A Summer In Europe

by Marilyn Brant

  Praise for Marilyn Brant and A Summer in Europe

  “How I wish I were on this European tour with Marilyn Brant’s

  winsome, wonderful characters. I loved every minute of

  this delightful novel, from the breathtaking sights to

  the deliciously described food to the thrilling new

  experiences. Brava, Marilyn Brant!”

  —Melissa Senate, bestselling author of

  The Love Goddess’ Cooking School

  “Reading a Marilyn Brant book is like eating a piece of rich

  chocolate—it gets you excited, it’s deliciously satisfying, and

  it leaves a smile on your face after you’ve finished it!”

  —Simone Elkeles, New York Times and USA Today

  bestselling author of the Perfect Chemistry series

  “Marilyn Brant has done it again: she has crafted a warm and wise

  novel filled with characters that live on in your imagination. Make

  sure your passport is in order. After reading A Summer in Europe

  you’ll want to book your flight immediately!”

  —Laura Moore, author of Remember Me

  Books by Marilyn Brant

  ACCORDING TO JANE

  FRIDAY MORNINGS AT NINE

  A SUMMER IN EUROPE

  Published by Kensington Publishing Corporation

  A Summer in Europe

  MARILYN BRANT

  KENSINGTON BOOKS

  www.kensingtonbooks.com

  All copyrighted material within is Attributor Protected.

  Table of Contents

  Praise for Marilyn Brant and A Summer in Europe

  Books by Marilyn Brant

  Title Page

  Dedication

  ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

  1 - An Unexpected Turn of Events

  2 - From Home to Rome in Search of Adventure and Authentic Gelato

  3 - A Clash of Philosophies

  4 - The Birthplace of the Renaissance

  5 - Lying to Emerson and Aunt Bea and Cynthia and Thoreau

  6 - All the World’s a Stage

  7 - A Prelude to the Music of the Night

  8 - The Bold, the Beautiful and the Bad-Boy Brothers

  9 - Illuminations

  10 - Games People Play

  11 - Beware of What You Wish

  12 - A View with a Room

  13 - Got the World on a String

  A READING GROUP GUIDE

  DISCUSSION QUESTIONS

  Learning to Play Mah-jongg at the Steak-n-Shake

  Copyright Page

  To My Dad,

  who first enchanted me with tales of world travel ...

  To My Husband,

  who enthusiastically traveled the world with me ...

  And To My Son,

  who now travels with me, so I can see the world anew.

  ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

  You can hold in your heart a passion for a place that lingers years after you’ve left it. It takes little more than a flash of film footage, a whiff of a certain delectable scent or a melody that dances through the airwaves and tangos with your memories to bring back the experience full force ... zipping through you like the exhilarating rush of a speeding train ride, on a warm summer night, with the windows wide open.

  Such is my love for Europe.

  From holding my mom’s hand and gazing out at London Bridge when I was just a little girl to getting engaged to the love of my life on that same bridge over twenty years later, I’ve traveled at so many significant moments that the experience of embarking on an international journey has melded with my DNA and become part of me. I performed in folk-dance festivals throughout Europe as a college student, backpacked with my fiancé-then-husband through the dust-covered ancient ruins of Italy, Greece and Turkey, touched a glacier on the snow-tipped Alps, strolled along the coastal walkways of the Riviera and explored the vibrant European capital cities from Budapest to Dublin and from Madrid to Oslo. I never tired of the thrill of it.

  So, my first thank you is to the people of Europe for your kindness and for helping to make every one of my visits a joyous, memorable adventure.

  Thanks, as always, to my wonderful writing chapter, Chicago-North RWA, especially to my critique partners Karen Dale Harris, Laura Moore and Lisa Laing, who each brought tremendous insight to this manuscript. Special thanks to Simone Elkeles for sharing her mah-jongg expertise with me, and to Erika Danou, Sara Daniel, Pamala Knight and Susan McBride for their unflagging moral support. The friendship you’ve all given me is a treasured gift.

