by T A Williams
She finally arrived at the Mona Lisa hotel towards the end of the afternoon, feeling hot and sticky, and the sight of the swimming pool had considerable appeal. In fact, the whole place was most appealing. It was set in magnificent gardens in a densely wooded valley, surrounded by lines of cypresses and, inevitably here in Chianti, row upon row of vines. It was a surprisingly small villa – by Tuscan standards – and her room was in the recently restored former outbuildings, but still very luxurious. It was light and airy, completely painted in white – even the massive beams and joists supporting the roof – while the floor was composed of terracotta tiles laid in a herringbone pattern. Her bed was enormous, but she knew she was only going to use a small portion of it. Interestingly, the sight of her bed took her mind to Matt, rather than David, and she couldn’t help wondering – yet again – whether she would see him over the next few weeks.
As she had said to Millie, she was at a loss to explain how a man she barely knew had been able to affect her so deeply. Over the years of Pals, the script had decreed that a number of cast members, herself included, had been afflicted by sudden attacks of love at first sight. These had led to often hilarious situations which had all, without exception, ended in tears. Of course, Pals was fiction and this was real life but she couldn’t help wondering whether her own inexplicable infatuation with this man would also end in crying.
The pool was an ‘infinity pool’, set into the sloping hillside with no raised lip on the far side, so she was able to float around like a seal, with just her chin above the water, and look straight out over the beautiful Tuscan countryside. Two massive old umbrella pines leant drunkenly over the water, providing welcome shade – although at the expense of shedding pine needles in the water. Having had a pool in her garden back in her Hollywood days, she wondered how often somebody had to come along here with a net to skim the surface. Still, on a boiling hot day like today, she was glad of the shade. As she floated lazily about, she wondered whether the Mona Lisa had really been painted here and if it really had been a portrait of a woman, rather than a convoluted self-portrait by a self-absorbed painter. Either way, it was exciting to imagine that maybe Leonardo da Vinci himself had once looked out over this exact same view. The thought was stimulating and helped to raise her spirits further.
Dinner was served on the terrace outside the old villa and, unlike the terrace at Villa delle Vespe, the view from here was downhill and across the valley, rather than up towards Matt’s tower. The whole terrace was bordered by a dense bed of rosemary and the aroma was intoxicating. Along with the scent of the flowers came the inevitable background buzzing of the bees and she felt sure there would be honey on the breakfast table the next morning. Beyond the bushes were gnarled olive trees and then more vines, stretching away until they were replaced by dense woodland.
She ordered a glass of the villa’s own Chianti Classico and took a sip, relaxing after what had been a fascinating day. That feeling didn’t last long.
‘Hi, Al. Millie told me you’d be here.’ She looked up in surprise to find none other than Richie standing at her shoulder, a nervous grin on his face. ‘Pleased to see me?’
For a moment she was genuinely speechless, but she managed to collect herself. ‘Amazed is more like it. What on earth are you doing here, Richie? I thought you and Carrie were on your way back to the US.’
‘She is. I’m not. Millie told me about David going off and leaving you, and I wanted to stay on and talk to you.’
‘So Carrie’s gone home on her own?’
‘The fact is, Al, I’ve dumped Carrie. I wanted you to be the first to know.’
‘You’ve done what?’
‘We broke up… on the way to the airport, actually. I left her there and she should be on her way back to the States by now.’
‘You did what? That’s appalling, Richie. She seemed like a nice girl.’
‘Yeah, she’s nice, but she’s not you. But don’t worry about her, she’s a big girl. She’ll be okay. It’s you I want, Al, honestly.’ He was staring nervously out over the hillside, unwilling to meet her eye.
