Genuine Fraud(23)

“Yeah.”

“What’s the best one, you think?”

“Great Expectations.”

“What’s it about?” Paolo wasn’t looking at the waxwork. He was looking at Jule, intently. He reached out and ran his hand down her arm while she answered. It was a very confident move, to touch her like that, seconds after reintroducing himself. She didn’t usually let people touch her, but she didn’t mind with Paolo. He was very gentle.

“This orphan boy falls in love with a rich girl,” she told him. “Her name is Estella. And Estella has been trained her whole life to break men’s hearts, and perhaps she has no heart of her own. She was brought up by a crazy lady who was jilted at the altar.”

“So this Estella breaks the boy’s heart?”

“Many times over. On purpose. Estella doesn’t know how to do anything else. Breaking hearts is her only power in the world.” They walked away from Dickens and into a different section of the museum. “Are you here on your own?” Jule asked.

“With a friend of my dad’s. I’ve been staying with him for a few days. He wants to show me the city, only he keeps having to sit down. Artie Thatcher, you know him?”

“No.”

“His sciatica flared. He went to rest in the tea shop.”

“And how come you’re in London?”

“I did the backpacking thing through Spain, Portugal, France, Germany, the Netherlands, France again. Then I came here. I was traveling with my friend, but he went home for Christmas, and I didn’t feel like going back, so I came to stay with Artie for the holidays. You?”

“I have a flat here.”

Paolo leaned in close and pointed down a dark hall. “Hey, there’s the Chamber of Horrors, down that hall. Will you go in there with me? I need protection.”

“From what?”

“From the crazy-scary waxworks, that’s what,” Paolo said. “It’s going to be a prison with escaped inmates. I looked it up. Lots of blood and guts.”

“And you want to go?”

“I love blood and guts. But not alone.” He smiled. “Are you coming to protect me from the inmates of the asylum, Imogen?” They stood at the door to the Chamber of Horrors now.

“Sure,” said Jule. “I’ll protect you.”





There had never been three boyfriends at Stanford.

There had never been three boyfriends anywhere. Or even one boyfriend.

Jule didn’t need a guy, wasn’t sure she liked guys, wasn’t sure she liked anyone.

She was supposed to meet Paolo at eight o’clock. She brushed her teeth three times and changed her clothes twice. She put on jasmine perfume.

When she spotted him waiting by the carousel where they had arranged to meet, she nearly turned around and left. Paolo was watching a street performer. He had his scarf wrapped tightly against the January wind.

Jule told herself she shouldn’t get close to people. No one was worth the risk. She would leave right now, she was about to leave—but then Paolo saw her and ran at her, top speed, like a little boy, stopping short before he crashed. He swung her around by the wrists and said, “Jeez, it’s like a movie. Can you believe we’re in London? Everything we know is on the other side of the ocean.”

And he was right. Everything was on the other side of the ocean.

Tonight would be okay.

Paolo took Jule walking along the Thames. Street performers played accordions and walked low tightropes. The two of them poked around in a bookshop for a while, and then Jule bought them both cotton candy. Folding sweet pink clouds into their mouths, they walked along to the Westminster Bridge.

Paolo took Jule’s hand and she let him. He rubbed her wrist softly now and then with the pad of his thumb. It sent a warm thrill up her arm. She was surprised that his touch could feel so comforting.

The Westminster Bridge was a series of stone arches over the river, gray and green. Light from the lamps on top of the bridge shone onto the rushing river.

“The worst thing in that Chamber of Horrors was Jack the Ripper,” said Paolo. “Know why?”

“Why?”

“One, because he was never caught. And two, because there’s a rumor that he killed himself by jumping off this exact bridge.”

“Get out.”

“He did. He was probably standing right here when he jumped. I read it on the Internet.”

“That is complete trash,” said Jule. “No one even knows who Jack the Ripper really was.”

“You’re right,” he said. “It is trash.”

He kissed her then, under the streetlight. Like a scene from a film. The stones were damp in the fog and glistened. Their coats flapped in the wind. Jule shivered in the night air, and Paolo put his warm hand against her neck.

He kissed like he couldn’t imagine wanting to be anywhere else on the planet, because wasn’t this so nice, and didn’t this feel good? As if he knew she didn’t let people touch her, and he knew she would let him touch her, and he was the luckiest guy in the world. Jule felt as if the river underneath her were running through her veins.

She wanted to be herself with him.

Wondered if she was being herself. If she could go on being herself.

And if anyone could love the person she was.