  I’ve also had a team of extraordinary friends—online and off—who make day-to-day life enormously fun. I’m so thankful for Sarah Pressly-James, Joyce Twardock, Karen Karris, Heather Eisenhour, Ann Dingman and Anne Scarano for being my hometown cheerleaders. Love you, ladies—even though you made me sing karaoke once. And hugs of gratitude to my online pals: my 007 Golden Heart Bond Girls, the Girlfriends Book Club, the Austen Authors, my fellow Magical Musings sisters and the generous blogging friends who visit me on Brant Flakes and other sites around the Web. I can’t express how much I appreciate you all.

  One of the great delights in writing women’s fiction has been the opportunity to visit so many fantastic book clubs and have discussions about my novels after their release. This year one book club dear to my heart—The Page Turners—read this novel months in advance and shared their thoughts with me. Huge thanks to Brenda Brown, Gayle Jensen, Jeanne Kircher, Kristi Knull, Julie Leach, Dina Pierce, Michelle Ritchie and Evelyn Webber. Your enthusiasm for this story and your thoughtful feedback was truly helpful. Thanks, too, to Nephele Tempest for your suggestions, and to Barbara Dacloush and Ana Dawson for years of encouragement.

  Boundless appreciation to my fabulous editor, John Scog-namiglio, and the entire Kensington staff. I feel so fortunate to be working with all of you. Heartfelt thanks to librarians, booksellers and readers everywhere for your interest in my novels and your warm e-mails to me. You’re a big part of why I adore my job.

  And, of course, my love and gratitude to all my family—most especially my parents, my brother, my husband and my son—who have understood my wanderlust for as long as they’ve known me and, in many cases, shared it.

  If music be the food of love, play on ... (Twelfth Night)

  The web of our life is of a mingled yarn,

  good and ill together. (All’s Well That Ends Well)

  —William Shakespeare

  “Life ... is a public performance on the violin,

  in which you must learn the instrument as you go along.”

  “Does it seem reasonable that she should play so wonderfully,

  and live so quietly? I suspect that one day she will be wonderful in both ...

  music and life will mingle.”

  —E. M. Forster (A Room with a View)

  1

  An Unexpected Turn of Events

  Tuesday, June 26

  The thing no one understood about Gwendolyn Reese was that she was three ages at once: thirty chronologically, forty-five intellectually and fifteen experientially. The people inhabiting her small circle of acquaintances planned to celebrate the first of these maturational milestones with Mylar balloons and devil’s food cake. The second, they revered privately, hoping their appreciation would score them a shot at being her partner during the odd game of Trivial Pursuit. But, with the possible exception of her eccentric Aunt Beatrice, they were patently oblivious to the third.

  Aunt Beatrice—who clocked in at sixty-seven chronologically, twenty-four intellectually and a whopping one hundred-ten experientially—knew how to have a good time. Even if Beatrice’s idea of “a good time” didn’t exactly mesh with Gwendolyn’s own.

  A poin
t Gwen was painfully reminded of when she was awakened—at five a.m.—by the persistent ringing of the telephone and realized that on this, her thirtieth birthday, and in complete disregard of her intentions for a quiet solo dinner and a warm bath to the emotionally soaring melodies of Andrew Lloyd Webber, she’d be spending the evening instead with Beatrice and all thirteen wack-job members of her aunt’s S&M club.

  The day was off to a disturbingly atypical start.

  “Gwennie! Happy birthday!” her aunt chirped on the phone.

  Gwen yawned, sat up on her extrafirm mattress, swung her legs over the side and slipped her feet into her sensible beige slippers on the floor. “Thanks, Aunt Bea.”

  “I know you’re an early riser, so I set my alarm special, just to wake up in time to catch you before you left. You’re going to your, whatchamacallit, spinning class now, right?”

  Gwen rubbed her eyes and glanced at the clock—a palindromic 5:05. “Yep. Soon.” She didn’t have the heart to tell her aunt that she only went to the five-thirty class during the school year when she had a full teaching day ahead. She slept late during summer vacation and never, ever got to the gym before six forty-five. Not in June.