Alice just sat there in amazement. This certainly was a very different Richie from the one she had known five years ago. Yes he was looking good, yes he was communicating and interacting far more than before, and he no longer had bags under his eyes and a lingering aroma of cannabis about him, but that wasn’t the main difference. Even at his lowest, he had never been unkind. The Richie she had known would never have dumped a girlfriend in such cavalier fashion. He really had changed, and she realised she didn’t like this new version of her former boyfriend one bit. Suddenly, the little spark of attraction she had felt stirring inside her when she had first seen him again was completely extinguished – and that had nothing to do with any possible, if unlikely, future connection she might be able to forge with Matt. In consequence it was remarkably easy for her to make her position absolutely clear to him.
‘You shouldn’t have done that, Richie, and you certainly shouldn’t have done it for my sake. Like I said before, it’s all over between you and me, and I’ve moved on. You need to do the same.’
He looked back at her sharply. ‘You’ve moved on? Does this mean there’s somebody else?’
Alice was now faced with a dilemma. Her natural instinct was to tell the truth, but that would mean admitting that she no longer had a man in her life, which might just encourage him. Instead, she decided to ignore the question and spell it out to him as clearly as possible.
‘Anything there was between you and me is long gone, and you’ve got to accept that there’s no future for us together. Find yourself a new girl – there must be thousands of them out there just clamouring for you – and you’ll be fine. Just forget about me, will you? At least, I hope we can stay friends, but that’s as far as it goes. Okay?’
She deliberately didn’t invite him to sit down and he stood there, looking blank, before finally accepting the inevitable.
‘So what you’re saying is that it’s all over as far as you and I are concerned?’ She nodded firmly and saw him take a deep breath. He held out his arms towards her. ‘Okay. One last hug for old times’ sake?’
She couldn’t begrudge him that, so she rose to her feet and gave him a hug and a kiss on the cheek. She felt his arms tighten around her for a moment, but she gently disentangled herself and sat back down again. ‘Are you staying here tonight?’
‘I was going to but I wanted to talk to you first. If this is the way it is, I think I’m going to leave. There’s an early flight out of Florence tomorrow morning, so I’ll head for an airport hotel. Goodbye, Al.’
And he left.
She enjoyed an excellent meal, but if asked afterwards to describe what she had eaten, she would have struggled. It had been a stressful twenty-four hours and her head was full of conflicting thoughts. There was David, the man she had once thought she loved and who had behaved so shabbily, and then Richie – another man for whom she had once had strong feelings, but had now rejected. And of course she couldn’t stop thinking about Matt, who was almost certainly unavailable. The overriding sensation running through her was one of annoyance. As Millie had said, she had always been the grounded, sensible one – and now? What on earth was going on? If any of the diners at the neighbouring tables heard her grumbling to herself, they were polite enough not to comment.
Back in her room, she sat on the bed and did something she hadn’t done for quite a few years. She dug out her iPad and pulled up an old episode of Pals to watch. It was the one where she and Richie’s character had first hooked up and fallen in love. Polly the flirt had been unusually serious in this one and she remembered how easy it had been for her to appear infatuated with Richie. Indeed, it had been during the filming of this episode that she had admitted to herself that she had feelings for him off-set as well as on it. She paused it on the scene of their first kiss and stared at the screen blankly for some minutes, thinking back over what had been and what might have been. In spite o
f the apparent love in their eyes, it had all ended badly – on-screen and off.
But then a funny thing happened. As she stared at the screen, Richie’s face somehow morphed into Matt’s and she found herself wondering how a relationship with him might end. Was the growing attraction she felt for the man in the tower destined to end in tears, just as her previous two relationships had done? In spite of the beautiful surroundings, her heart sank. She was still sitting there, deep in her thoughts, a few minutes later when the iPad, deciding she was no longer interested, switched itself off, and by that time there were tears at the corners of her eyes. It had been an eventful week and there was no way of knowing how the rest of her stay in Chianti was going to pan out. What would happen over the next four weeks?
