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She lowers the phone. Her thumb hovers over the screen for a moment before she ends the call, like she doesn't want to let go.

"You can eat in here," I tell her, holding out the plate. "Sit. Drink the water first."

She takes the plate and looks down at it like she's never seen food before. Then she sets it on the bed and lowers herself down beside it.

I set the glass on the nightstand and turn to go.

"Stay."

A request. Something I don't know what to do with. But I stay.

I lean against the wall by the door.

She takes a bite, then another.

"It's good," she says. She sounds surprised, which I choose not to be insulted by.

"It's not. But it's warm."

The corner of her mouth lifts. She eats more.

Then she looks up.

"Why do you keep looking at me like that?"

The fork stops halfway to her mouth. She's not joking now.

The truth is, I've been looking at her for years.

A black dress at a birthday party. Her laugh cutting across a crowded room before she saw me and looked away. I saw her then and dismissed it as Vittoria's friend, off limits.

I've looked at her in cafés and corridors and across the hood of Elio's stupid car.

"I like looking at you," I say.

She doesn't speak. The fork lowers. Her eyes move over my face, searching for the catch. The part where I take it back.

I don't.

"We've known each other for ten years," she says.

"I know how long it's been."

"Ten years, Valentino. And you never looked at me like this. Not once." She tips her chin up, and there's a brightness in her eyes that has nothing to do with happiness. "So forgive me if I'm a little suspicious of the timing."

I watch her work it out.

She's deciding I'm looking at her because I feel sorry for her.

She's wrong. So wrong it's almost funny.

For most of those ten years, she belonged to another part of my life. Vittoria's friend. Too young at first, then too close to family, then too easy to want and too dangerous to touch.

So I noticed and did nothing with it.

I spent years ignoring it because that was the sensible thing to do.

I can't pretend anymore.