The Sweet Life

by Rebecca Lim

  ‘You can be a bit of a sap,’ Gabs agreed, as Janey pushed her right off the bed in mock outrage.

  ‘Right.’ Ness pulled the doona off Janey completely. ‘Strategy needed. We have to hit Prada, Valentino, Fendi, Armani, Gucci and Missoni before lunchtime or I will die. I haven’t been able to shop for about twenty-six hours because the others wouldn’t let me go anywhere near the stores in any of the airports we had to run through to get here. Call a taxi! Now!’

  Her friends laughed.

  ‘Or better still, bring Luca back,’ Em sighed. ‘Now there’s a hunk of spunk right there!’

  ‘Didn’t I say he was a dreamboat?’ said Janey happily.

  ‘Words failed me,’ said Gabs in disbelief, because words never failed her, ‘when we stumbled out of that sorry excuse for a baggage collection area and saw him standing there—’

  Janey giggled.

  ‘The sun gilding his curling dark hair and magnificent shoulders . . .’ said Ness. ‘Bouncing off his impeccably styled shades – Prada current season . . .’

  ‘And holding a sign with our names on it!’ Em squealed.

  Janey’s friends sighed in unison.

  ‘And he was so easy to talk to,’ said Gabs.

  ‘Gabs sat in front,’ said Ness enviously. ‘Em and I were bobbing up and down like gophers in the back trying to get a word in edgeways, even a skerrick of his attention—’

  ‘Basically, you hogged him,’ Em said to Gabs accusingly.

  ‘See? See? ’ Janey laughed as her friends pouted at each other. ‘I wasn’t exaggerating! He’s divine.’

  Through the half-open door to Janey’s room they heard a derisive snort as Freddy turned on her heel and retreated down the hall. She’d been eavesdropping the whole time.

  ‘She’s just jealous,’ said Em. ‘You should’ve seen her gobsmacked, classically beautiful features when we fell through the door this morning with Luca on our heels carrying our bags, and Celia welcoming us with open arms. Words cannot express how delicious it was.’

  ‘It was karma,’ said Ness simply.

  ‘What goes around . . . comes around!’ Janey giggled, recalling Brandon’s mobile ringtone.

  ‘Now get up, lazybones,’ said Ness. ‘The only thing that will fix my incredible jetlag is at least one pair of couture size 40 peep toes. And apparently, Romans are blessed with naturally small feet. So there should be plenty about.’

  Gabs and Em rolled their eyes.

  ‘The only thing that will fix me is food,’ Em said plaintively.

  ‘A big, aromatic bowl of pasta,’ Gabs declared. ‘With a chaser of semifreddo and a cappuccino on the side.’

  ‘How’s this for a strategy?’ said Janey as she bounced out of bed and threw on some clothes. ‘We grab a coffee at a shabby chic café I’ve been haunting just around the corner from here, then strip mine the designer stores around the Via Condotti for the rest of the day. Sound like a plan?’

  The four girls grabbed their daypacks, sunnies and lipgloss, and squeezed through the door as one.

  The last few days of Janey’s holiday were the most memorable and fun-filled of her life so far.

  The four girls stormed the boutiques like a horde of conquering Vikings. They revisited Janey’s favourite spots together, from Trastevere right through to the top of the Janiculum Hill. They dropped in on Gabriel Sansovino – the antique seller who’d sold Janey her keepsake painting of Rome – with an impromptu morning tea. He promptly returned the favour by treating them to lunch at Dal Bolognese, which overlooked the glorious Piazza del Popolo – the magical square depicted in the very oil painting that Janey had purchased from him.

  And they even revisited the bone-filled chambers beneath the Santa Maria della Concezione church at the foot of the Via Veneto – which wasn’t quite so creepy an experience with all of them there – and indulged Em’s wish to gorge on tiramisù at the Café de Paris.

