The Sweet Life (7 page)
‘Who
is
he?’ Em breathed. ‘He knew who you were?’
‘He’s my aunt’s personal chauffeur, Luca,’ said Janey. ‘Even his
name’s
divine!
And
he’s picking me up tonight at eight . . . but only to take me to my aunt of course.
‘He probably doesn’t even remember what I look like, Em,’ she added. ‘He’s the sort who deals with sophisticated people all day, all year round. If you’ve ever seen an elegant Roman woman in full war paint, big hair and designer gear – and I passed plenty on my way here – someone who looks like me wouldn’t even rate a second glance! As soon as he dropped me at my aunt’s place, I’m sure he pretty much forgot I existed.’
‘You’d be surprised, Janey,’ Em replied. ‘Since Ness performed emergency wardrobe surgery on you that night, and you started trial-running the principles of high fashion during the last week of school, even Cameron Mallory and his too-cool-for-school skater crew were suddenly asking about you.’
‘Are you kidding?’ Janey shot back with disbelief. Cameron Mallory and his skater boy buddies were the hottest Year 12 guys at Selbourne High. They never noticed
anybody
, mainly because they didn’t have to. Every guy wanted to hang out with them. Every girl, from the smallest Year 7 pipsqueak upwards, wanted to date them.
‘Believe it,’ said Em. ‘Apparently, a millisecond after you walked by him on the last day of school in that very Jessica Simpson-esque ensemble you were wearing, he was asking Jenny Kyriacou’s older brother who on earth you were. Like you haven’t been part of the school furniture since, well,
forever
! It was pure genius to throw your long cardie over that grey T-shirt dress Ness lent you. And only someone with stick legs like yours could get away with wearing black tights and red open-toed wedges. In
winter
.’
Janey snorted. ‘He was probably asking, Emily, because I trod on his toes as I clomped past. I almost did a Naomi Campbell off those platforms that afternoon, that’s how out of control I was in them! If Gabs hadn’t grabbed me by the elbow I would’ve fallen flat on my face as the final bell went.’
‘Well, believe what you like, Janes, but if you keep up this whole dressing-like-a-Hollywood-starlet thing, don’t be surprised if Cam Mallory suddenly sails up to you on his Dogtown skateboard next term and asks for your phone number,’ said Em loyally. ‘Jenny said he sounded pretty keen to get to know you. And we
do
have an end-of-year formal coming up. You could do worse.
Way
worse.’
‘Don’t do my head in!’ Janey turned as the hotel employee tapped on the glass door of the phone booth and indicated that she was about to be charged for a second block of time. ‘Gotta go,’ Janey said, miming her thanks at the young woman. ‘Apparently I’m about to blow a second huge chunk of change if I don’t get off now. And I
really
want that tiramisù that I promised to eat for you! Tell the others I’ll try to call again.’
‘Soon as you get back to luxury central, check out if your aunt has a computer,’ Em advised. ‘She should, if your description of her pad is anything to go by. If my calculations are correct, I’ll tell the others to expect a bit of MySpace or telephone action from you either really early or really late our time.’
‘You got it,’ Janey replied. She replaced the heavy black old-style receiver in its cradle. It suddenly struck her how far away her besties were. Rome would be ten thousand times more breathtaking than it was already if those guys were here as well. She was so used to sharing everything with them, highs
and
lows. She felt her eyes misting again, and had to compose herself before leaving the booth.
Janey grabbed her sunnies, paid her phone tab with a smile, and walked quickly back across the reception area towards the revolving front door of the hotel. But before she could enter it, she heard someone call out her name. Janey spun around in surprise.
‘Thought it was you,’ drawled the tall, blond young man in a confident American accent, looking Janey up and down appreciatively. He took off his Ray-Bans and slicked back his perfect hair with one tanned hand. ‘Brandon, remember?’
Janey coloured. Freddy’s friend, the preppy guy with the amazing sky-blue eyes. Of course, he had to stand there looking like a male model, while, thanks to her long walk and her conversation with Em, she looked like a sweaty, shiny, emotional fur ball. Janey wondered why he’d even bothered to call out to her.
‘Mmm-hmmm,’ she said. ‘Um, fancy meeting
you
here.’ She winced at how lame she sounded, just wanting to escape.
Brandon surprised her by apologising. ‘Look, I’m sorry if I made you feel uncomfortable yesterday, grabbing you like that. I forget how full-on we can all be! Especially Freddy, who can be a pretty forceful character. You’re both so . . . different. It’s hard to believe you’re related.’
Janey blushed even more wildly.
‘I meant that in a good way,’ he said hastily. ‘Look, can I buy you a coffee? I can feel foot-in-mouth happening again. You have this effect on me . . .’
Janey shot him a look of pure astonishment and Brandon laughed. ‘Honestly, there’s something about you, Jane, that makes me say and do all the wrong stuff. Let’s start over?’
‘Uh, my friends call me Janey, and I’ve already got a date, s-sorry, and I’m pretty keen to keep it.’
But Brandon wouldn’t be deterred. ‘Would he mind if I crashed it?’
The determination on his face made Janey burst out in giggles, despite how uncomfortable she was feeling. ‘It isn’t with a
he
, but with a giant serving of tiramisù. At the Café de Paris. I promised someone I’d make haste there forthwith and genteelly stuff my face with it. You can come along if you want. But it won’t be pretty!’
