Wish You Were Italian (16 page)

I’m pulling eggs out of the refrigerator when Bruno shouts, “Do not drop them!”

I startle but keep the eggs steady in my hands, then turn to him and close the fridge with my hip. “I should crack one of these on your head.”

“Try it. See what happens.” He smirks, the circles under his eyes still there but not as noticeable.

I set all but one egg onto the butcher-block countertop, ready to tease him with it, but Chiara appears in the door to the kitchen and I lose my nerve. I may not exactly be listening to her over-protective lectures, but I don’t want to deliberately make her mad in full view. I turn from Bruno quickly and scoop the eggs back up, taking them to one of the cooks hovering over the stove.

“Someone is asking for you outside,” Chiara says.

Bruno rattles something off in Italian. All I catch are the names Francesca and Juliette. Something in my gut twists.

“Your girlfriends this week? How can you keep track?” she replies in pristine English, obviously a jab to both Bruno and me. “No, this is a man.”

My head whips up to look at Bruno. I’m armed and ready with a joke to throw at him, but his eyes are drawn tight in thought. The unmistakable hint of fear flashes across his face.

“He is here for Pippa,” Chiara says, practically bubbling over from the suspense of telling me.

A man?
Now the fear spreads through me. My limbs start to
weaken and all color drains from my face. Who knows I’m here? I only told Morgan, and there’s no way she’d snitch.

“Who?” I finally get out.

She shrugs, clearly pleased with the situation, and glances at Bruno. Both of their footsteps follow behind me as I limp my way through the indoor dining area and peek out the front. I scan the tables for a familiar face, but it’s the hair that catches my attention first. My heart kicks into gear and blood rushes back to my cheeks in an instant.

Darren’s lips are pulled in and an eyebrow is raised at a couple one table over engaged in a shameless make-out session. Honeymooners. I’m already trained to spot them. He looks away from them and catches me spying on him. His face relaxes into a smile.

I peer back at Chiara and Bruno with my best shouldn’t-you-be-doing-something look. Chiara grabs a pitcher and brings it to the kitchen while Bruno heads straight for Darren’s table. I snatch his arm and pull him back.

“Let me get his table,” I spit out in a rush. “I already know the menu. Plus, he’s here to see me, remember?”

“That is my section,” he retorts, eyes slightly narrowed.

“Too bad. I’m taking it.” I reach for a menu. Without waiting for a reply, I hobble as quickly as I can to meet Darren. He’s still smiling.

“Hey! What are you doing here?” I ask, doing my best to tone down my inner schoolgirl.

He laughs, leaning on the back legs of his chair, hands resting just below his chest with fingers interlocked. “I’m fine, thanks, how are you?”

“I’m sorry,” I say, mentally kicking myself. “How are you?”

“Still fine.” His smile stretches to his ears tucked deep inside his curls. How did I forget those dimples?

“I’m sorry! You just sort of disappeared last time, so I’m surprised to see you. Again.”

His smile falls a little and his Adam’s apple bobs up, then back down. “Good surprise?”

Gripping the menu like a fan, I push air toward me. I open my mouth to speak, still unsure of how to answer in the least psychotic way possible, when Nina walks up, sporting a bright orange tank top and army green shorts that barely hit her thigh. She’s followed closely by a nicely tanned guy with short, wavy hair.

“I guess you really did find Pippa, didn’t you?” Nina walks up the couple of steps to the patio and wraps her arms around me. “How are you? Darren tells us he was your knight-in-shining-armor last weeke—”

“I didn’t say it like that,” he jumps in.

Nina pulls away and checks out my feet. “All healed up?”

I can’t tell if she’s genuinely concerned or if she’s about to step on my ankle to reinjure it.

“I’m a lot better now, thanks. Yeah, I—I had no idea he’d even be here,” I stammer like I’ve got something to hide. “It was a total freak accident, running into each other. And right when I’d hurt myself and needed help getting back.” Ugh. Ramble much?

Nina laughs without opening her mouth. “Lucky girl.”

She takes a seat next to Darren, and the tall guy who walked up with her holds out a hand for me to shake.

“I’m Tate.”

“Pippa.”

“Yes. I’ve heard.” Tate smiles, revealing familiar dimples, and sits on the other side of Darren. He plucks a sugar packet from the container on the table and nervously tears at its edges.

