She placed the binoculars on the sill and scanned the square. A black cat stood on the brim of the fountain, stretching languidly. As it did, the shape on the walled-up window distorted. The cat hopped to the ground, out of the beam of the fountain’s spotlight, and the mysterious shape disappeared.
Beatrice exhaled. It was just the shadow of a cat. She chided herself for being silly and reached out to pull in the shutters. Just then, a pair of sneakers squish-squished across the cobblestones below.
A young man stalked across the otherwise motionless square. He was tall and lanky with a shaved head and tattoos snaking down his arms, a backpack slung over one shoulder. With every few steps he whipped his head around, as if he were afraid someone was following him.
As he crept in the direction of Beatrice’s building, she yanked in the shutters. The squeal of the unoiled hinges echoed through the square and the man looked up just as the shutters slammed into place.
Had he seen her?
Beatrice peered down through the shutter’s wooden slats, but the man was out of sight. She couldn’t see him without reopening the shutters and sticking her head out, and she wasn’t about to do that.
What was he up to? Maybe he was the vandal who’d scribbled graffiti on her front door, and was back at it again? Or worse, maybe he was trying to break into one of the buildings in the piazza!
She strained her ears. Nothing.
For a moment she thought about waking her father, but no, she was probably just jumping to conclusions. Her dad was always teasing her, saying she had an overactive imagination and a naturally suspicious character. The guy on the street below was likely as harmless as a fruit fly.
“Mind your own business, Bea,” she advised herself. Able to resist her hunger pangs no longer, she put the man with the shaved head out of her mind and went in search of her new kitchen and, with any luck, a satisfying snack.
Over the next few days, between unpacking and sleeping off jet lag, Beatrice and her dad found slivers of time to visit Rome’s major sites. But soon Mr. Archer consigned himself to the library, determined to get a head start on his research before classes began in the fall. Beatrice was used to her dad’s frequent absences. Still, she wasn’t about to sit around indoors—she had a city to explore.
“I don’t like the idea of you out roaming all by yourself,” said her dad one morning as she prepared to take a walk.
“You never worried about it in Boston. Do you think we should have stayed instead of moving to Rome?” Beatrice teased.
“Just promise you’ll keep your wits about you! Do you have your cell phone? Is it charged?”
“Of course!” She tapped the disappointingly low-tech hand-me-down phone in her pocket.
“And don’t forget your map. You know our address, right?”
“Ye-es,” she sang impatiently. “Piazza Mattei, 10.”
“Don’t talk to any strangers—”
Beatrice rolled her eyes. “You taught me that when I was six. I’ll be smart.”
He took her by the shoulders, his pale gray eyes piercing her hazel ones. “You’re not in your home country anymore,” he said gravely. “Some people take advantage of foreigners, and it’s easy to get distracted. I know you’ll be fine, but just don’t let your guard down, okay?”
“I promise,” she said with equal seriousness.
“Have fun, then, princess.” He mussed her copper locks. “Or perhaps I should say, principessa!”
Four
EXPLORATIONS AND EMBARRASSING SITUATIONS
Stepping into the morning sun felt as soft and delicious as slipping into a warm bath. The neighborhood was just waking up: a motor scooter buzzed past, cups rattled on saucers in a nearby café, and a woman’s high heels clack-clack-clacked across the cobblestones.
No sooner had the enormous door of her building swung shut behind her than Beatrice’s gaze fell upon the babbling fountain in the center of the piazza. She felt an overpowering pull toward it, as if an invisible string attached to the foot of one of the turtles was fastened to her sternum. Maybe it was just that the turtles reminded her of her pets back home, or perhaps it was the way the gleeful look on the faces of the sculpted boys buoyed her own spirits. Whatever it was, the turtle fountain was officially her favorite thing in Rome.