  Janey introduced them to Luca properly when she and her best friends all joined him, his sister and their friends for the promised daytrip to the black sand beaches of Ostia. A trip that was the source of much laughter, teasing and goofy photography. Janey got horribly sunburnt but somehow it didn’t matter, because late in the afternoon, Luca swam out with her to a floating pontoon moored far out in the ruffling water and asked whether he could come out to Australia to see her, later in the year. They sat and talked for a long time on the bobbing pontoon while the others looked on from the beach and gave them both space just to be with each other for a while.

  This thing between them, whatever it was, thought Janey as they all piled tiredly back onto the train at the end of the day, might actually, maybe, one day, turn into something. Twenty-one and sixteen wouldn’t be so very far apart, down the road. After the day they’d spent together getting to know each other’s family – because if Janey was certain of one thing, her BFFS were her family as much as Celia and Freddy would ever be – Luca felt right. She wanted him in her life, and if it had to be via Skype, MySpace, email or carrier pigeon, so be it.

  As if he heard her private thoughts, Luca turned his dark eyes upon her from the other side of the train carriage and smiled his heartbreaking smile.

  ‘You’re back,’ sniped Freddy as Janey passed her in the hallway, her arms full of cushions. Janey was on her way to the living room, where her friends were camped out on mattresses.

  Janey studied the younger girl, who looked even younger than she usually did because she had no make-up on and her hair wasn’t styled to within an inch of its life. Being grounded agrees with her, Janey thought with an inner grin.

  ‘Bored, were you?’ said Janey, not unkindly.

  ‘Me?’ Freddy snorted. ‘You wish!’ She made to walk off, but turned abruptly. ‘I wish I had real friends like yours. No one bothered updating me on MySpace today, even though I was online for hours just waiting.’

  Janey’s gaze softened. Yes, Freddy had been a horror and caused her more anguish than she ever wished to experience again, but she was lonely and bored and it was the holidays.

  ‘I’ll speak to your mum and see what I can do,’ Janey said.

  Surprised, Freddy regarded Janey gratefully. ‘I really am sorry,’ she replied. ‘It just got out of hand. I forgot you were a real person with real feelings. It really annoyed me how much Mum was looking forward to meeting you. She even left work early to take you out to dinner! She hardly ever does that with me. She just sends me over to Dad’s.’

  Janey grinned. ‘Thanks to you, I’m seriously considering getting rid of my MySpace and starting a Facebook page!’ She trailed off with a giggle, hearing an answering giggle behind her.

  They had so much luggage that Celia had to organise a second embassy car to take all of them to the airport.

  ‘Thanks for talking to Mum,’ Freddy murmured to Janey as her friends took last-minute photos with Luca, promising to email him. ‘If I hadn’t had you guys to hang out with this week, I would’ve gone seriously stir-crazy. Your friends are great.’

  ‘They are, aren’t they?’ Janey smiled. She gave Freddy a swift hug. ‘You, however, were a royal pain in the bum – but we’re all good now, aren’t we?’

  Freddy nodded. ‘If it’d been you doing it to me,’ she said, ‘I wouldn’t have coped well at all.’

  ‘Never would’ve happened,’ Janey laughed. ‘’Cause I’m nowhere near as devious as you are!’

  ‘Are you sure you won’t put Brandon out of his misery and at least call him before you leave?’ Freddy added.

  Janey looked thoughtful. Brandon had called her mobile several times over the last couple of days, but she’d passed on rehashing the whole Fellini misadventure. It turned out that the mystery Italian-speaking male who’d been sending Janey the creepy texts had been Paolo, but it still didn’t excuse Brandon’s involvement. Especially if he really did like her.

  Janey shrugged. ‘He knows where to find me – if he really does want to get to know me better he can write to me first and we’l
l see what happens. And tell him to use his own name this time! And definitely no creepy stuff.’ Janey hugged Freddy again and told her, fiercely, to write.

  Luca disengaged himself from Ness, Gabs and Em, and wandered over to where Janey was standing. ‘You promise you’ll come and see me?’ she said to him, trying to sound cool. She wasn’t sure of the right tone to project in a situation like this.