Darren drops his chair on all fours and clears his throat with excessive force. “Tate’s my brother.”

That explains the dimples and the hair. “Oh, that’s right. I remember you mentioning him.”

I turn to observe Tate again. He’s a little thicker than Darren, and clean shaven. Probably a few years older.

I should take their drink order, but that’s not really the question I’m dying to learn the answer to. “So, what brings you guys to Cinque Terre?”

Darren steals the menu from Nina and scans it as he says, “Oh, we have a couple of weeks off. Thought it might be nice to spend most of one of them here on the coast.”

I stifle a gasp. A week? Here?

“I wasn’t finished with that,” Nina says, taking the menu again, then looking up at me with an almost devious smile. “Darren insisted we come up here first. Wouldn’t take no for an answer.”

My eyes dart to Darren, expecting him to explain.

“Next week we’re heading down to Pompeii,” Darren says, giving Nina a pointed look.

I let out an audible gasp. “Oh, that’s awesome. I’m dying to see Pompeii.”

Nina sets the menu down on the table and props her chin in her hands. “You should come with us.”

Her words hit me like a challenge. I look from Darren to Tate, both of them smiling like they’re in on it and know my answer will be yes.

Wait a second. Is this some kind of setup?

Tate said he already knew my name, and he said it in that amused yet borderline annoyed tone as if Darren talked about me too much. Would he really try to set me up with his brother?

“You don’t have to answer right away,” Tate says. “We did sort of randomly spring it on you.” He flings the sugar packet at Nina and she ducks behind her menu again.

“But we’d love for you to come,” Darren adds, reaching to the top of his head and retrieving a pair of sunglasses I didn’t even notice before buried in his hair. He folds them up and places them on the table. “You did say you wanted to see Pompeii.”

“Who wouldn’t?” I finally say.

Shrill laughter from across the patio demands my attention, and I find Bruno flirting shamelessly with a bleached blonde. His hand rests on the back of her chair and she’s gawking up at him, her fake-baked face barely letting her natural blush shine through. Is this his way of getting back at me for wanting Darren’s table, or is he like that with customers all the time no matter what? This whole week I’ve been trapped in the apartment, has he been here carrying on, “business” as usual?

When I turn back, Darren is glaring at Bruno, jaw set in a hard line. Nina and Tate are smirking at each other. This is all just too weird.

Another shriek of laughter comes from Bruno’s table. He
catches me looking and cocks his head to the side, eyes darting between Darren and Tate before clearly checking out Nina. The blonde coughs and his attention is back on her. He’s like two different people and I don’t know which one to believe in.

I exhale and smile at my new friends. “I’m in.”

Chapter Twenty-Four

The next morning, I change my mind. Several times over.

Darren, Nina, and Tate are staying in Manarola—just as Darren had last weekend—so we planned to meet up for lunch at Bar dell’Amore, a tiny cliff-side restaurant between the villages. A gray wall of cloud cover looms overhead and I’m able to walk the trail without my skin melting off. I’m also able to think semi-clearly, and I teeter back and forth with my hasty decision to go with them to Pompeii. My frequent breaks allow my ankle to rest and I get a good forty-five minutes’ worth of quality think time.

I shouldn’t go. Even though Darren’s been nothing but nice, I don’t actually
know him
know him. Or Tate, or Nina, for that matter.

Besides, how can I make myself stop thinking about Darren now that he found me again? Actually sought me out this time, knowing where I’d be. Even if it was all for his brother.

I spot Darren sitting alone at a table, chewing the tip of his thumbnail, elbow propped up on the metal railing, gazing out over the sea. I can’t help it. I raise my camera and snap a picture of him, then check it on my display. The perfect candid. He could be anyone, enjoying the beauty of the Italian Riviera. But he’s sitting there, waiting for me.

Maybe I
should
go.

I pull out the chair opposite him and plop down, setting my camera on the table. “Hey.”

The wind whirls around us, causing our hair to fly up in the air and tangle around our faces.

“Hi.” He smiles, placing a hand on top of his head to control the madness.

“Windy today.” I use the band on my wrist to pull my hair back in a floppy loop.

“It’s supposed to rain.” Darren points across the water to an ominous black cloud. “It’s already storming out there.”