She picked a direction at random and skirted down an alley, shadowy and deserted. Via di Sant’Ambrogio read a sign on the wall of a building. A laundry line hung across the narrow street with a row of pink baby clothes, but apart from this fresh sign of life, everything else belonged to the past: worn paving stones, narrow arched windows, massive wooden doors with lion’s-head knockers. She half expected someone dressed in Renaissance finery to come prancing through a doorway.
The alley opened onto a wide, busy street. Here, modern life was bustling all around: people scurrying about with shopping bags, old men arguing and gesticulating, elderly ladies gossiping on benches. Beatrice’s eyes danced between silver menorahs sparkling in a shopwindow, an enormous stack of laundry detergent boxes teetering outside a corner market, and a wicker basket overflowing with purple artichokes sitting in front of a restaurant.
Then she stopped in her tracks. An ancient building with crumbling brick walls and cracked marble columns stood at the end of the street. Beatrice knew these sites were called ruins, but she didn’t like the term. She didn’t think they were ruined at all. The fact that they were still standing, after so many centuries, made them unruined somehow.
The decrepit building looked as wobbly as a house of cards. Disintegrating columns and a brick arch supported a marble slab with an illegible inscription. A few columns sprouted from the nearby sidewalk, as if refusing to give up their ground to the modern city.
As Beatrice approached the crumbling mass of stone, she tried to visualize what it had looked like two thousand years ago, with columns intact and walls gleaming with marble, maybe even bronze. She imagined that the handful of tourists in pastel polo shirts and khaki shorts, snapping pictures and thumbing through guidebooks, were ancient Romans in togas instead, going about their business and chattering away in Latin.
How many people, throughout the centuries, had stood where she was standing now, gazing up at this same building? If she only knew what it was . . .
As if in answer to this silent wish, a slender young man with floppy brown hair and a crisp white shirt sauntered over. A few dozen tourists straggled behind him, gazing at the monument with varying degrees of interest.
“And this, ladies and gentlemen, is the Portico of Octavia!” he announced in a hoity-toity British accent. He paused for effect, but no one in the group seemed to have heard of it. Beatrice’s ears perked up as he started what sounded like a well-rehearsed speech.
“Shortly before Augustus became emperor, when he was still known by his birth name Octavian, he built this structure in honor of his sister, Octavia. The Romans weren’t very creative when it came to naming their children,” he added parenthetically. He paused, as if he’d just said something fantastically witty, but instead of a laugh, his group rewarded him with a collective blank stare. “Anyway,” he continued, “built on the foundations of an earlier portico . . .”
Beatrice slipped into the group, hoping to pass for one of the tourists. She pulled out her trusty notebook and began taking notes, jotting down the purpose, date, and materials of the portico so she could check the tour guide’s facts as soon as she got home.
When he finished his speech, he began herding the group to the right. Beatrice turned and gasped. Between a few buildings, she caught a glimpse of another ancient site just beyond: a gigantic, curving structure with three levels of arches and columns.
“The Colosseum!” Beatrice shouted involuntarily. She immediately regretted it. Everyone in the group spun around to gawk at her, then turned back to look at the monument in question.
The guide wore a look of condescending amusement. “No, little girl,” he snorted, “that’s not the Colosseum. It’s the Thea
ter of Marcellus!”
A few of the tourists chuckled at her mistake, as if they’d known all along it was the theater of old what’s-his-face.
“I suppose it might be confused with the Colosseum to the uneducated eye,” the guide allowed with a sniff, flicking his hair out of his eyes.
Beatrice’s face burned to the roots of her hair. She wished she could just disappear. Or maybe turn into a column herself.
“I’m sorry,” the guide said smugly, “I don’t remember seeing you at the sign-up for this tour. Are you part of this group?”
It wasn’t enough that he’d laughed at her in front of everyone; now he was exposing her as a shameless eavesdropper. If only she’d listened casually from the side, she might have gone unnoticed, but she’d planted herself in the middle of the group and now she had no excuse.
“Um . . .” Her mouth went dry. “I got a little bit lost. . . .” She pulled out her phone and tapped a few keys at random. “My dad’s probably wondering where I am. I should . . .” Without finishing the sentence, she turned and bolted, desperate to put as much space as possible between her and the source of her humiliation.