  Luca nodded and took her hands in his. ‘And I will email you and you will do the same for me, yes?’

  Janey nodded, hoping she wouldn’t cry when she had to walk away from him. ‘It’s been . . .’ She struggled to find the words. So much had happened since she’d first met Luca outside this very building.

  ‘You will take care of her?’ Luca said with concern to Janey’s friends, ranged protectively behind her.

  ‘We will,’ Gabs nodded.

  Smiling through her sudden tears, Janey pulled her hands gently from Luca’s and turned to face her aunt.

  ‘We started out pretty rockily,’ Celia said wryly, ‘but the truth won out, hmm?’

  She glanced over at Luca standing a little distance away, his dark eyes shielded by the shades he’d just put on. ‘I’ve been wrong about so many things!’ Celia whispered for Janey’s benefit alone. ‘At least think about what you want to do, and who you want to be with, can you promise me that?’

  Janey nodded and gave her aunt a swift hug, too. ‘I-it’s really important to me that there’s no more misunderstandings. About anything,’ she said huskily.

  Celia nodded. ‘You, uh, wouldn’t consider coming to live with us permanently, would you?’

  Janey felt as stunned at the surprise offer as her three best friends looked. She wondered if their shock was mirrored on her face.

  ‘Hear me out!’ Celia urged. From the corner of her eye, Janey registered Freddy’s frozen expression of surprise at Celia’s bombshell. ‘You don’t need to get on that plane. You could stay on with Freddy and me . . . I’m pretty confident now that meeting the terms of that stupid will wouldn’t be a problem! You could finish your schooling here, Janey.’

  Janey and her best friends exchanged glances. She could tell they were happy for her, but terrified at the same time that she might actually say yes! Gabs was practically holding her breath and turning purple.

  For a crazy moment, Janey wondered what it would be like to just walk away from her old life, right here and now.

  Finally, she shook her head. ‘Thanks again, Aunt Celia. But I’d like to finish school with my friends and all the things I know around me before I take up your offer. Even though I’ve loved my time with you in Rome . . . and I’m pretty confident now that Freddy and I can happily coexist!’ Janey and Celia shared a conspiratorial grin. ‘I really just want to get back for now, and be with the people I love and see if I can stand on my own two feet and make a life for myself without anyone else’s help.’

  Celia nodded. ‘I understand. Though I can’t promise Freddy and I will still be based in Rome when you decide to come back to us.’

  She hugged Janey tightly. Em, Gabs and Ness descended on Janey and linked their arms through hers before the four girls waved their final goodbyes to Luca, Celia and Freddy and swept through the departure gate together.

  ‘What was the best bit about it all, do you think?’ said Em as they lined up to board their plane.

  ‘The food,’ sighed Gabs.

  ‘The accessories,’ said Ness, who’d almost been slapped with extra duty on her back-breakingly heavy luggage, but had managed to charm the ticketing officer into making an exception. Just this once.

  The three of them looked over at Janey. ‘All of it,’ she declared mistily. ‘It’s just like Libby told Celia. It’s Rome. It’s practically spelt the same way as romance.’

  She hugged the possibility of her brilliant future to herself and gave her friends an enormous smile. ‘But for now,’ she said, ‘let’s go home.’

  About the Author

  Rebecca Lim was born in Singapore, and grew up in Melbourne via a short, toddlerish stint in Warwick, Queensland. She has always loved reading everything from poetry and trashy thrillers straight through to cookbooks and Shakespeare. She is also an affirmed trash mag and fash mag hag, and hopes that her expensive habit has been adequately reflected in The Sweet Life.

  Rebecca worked as a commercial lawyer for way longer than was sensible before leaving to write full-time. She is the author of the Whiffy Newton detective series, as well as a number of books for pre-schoolers.

  She lives in Melbourne with her husband, son and daughter, and hopes to return to Rome one day without having to take a nappy bag or a stroller.