I frown at the sky. Hiding from rain back at the apartment is the last thing I want to have to do today.

“What’s wrong?” he asks. “Afraid to get wet?”

I motion to my camera. “I’m afraid to get
that
wet.”

Now he frowns at the sky. “Do you want to go back?”

The distant storm flashes with fingers of lightning, probably a sign I should call it a day, but I can’t make myself do it.

“I’ll take my chances,” I say, turning one corner of my mouth up in an attempt to look saucy.

What am I doing? He has a girlfriend.

I scan the area around us to try and spot her. “So where are Tate and Nina? I thought they’d be with you.”
And I thought you were pushing Tate on me. I prepared myself for all three of you and it’s just you. Again
.

“Nina had a headache.”

“Okay.…”

“She acts tough sometimes but she’s a big baby when she doesn’t feel good.” He gives up holding back his hair and just lets it fly where it wants. “Tate stayed with her,” he adds with a roll of his eyes.

“Tate …?”

“Yeah …?”

“But I thought—” No. Way. “Wait a minute. Are they …
together?
” I manage to spit out, mouth suddenly filled with cotton.

“Tate and Nina? Yeah.”

“Ohhhh.” My mind is a whirlwind.

His eyes widen and the words race out. “You thought—wow, no no no no no. She’s like three years older than me.”

“So there’s nothing between you and her?” I stare at his face but I’m unable to focus on his features.

“No. They were already dating when I met her. That sort of thing’s off limits, you know?” He opens his mouth to continue, but instead bites at his bottom lip and turns his face back to study the sky.

Do I
know?
I want to tell him that’s why I never asked for an e-mail address, phone number, any way to contact him. He was off limits, and I couldn’t be that girl.

I fight to keep laughter from escaping my lips, my mind flipping through memories of every interaction Darren and I have had. How did I go this long thinking he was the one dating
Nina? Neither of them ever came right out and said it. They just seemed so comfortable around each other. Like … family.

I am one big, fat idiot—
sono un grande idiota
.

Darren crosses his arms on the table and leans toward me. My heart kicks the inside of my chest, forcing me to mirror him.

“You really thought I was with her? This whole time?”

I nod. “I guess I shouldn’t assume so much.”

He shrugs and studies my face intently. “Sometimes it’s hard not to.” He bites his lip again, obviously keeping himself from saying more.

The wind rushes around us and my face gets pelted with loose grains of sand from the edges of the nearby trail. I close my eyes tight but it’s too late.

“Agh!” I shout, pressing my fingers into my eyelid reflexively—probably the absolute worst thing to do.

“Stop! You’re gonna scratch your cornea or something.”

I stop. A chair screeches and I sense him super close to me. My right eye is on fire, tears welling up. I bring my hand back up, but Darren snatches my wrist before I can do any more damage.

“Do you want me to see if I can get it out?” he asks.

The scent of warm spearmint reaches my nose. I try to look at him but I’m practically underwater. All I see is a flesh-colored mass with a dark halo.

I swallow. “Are your hands dirty?”

He laughs deep and my body rocks as he rotates my chair to face him better. “What do you think is in your eye, Pippa?”

“Dirt.”

I catch a whiff of spearmint again. Too close.

“So am I doing this or do I have to carry you to a mirror?” he asks.

I squint and slam my fist toward where his shoulder should be. “Smart aleck.” I try to relax as he pries my eyelid open.

“I see it. Look up and to the right.”

My teeth clench together as a fingertip gently touches the white of my eye and pulls away. Every part of my body is tense, completely disgusted.

“Got it.”

I blink a few times and try to refocus on my surroundings through the blur. “Thanks.”

He observes the dark dot resting in the middle of his pointer finger. “Make a wish.”

A wish. I wished on a coin at the Trevi in Rome, and I saw Darren’s face in my mind just as the coin fell in. Now I’m actually looking at his face, the real one. A shiver tickles my spine and I take a shaky breath.

“You want me to wish on a grain of sand?”

“Well, yeah. It was in your eye, wasn’t it?”

“It’s not an eyelash.”

“Oh, is that the rule? Hmmm.” Darren frowns at the granule. “That’s too bad. I was sure it had a wish to grant.” He’s just about to wipe his hands on his khaki shorts, but I stop him.