia.
Ma bulldozes me to my language class in the afternoon, desperate to get rid of me and my “incessant questions.” But when her lawyer friend wasn’t able to find a loophole, and Pa confirmed he can’t free up any savings in time, the idea of having pretend conversations about giving directions and ordering taxis feels … as pointless as ordering milk for a bar that’s about to be repossessed.
Ma practically hands me over to Kenzi at the school entrance and disappears around the corner at lightning speed.
“What happened at the swap last night? Yourmum looked angry … Did she find out about the debts?”
Was that only last night? So much has happened in so little time. I take a long breath, and as we slowly climb the stairs, I tell Kenzi the short version of the fallout from Bertolli’s visit, and the hospital showdown between Ma and Nina.
When we reach the second floor, Kenzi stops to hug me. “Sounds intense. But things are finally out in the open now, right?”
I nod into her shoulder and spot Mas-si watching us from the classroom doorway. “You two—” He stabs a finger at Kenzi and me—“fourth floor,immediatamente.”