Chapter 13
In spite of her swirling thoughts, Alice slept remarkably well and got up late next morning. After a swim in the pool and a sumptuous breakfast, she drove back to the village at noon and met Signor Innocenti at the little house. Everything looked clean and smart inside, and there was even a lovely bunch of freshly picked flowers in a vase on the fine old kitchen table. What looked like a brand-new sofa was positioned in the lounge area, as well as a big flat-screen television, but most of the rest of the furnishings were old and, in some cases, almost certainly antique. She smiled as she spotted a print of the Mona Lisa hanging on the wall. He proudly showed her the selection of utensils in the kitchen cabinets and opened the fridge to display a bottle of what looked like Prosecco as a welcome present.
Upstairs, she was delighted to see a fine old wooden bedstead in the larger of the two bedrooms and a brand-new bed in the other room, both fully made up. The bathroom was spotless and, all in all, the place was perfect. She thanked him warmly and he left her with some helpful advice.
‘My phone number’s on the fridge door – do, please, call if you run into any problems. As some things are brand new, there are bound to be a few surprises. As far as food is concerned, there are lots of shops in Greve, which is only ten minutes by car, and the bakery here in the village sells a bit of everything, so you shouldn’t starve. If you feel like treating yourself, Giovanni’s restaurant in the village serves remarkably good food. Don’t be put off by the appearance of the outside. It’s a good place.’ He explained where the shop and the restaurant were and left her to it.
Alice checked the time on her watch: it was almost a quarter past twelve and she knew that shops here in Italy often closed at twelve thirty, so she hurried off to buy some supplies. The bakery stocked a limited selection of essentials, mainly consisting of canned vegetables, tuna and other long conservation products, so she resolved to do a run into Greve in Chianti later on that afternoon to stock up. While she was in the shop, she bought a freshly baked big round loaf of the traditional Tuscan bread she had come to love. The beauty of this product, apart from the taste, was that she knew from experience it would last for as long as a week and, seeing as she was now on her own, she would need that long to get through it. She also bought a slice of pizza for lunch and, on an impulse, she added a delightful-looking little strawberry tart. After all the trauma of the past few days she thought she deserved a treat.
Back at the house, she opened the bottle of wine from the fridge, discovering that it wasn’t Prosecco after all. It was a local sparkling wine from just a few kilometres up the road and, ice-cold from the fridge, it was very drinkable indeed. After pouring herself a glass, she took the slice of pizza and went out into the back garden. All the builder’s rubbish had been cleared away and a wooden bench positioned in the shade of the branches poking over the wall from the neighbour’s walnut tree made an excellent place to sit and have her lunch. Apart from the twittering of little birds high above her, it was quiet and peaceful there, and she settled down contentedly, letting her mind roam.
Settling into the little house had cheered her and she was determined to enjoy her holiday. She would be here for almost four weeks and, with David out of the equation, she could go wherever she liked. The only constraint on her was the interview at the auction house in a few days’ time. She had booked a flight from Florence, going out early next Thursday morning and coming back on Friday afternoon. That way she would be able to spend the night with her mum, whose holiday in Cornwall would be starting the next day. If the auction house offered her the job, she imagined she would be free to continue her holiday here until that started, presumably in early or mid-August. Of course, if they didn’t offer her the job, she would need to dedicate time over the next few weeks to trawling the internet for suitable alternative positions. So far none of her other applications had produced positive responses. Still, she told herself, it was mid-summer and no doubt lots of decision makers were on holiday. Besides, she had the safety net of enough in her savings account to keep her afloat for a good long while, until she managed to find a position that really appealed.
On a personal level, things were no clearer. If she managed to meet up with Matt once more and things developed between them – if he was unattached – she would no doubt want to stay around here. Of course, if she never saw him again or if he proved to be in a relationship already – or just not interested – then she could go anywhere. Those, she realised, were a hell of a lot of ifs. With a certain degree of surprise, it occurred to her that this was virtually the first time in her adult life when she found herself without any pressing commitments. She was free to do whatever she wanted. There was just one downside – she would be doing it on her own. For now, that wasn’t a problem, but maybe four weeks might be pushing it. Time would tell.