  “Well, I won’t keep you for long then, honey, but it’s Tuesday so, of course, the club is getting together tonight. And we have a special birthday celebration planned just for you. When can you get here?”

  Gwen smothered a sigh. “Um ...” Her aunt’s “club” was something she tried to avoid like mosquitoes at twilight, like filing her taxes any later than March 1, like her eighth-grade math students coughing in her face during flu season. Those club people—however sweet, bighearted and well-meaning—were nothing short of crazy, and her aunt always wanted to drag her into their gatherings. All of them were sixty or older, but they acted like irresponsible teenagers half the time and horny college students the rest. Case in point, even though “S&M” technically stood for sudoku and mah-jongg, some of the members liked to imply that they weren’t opposed to the other meaning.

  Retired vet Dr. Louie Strand even had T-shirts made up that said, “I’m into S&M ... wanna play with me?”

  And Mrs. Matilda Riesling, at age eighty-three (and a former Presbyterian Church secretary no less!), apparently thought Dr. Louie’s shirts weren’t suggestive enough, so she countered with, “The S&M Club: It’s even more fun when we’re tied.”

  These were not people Gwen could relate to with ease.

  “Gwennie?”

  “I, uh, have to meet Richard for lunch downtown. One o’clock sharp, he said. But I could be at your house in the late afternoon or early evening.” Maybe if she arrived before five, she’d get to leave by seven.

  “Oh, good. Come around four-thirty, then. No later than five-fifteen, you hear? We’re seniors. We like to eat early.”

  Gwen agreed.

  “And, Gwennie, enjoy your lunch date. You’ll tell us all about it tonight, right?”

  “Right.”

  Aunt Beatrice hung up and Gwen was left holding the phone. She stared out the window of her condo into the rising eastern sun of a bright Iowa summer day, the mighty Mississippi River glinting in the distance. June 26. Her thirtieth birthday. She hoped, with a shiver of pure excitement, that she’d have more to celebrate than a new decade by the day’s end—provided, of course, she survived until bedtime.

  She set about skipping through the paces of her scrupulously well-structured morning. She may have been awakened a tad earlier than anticipated but, on a day as significant as this one, a little extra time to prepare wouldn’t be a bad thing, would it?

  She performed her series of twelve flexibility stretches, just as she always did, vacation or no. Her one really good friend from the school district, Kathy, her team-teaching partner in the junior-high math department, would always laugh when Gwen would do a few extra stretches during their lunch breaks, and she’d make up goofy animal descriptions of Gwen poses. It made Gwen smile to think about it. Kathy was funny, sweet-tempered ... and away on a summer-long missionary trip to El Salvador. She wouldn’t be calling Gwen up and asking if she were a Squatting Ostrich or a Twisted Ferret today.

  She sighed, feeling the twinge of her aloneness spreading like a low, slow ache. She wasn’t the type to make hordes of friends, so she missed having another woman to talk to on weekdays. Someone who’d sincerely listen. There was always her aunt, of course, but, well ... not really. And were it not for Richard, she’d be more than alone this summer. She’d be lonely, too.

  She walked into the kitchen and poured one measuring cup of her high-fiber bran flakes into her favorite white ceramic cereal bowl—the one with daisies very cheerfully ringing the circumference. She topped the flakes with two tablespoons of dried California raisins, half of a sliced banana and one level scoop of slivered almonds. She then poured exactly two-thirds of a cup of 1 percent milk over all of it and took her first bite.

  Mmm. Wholesomely balanced, delicious and even leisurely. And, because she could indulge in the extra time, she savored her healthy meal to the sounds of Andrew Lloyd Webber’s GOLD: The Definitive Hits Collection.

  She chewed her food with diligence while jumping between tracks. Barbra Streisand’s beautiful version of “As If We Never Said Goodbye” stirred her. When she heard the strings, she glanced, as she always did, at the violin hanging on the opposite wall. Her dad’s. She could almost imagine him playing that song. Feel the emotion he surely would have brought to it.

