“Cool, thanks,” I interrupt, because I cringe to think how many of my peers can hear through the walls as my mother loudly muses about my hypothetical bathroom needs.Fortunately, she stops a moment later in front of one of the bright Mediterranean-blue doors.
“This is you,” she announces with a smile. Letting go of my suitcase, she digs in her jeans pocket for a minute before producing an antiquated metal key. The lock releases with a much gentler click than the sturdy dead bolt on the apocalypse-proof door to my dorm room at school, and Mom pushes the door wide, gesturing me in first.
The room is what a Realtor would describe as “cozy.” Bright, too, with a glass door to a tiny balcony on the far wall that lets sunlight stream in. The walls are the same bright white of the hallway outside with a single piece of artwork hanging on one, a picture of the Bay of Naples. Underneath that is a twin bed, tidily made up with a white duvet over a blue fitted sheet and pillow. A dark wooden writing desk, chair, and chest of drawers fill the rest of the space.
“Ooh, looks like you’ve got a bigger closet than I do,” Mom gushes, and I turn to see her standing by an open narrow door, revealing a modest space with a rod and hangers for my clothes.
“You’ve got a shower you can use without shoes on,” I reply with a shrug. Her answer is a musical laugh that never fails to make me smile. I cross the small room toward the balcony, and it takes me a moment to figure out the handle on the door. It can be turned up to open the top only, letting in some airflow, but when I turn it down, the whole thing pushes open and I step out into the balmy afternoon air.
The balcony isn’t getting direct sunlight at this time of day, but the metal railing is still warm under my palms when I restthem there. It grounds me as the view nearly takes my breath away—Villa di Bronzo, right before my eyes. I’ve seen so many pictures of the ancient structure over the years, I wasn’t sure if the real deal would be a letdown. But pictures don’t do it justice.
Stretched out before me is the palatial home of a seriously wealthy ancient Roman citizen. What remains of that home, anyway, after two thousand years buried under volcanic matter. From this vantage point, it’s almost like a dollhouse with the roof lifted off—a maze of rooms and walkways and courtyards. Half-crumbled stone walls enclose long-ago living spaces. Columns stand sentry in long, straight lines, still majestic even if the loads they once supported have caved in. Pops of blurry color where I know that frescoes have been carefully revealed and restored, and intricate mosaics in the floors form patterns I can’t make out from afar but will soon reach out and touch.
I’ve always thought the wordruinsfeels unfair. It emphasizes what was lost, whether to catastrophic events or the more gradual effects of time, rather than the incredible things that remain. Sites like Villa di Bronzo aren’t just scraps of once-great structures, or symbols of devastation and destruction. They represent a persistence that’s hard to wrap our heads around, this combination of strong engineering and all-natural preservation that offers us an invaluable connection to the past, if we’re lucky enough to find them.
Villa di Bronzo is less ruin, more treasure. And I can’t believe it’s practically under my feet.
“Bring back any memories?”
Mom’s voice startles me out of my spell, the two of us only barely fitting side by side as she joins me on the balcony. I blink, then shake my head quickly to try to clear it before giving the site another sweeping perusal. Then another, like maybe I’m just not focusing hard enough to make a memory surface.
“Not one,” I finally admit, even though it’s not my fault the toddler brain doesn’t store anything long-term. “Does it for you?”
I turn to see Mom’s lips purse, her stare going distant. “Oh, absolutely. Too many, maybe.” She mumbles this last bit, like she doesn’t really mean to say it out loud, and seems to snap out of whatever path her mind started wandering down. “More to come this summer, huh?”
Her excitement shows on every inch of her face. It’s in the crow’s-feet at the corners of her eyes that deepen with the smile she’s almost holding back, the knowing twitch of her lips that says,This is gonna be a good one, Cam, I can feel it, just like she has said countless times before.
Guilt squeezes my heart. It’s always been her and me against the world. And most of the time, that’s felt like enough. It certainly has to her; she always tells me she loves me enough forthreeparents, let alone the standard two.
It makes me feel greedy, or maybe ungrateful, for what I’m trying to do now. Because unbeknownst to my mother, I’m on the hunt for that second parent I’ve never known.
A shiver rolls down my spine as I realize that at this very moment, I could be closer to my biological father than I’ve ever been. I don’t know that he’s still in Italy, of course, buttwenty years ago, he was. He met a young archaeologist named Alex, they had a short-term fling, and he opted out of the very long-term commitment of raising the tiny human they accidentally created.
That accidental tiny human grew up to be less tiny, with a relentless need to know everything and a lot of free time on her—my—hands for summer break, time that’s happened to coincide with her first chance to come back to the place her parents met.
It’s a complicated feeling, this urge to find a dad who, as far as I know, didn’t want me. I worry that I’m betraying the parent who stayed, telling her she hasn’t been everything I’ve needed and more. I couldn’t stand to hurt Mom that way.
But I want to find out more about myself, and right now, it feels like that starts with this—with him.
So I really need to get better at lying.
“Definitely,” I belatedly answer Mom’s question, and then in the hopes of sounding more convincing, tack on, “Can’t wait!”
Thoughts of my secret dad-finding mission have almost made me forget the unexpected blast from my past. But Mom must misread my emotions as some kind of positive attitude adjustment, as she decides it’s safe to steer us back West-ward.
“The Welcome Dinner is at eight this evening, and I’m planning to meet Danny and West in the first-floor common room at 7:50 to walk over. I know you’ll be even more wiped by then, but I’d love for you to join us, at least for a little while. It’s outside on the terrazzo. You’ll have to eat something fordinner anyway, right? And I’ve heardsuchgood things about the chef they have at Villa Russo now, so—”
“Alexandra,” I cut her off before she can somehow ramble her way back to my toilet options.
Her lips press together, twitching up on one side even as she tries to give me stern, narrow eyes. “Camilla.”
“I will be delighted to have dinner withyou. I will grudgingly accept the presence of anyone else, and then I will get my long-awaited sleep and hope that when I wake up, West Jacobs being in Italy was only a bad dream.”
Mom’s sigh creates a pleasant breeze in this stifling heat, an unintentional reward for my petulance.
“Honestly, Cam, I didn’t think there was still this much…animosity between you. Isn’t three years enough time to let bygones be bygones?”
It’s clear the woman doesn’t realize she raised the reigning world champion in Grudge Holding. I bite my tongue so hard, I’m surprised I don’t draw blood. I rarely let myself think about West and what happened between us, so it’s easy to forget that Mom doesn’t know the whole story. She had enough to worry about, what with her partner in crime Dr. Danny deciding to hang up his adventure hat and get a steady stateside job. I didn’t want to pile on with the full extent of my own best friend drama.