She spent the afternoon unpacking, reading and checking the internet for possible places to visit, before driving into Greve in Chianti to stock up on food, washing powder, and some wine and water. It was a pleasant little town with a variety of shops and restaurants, and a beautiful triangular central piazza, and she resolved to come back to do a bit of exploring soon. It was as she was walking around the perimeter of the piazza, hugging the shade, that she had an unexpected encounter. She heard footsteps behind her and felt a light tap on her shoulder.
‘Alice – it is you, isn’t it? Even from the back I recognised you.’
She wheeled round to find herself looking straight into a pair of familiar light-blue eyes and her spirits soared.
‘Hi, Matt, fancy seeing you here.’ She glanced around. ‘No Guinness?’
‘No, I left him at home. A lot of the shops don’t allow dogs and he isn’t used to being tied up. The last time I left him outside a shop he howled the place down.’ He looked pleased to see her. ‘Are you shopping?’
‘That’s right. I’ve rented a little place for a month.’ She thought she saw a spark of interest on his face as he heard the news. ‘I need to stock up on supplies – including wine.’
‘Well, you’ve come to the right place for that.’ He glanced at his watch. ‘Got time for a coffee?’
‘Yes, of course, although I think I’ll just have something cold. It’s absolutely boiling today.’
He led her across to a cafe with tables outside on the square, sheltered from the afternoon sun by the buildings ringing the piazza. He ordered a caffè freddo for himself and insisted on treating her to one of the establishment’s home-made ice creams. On his advice, she went for strawberry and meringato, which was a heavenly mix of creamy vanilla and chunks of meringue. With it, she asked for a glass of sparkling mineral water and sipped it as they chatted. She was dying to ask him about his situation and whether there might be a special someone waiting for him back at the tower, but she curbed her impatience and they talked about generalities. It was just lovely to be with him. For his part, he also refrained from asking anything personal, so by the time she had finished her ice cream, she had learnt that she always had to make sure she chose the Chianti with the little black cockerel on the label, which showed it was the good stuff from around here, and that in Greve there was no shortage of good wine on sale… but nothing that related to him. It was informative, but
hardly intimate.
As they talked, she studied him surreptitiously and her eyes were drawn to the third finger of his left hand, where she saw no ring. Of course, this didn’t prove anything these days, but it was maybe a step in the right direction. And the direction in which she wished to travel – she now allowed herself to admit without a sense of guilt – was towards him. The attraction she had been feeling for him was continuing to grow and she knew she wanted to get closer. For his part, he was definitely looking and sounding more interested in her, and that initial awkwardness she had sensed was no longer evident. As he told her about the best places to buy wild boar pâté, fresh vegetables and the tastiest cantuccini biscuits, she just soaked up his presence and liked what she found. He was intelligent, attentive and good-looking – and, wonder of wonders, he genuinely appeared not to know who she was. She felt a thrill at the thought that, just for once, she had met a man who was interested in Alice, rather than Polly.
All too soon, he looked at his watch again and stood up. ‘I’m sorry I have to dash, but I’ve got a load of things to do and I’m very conscious that Guinness might be chewing his way through my furniture while I’m away.’ He gave her a little grin that warmed her heart. ‘He doesn’t like being left alone.’
‘Who does?’ Although hadn’t she just decided that she was perfectly happy to stay here on her own for a whole month? To her surprise, she saw the grin disappear from his face.
‘Sometimes being on your own can be good.’
He didn’t elaborate and just shook her hand rather formally. Before she could say any more, he waved goodbye and headed off across the square. She sat there and sipped the last of her water, full of mixed emotions. On the one hand, she was delighted to have run into him, and to have found him receptive and interested, but the fact remained that she knew no more about him now than she had done before. It was as if he was steering clear of any kind of intimacy. He hadn’t asked where she was going to be living or arranged to see her again. It had been a pleasant interlude, but the net result was the status quo. The only plus point was that it sounded as though there wasn’t a special someone back at the tower waiting for him – otherwise why worry about the dog eating the furniture? It wasn’t much, but it was a glimmer of light.