  She flipped to Sarah Brightman’s famous rendition of “The Phantom of the Opera,” even humming along since no one else could hear her. But it wasn’t until an especially melodious moment in selection #11’s “Love Changes Everything” from Aspects of Love that she felt the oddest wave of longing rise up and crash into her rib cage. Far more powerful than usual. She didn’t know why.

  Quite possibly, it was Michael Ball’s incredible vocals and haunting musical interpretation.

  Or, perhaps, she was still caught in that netherworld of sleepiness and was too easily affected by lyrics that mentioned “trembling” at the sound of someone’s name.

  Or, maybe, she was just getting old and sentimental.

  She inhaled sharply, swiped away an unexpected tear that blurred her vision and gulped the last spoonful of cereal. Maybe, if she had someone to share this music with in the morning, she wouldn’t feel the pang of loss that jabbed at her when she wasn’t expecting it. Richard might claim he wasn’t big into musicals, but that was only because he’d never really gone to any. At least not to any good ones. Hadn’t they just watched Singing in the Rain on TV? She bit her lip and nodded to herself, remembering. He seemed to enjoy that well enough, so she had reason to be hopeful. Once they were living in the same house together, he would surely understand, wouldn’t he?

  Then again, Richard prided himself on being very constant in his opinions. Something she generally appreciated about him. She prized this constancy in herself, too.

  But, oh, this was the big day!

  Gwen snapped off the music, trying to shrug off dancing nerves of indistinct origin. What was with these senseless jitters? This was going to be wonderful! It was the day she’d been waiting for....

  She forced herself to take a deep breath and then floated down the hall to get ready. She brushed and flossed, meticulously chose an outfit for her luncheon (white blouse, floral peach and pale pink skirt, brown leather sandals, dangling pearl earrings that had once belonged to her mother—for good luck) and packed her gym bag. She pulled her straight, dark blond hair back into a ponytail and prepared to drive the 8.6 miles to the gym.

  The rest of the morning progressed in perfect thirty- to sixty-minute intervals, precisely as planned. She took her class, cleaned herself up, did a few household tasks and even spoke briefly to each of her brothers.

  George, six years her junior, called to say, “Happy birthday, Sis,” from his computer-programming internship in Atlanta.

  And Geoffrey, eight years younger than Gwen, phoned in f
rom his accountancy work-study site in Seattle with the jovial greeting, “So, whoa, three decades! You’re an old lady.”

  “Very funny,” she’d said to Geoff, laughing, but she only pretended amusement. As excited as she was about her date with Richard, she’d been dreading this particular birthday for months. Years, if she were to be completely honest.

  Of course, just hearing her brothers’ voices again, while delightful, underscored how alone she’d felt since she’d moved to Dubuque to take this math teaching position. The big city on the Mississippi may have been less than two hours away from her tiny hometown of Waverly, Iowa, but all of her memories of her parents and her life growing up were back there. Her brothers had moved away now, too, and much farther than she had after their dad died two years ago. They’d expanded their view of the world, and a part of her wished she could shake off her origins just as easily and be more like them.

  She shoved away her combination of homesickness and irritation and, finally, when noon came around, she changed into her preselected clothing, put on a touch of makeup and found herself uncharacteristically giddy with anticipation.

  This was it!

  She sang a few bars of “Love Changes Everything” to herself—aloud!—before she realized it and stopped herself in embarrassment. She was that happy. Richard had hinted more than once in the past few weeks that he thought she’d “be pleased” with his gift. Knowing him, she more than suspected she’d love it.

  By three this afternoon, four at the latest, she’d no longer be the unattached newish teacher Gwendolyn Anne Reese, the subject of some speculation and slight pity amongst the too-inquisitive junior-high teaching staff at Midland Park School District #76. She’d be the future Mrs. Richard Sidney Banks. And she knew exactly what that would be like: warm, caring and secure. Richard was smart, kind, steady, responsible. A man she could understand. She liked knowing what to expect out of people, and liked it even more when they consistently delivered.