She hadn’t gone a dozen paces when her right foot landed on a wobbly cobblestone. The toe of her flip-flop embedded itself in a crevice, sending her flying. She landed on all fours, her nose inches from the smooth gray stones, with an ominous crunch from the hand that held her cell phone. Before she had time to register any pain, a hot rush of blood surged to her face.
“You see that, everyone?” floated a smug voice from behind her. “Remember what I told you about Roman cobblestones? They bruise like murder, but they never break the skin. Marvelous invention.”
Beatrice looked down to inspect the damage. Her bare knees, wrists, and palms ached, but sure enough, there wasn’t a scratch on her. The same could not be said for her shattered phone. Her dad would be livid. She suddenly hated each Roman cobblestone with every fiber of her being.
Ignoring her throbbing knees, she scooped up the remains of her phone, scrabbled to her feet, and forced herself to walk down the street without limping. Desperate for escape, she stepped blindly into the first open shop.
Once inside, she peeked around the corner, but the guide had moved on and was leading the group toward the Theater of Marcellus. She’d never mistake it for the Colosseum again as long as she lived, she vowed, rubbing her tender palms.
She straightened her shirt as a deliciously familiar smell filled her nostrils.
Five
A RELUCTANT NEWBIE
In her haste to escape the scene of her humiliation, Beatrice had inadvertently wandered into an American bakery, right in the middle of Rome. A batch of freshly baked chocolate-chip cookies had just come out of the oven. Things were looking up.
The price of two euros for one medium-sized cookie was a bit shocking. Still, she had to have that cookie, whatever the cost. She deserved it after being laughed at by a group of strangers, not to mention having her phone ground to pieces.
She scrounged in her bag for the necessary coins and handed them over in exchange for a warm, moist piece of heaven. She closed her eyes and bit into it, the sensations of home flooding over her. It was as if she were no longer on a crowded street in Rome, but back in Boston, sitting at her own kitchen table. At that moment she would have traded all the marvels of Europe to be sitting at that table, sharing her cookie with Georgette.
Tears welled up in her eyes, but she wiped them away before they could fall. She wasn’t going to let the shop assistant see her crying over a chocolate-chip cookie. She sniffed a couple of times, hoping to pass for someone with allergies, and began retracing her steps back to the apartment that was now her home.
She turned the corner into a small piazza. Three boys about her age were kicking around a soccer ball. This was already a regular sight, but something was different about these kids—something familiar.
“Sean, over here!” shouted the tallest boy.
English! They were American! An irrepressible urge to talk to them—to communicate with other kids in her own language—washed over her. She summoned all her courage and when the ball rolled her way, she stopped it with her foot and said, “Hi. I’m Beatrice. Where’re you guys from?”
She felt idiotic even as she said it. Couldn’t she have thought up anything more clever to say?
“We’re from the States,” the tallest boy said. “I’m Alex. I’m from California, and Sean and Kevin are from Michigan. But we live here.” He seemed proud of this fact, although he was clearly trying to act like it was no big deal.
“Yeah, I live here too,” said Beatrice, attempting to match his coolness. “But I’m from Boston originally.” She’d heard people drop in the word originally when referring to their hometowns, and thought it sounded sophisticated.
“Cool.”
“Do you guys live in this neighborhood?”
Before they could answer, another boy came jogging up. With his brown curly hair, olive skin, and trendy clothes, he looked more like the local kids.
“Ciao, rega’!”1 he called to the American boys.
“Ciao, Marco!” they answered, slapping each other’s hands.
“È un’amica vostra?”2 said the boy called Marco, glancing at Beatrice.
“No, è un’americana che vive qui,”3 explained the boy called Sean.
Beatrice’s eyes widened. He spoke perfect Italian! How long had he lived here to be able to speak like that?
“L’abbiamo appena conosciuta,”4 added Alex.