Brandon’s shoulders relaxed, and he gave a pearly-white grin. ‘I’d like that. I haven’t been there in ages and I can’t imagine anyone better to share a very rich, very fattening dessert with.’
For a moment, Freddy’s flawless features bobbed up in Janey’s mind and her smile died. There was someone better, right there. She sighed inwardly before tucking escaped tendrils of hair back under her cap and saying brightly, ‘Lead the way!’
Janey and Brandon spent so long laughing over coffee and cake at the Café de Paris that she had to sprint like a madwoman to make it back to Celia’s apartment in time to have a shower before meeting her aunt for dinner. The day had already brought a surprise new acquaintance, not to mention an avalanche of new sights, tastes and experiences, and Janey couldn’t believe there was still more to come!
She began to feel really nervous about finally meeting her aunt, and it took her ages to work out what to wear. She finally settled on the classic red-and-white striped halter-neck top and skinny jeans, cramming her feet into the red wedges and praying silently that she wouldn’t topple out of them right under Luca’s nose. After achieving the usual slightly lopsided results with her hair straightener, she tied a jaunty silk scarf around her neck and let herself out of the apartment just before eight. She walked carefully down the front steps of the villa at the same time that Luca pulled up at the kerb in the shiny black car.
Luca slid elegantly out of the driver’s seat and held Janey’s door open for her as though she were visiting royalty. ‘Ciao bella!’ he said, as Janey slid into the front passenger seat, glad she hadn’t lost control of her treacherous footwear.
He didn’t really mean the
‘
bella
’
bit
, she told herself sternly.
He’s just being polite
. But her heart felt like it had skipped a beat regardless.
Luca turned the car in the direction of Celia Albright’s favourite trattoria, Da Edoardo. But he had to charm Janey into telling him about her day, because all of a sudden she was tongue-tied. She’d been looking forward to seeing Luca all day, and now here he was, and here she was, and the trip was probably half over already, and she’d probably never see him again after today and, well, what was the point anyway?
As the car entered Rome’s old city once more, and Janey couldn’t manage anything more than one-word answers, Luca began talking about himself, and how he was taking time off from his second year of architectural studies at the University of Rome to indulge his passion for meeting people from around the world, and to figure out what he really wanted to do.
‘I am lazy, no?’ he laughed. ‘At least, my father, he think so. He is quite the famous architetto here, in this country, and he is angry that I “waste my life”. But I enjoy very much the driving, and to talk with new people.’
‘Will you go back, do you think?’ Janey asked, her interest piqued. ‘I’m hoping to do, um, journalism or psychology one day. My friends seem to think I’m a good listener . . .’
‘Perhaps, in time,’ Luca replied airily, avoiding a bus that swung out without warning from the kerb. ‘But not yet, I think. The Australians, they are good to me. I meet many interesting people from your country, some I have even visit, in Sydney, Perth, your Great Reef.’
‘The Great
Barrier
Reef?’ Janey exclaimed as Luca nodded. ‘I haven’t even been there yet!’
And despite herself, Janey started to describe her day – fluffing her Italian verbs at the undercover market, her long walk, braving the super luxe Hotel Majestic. ‘And would you believe I met one of Freddy’s friends there when I went in to use the phone?’ she said. ‘He just happened to be there – visiting his uncle – isn’t that incredible?’
Luca glanced sidelong at Janey as he negotiated another impossible overtake. ‘Veramente? It is indeed incredible, signorina. Rome is a big city. Chi? Who was it?’
‘Brandon,’ said Janey happily. ‘The male modelly one, not the horrible one – Paolo, I think his name was – who looked at me like I was something stuck to the bottom of his shoe.
Brandon and I had afternoon tea at the Café de Paris. He even gave me his mobile number! I thought he’d be a bit stuck up, looking the way he looks, but he’s not. He’s actually really, really nice.’
Janey still couldn’t believe how much she and Brandon had had in common and how the afternoon had flown by. He rocked out to the same bands she was into (The Killers, Franz Ferdinand, Good Charlotte, Powderfinger), loved reading trashy thrillers like she did, and had lost his mum at a really young age as well. The similarities between their lives – apart from the fact that Brandon’s dad was a mega-wealthy industrialist from the east coast of America who was currently based in Italy doing million-dollar business deals – were
amazing
.
‘Why are you surprised that this Brandon, he is nice? You are not “stuck up”, as you say, yet you are also—?’ Luca hadn’t finished his sentence before Janey burst out laughing.
‘It’s lovely of you to even suggest that I’m remotely as good-looking as Brandon is. But it’s just the clothes, Luca. Until this week, I was a fashion dyslexic!’
Luca shot her a puzzled look as he prepared to make a right turn past a cluster of haphazardly parked Vespas into a narrow one-way street. ‘I do not understand you?’ he said.
‘No, you wouldn’t,’ Janey continued, amazed at how her life was suddenly filled with cute guys who seemed totally interested in
her
. The Janey of last week seemed a whole lifetime away.
Note to self
, she thought.
Do something nice for Ness when
you get home
.
She
so
deserves it.
The thought of having to return home soon made Janey’s smile dim a little, and it disappeared altogether when Luca announced, ‘We ’re here, signorina.’