Beatrice had no idea what they were saying, but she knew it was about her. As if on cue, she flushed scarlet. It was a redhead’s curse, and she was powerless to stop it.
“Piacere,”5 said Marco to Beatrice with a winning smile, each cheek pierced by a dimple. “Da quanto tempo stai qua?”6
Beatrice’s stomach wobbled as a pair of liquid brown eyes stared into hers. She ransacked her brain for a snippet of Italian small talk, but anything she attempted would have given her away as an imposter.
After a few moments’ silence, which felt like an eternity, Alex said with an accusatory tone, “I thought you said you lived here! And you can’t even speak Italian?”
Beatrice felt like a fraud. But she did live here! She hadn’t been lying.
She swallowed. “Well, we only just moved here earlier this summer.” This summer sounded a lot better than last week. “I haven’t had time to learn any Italian yet.” She tried not to sound defensive.
“Oh, a newbie! Ha-ha! We’ll see how you adjust!” Alex kicked the ball out from under Beatrice’s foot. The boys took up their game and she was instantly forgotten. Refusing to give them the satisfaction of showing off their soccer skills, she stalked away without another word.
“But you only just got here! It’s not easy to adjust to a new city, let alone a new country,” said her dad after she’d described her humiliating day. “Don’t be so hard on yourself, Bea. You’ll get the hang of it.”
“I’m not so sure,” she muttered. “It seems like everything in this city was designed to make me feel like a complete idiot. I can’t even communicate. Do you know how frustrating that is?” She slumped onto the couch.
“As a matter of fact, I do. But you’ll learn the language in no time. I have a feeling you’re going to be a natural.”
Beatrice rolled her eyes. Why was he always so infernally optimistic? “I’ll be the only one in my class who can’t speak Italian. How embarrassing!”
“But you’ll be attending international school; your classes and homework will be entirely in English.”
“Still! If all the kids speak Italian except for me, then every time they do, I’ll just have to stand there like a moron.” Her cheeks flushed at the thought. I’ll be left out, she wanted to add, but it sounded too pathetic to say out loud.
“I’ve got it!” her dad exclaimed. “I’ll hire you an Italian tutor—just for the summer—to come for a few hours each morning and give you private less
ons. By the time school starts, you’ll be speaking Italian as well as Dante himself!”
Oh, great. Now on top of everything else, she was being condemned to summer school. Private summer school.
“Why didn’t I think of this before? There’s a retired university professor living in this building. I’ll ask her if she knows a good tutor, and with any luck, you can start first thing Monday.”
Beatrice groaned silently. She couldn’t complain, not after the fuss she’d made. And who knew? Maybe she would be a natural, like her dad said. Maybe after a few lessons, she’d be able to show the neighborhood boys just how fast she could learn a new language.
Mr. Archer was true to his word, and the following Monday morning, with a lump in her throat, Beatrice was waiting for her tutor to arrive for their first lesson. What if she couldn’t remember the words? What if she couldn’t even pronounce them?
The buzzer sounded, scattering Beatrice’s negative thoughts. She opened the door to find a young woman with dark bobbed hair, an oval face, and an aquiline nose. She wore a severe black suit and stood as straight as a Corinthian column. Her appearance was animated by two black eyes glittering behind a pair of green-rimmed glasses.
“Hello,” said Beatrice, holding the door wide. “I’m Beatrice. Come in.” She managed a smile despite her nerves.
“Piacere,” said her new tutor, shaking Beatrice’s hand in a businesslike manner. “Io mi chiamo Ginevra Furbetta.”7
Beatrice froze, the smile dying on her lips. She realized with dismay that she didn’t even know the Italian for Pardon me?
“Piacere,” Ginevra repeated pointedly.
“Ah, right, piacere.” Beatrice parroted. She’d read this word in her phrase book. It meant Nice to meet you. Maybe she’d get the hang of this after all. “Please, come in—”
“Solo italiano!” Ginevra cut her off sternly.
Midnight in the Piazza Page 2