One Step to You (The Rome Novels #1)(29)

“Well, Gervasi, what is it?”

“I just wanted to tell you, teacher, that you made a mistake.”

A general murmur washed over the class. The girls seemed to have lost their collective minds. Babi was unruffled.

“Silence!” Signora Giacci turned red before regaining her self-control. “Oh, really, Gervasi, about what?”

“You couldn’t have tested Silvia Festa on March eighteenth.”

“What do you mean? It’s written right here, in my class ledger. Would you care to take a look? Here it is, March eighteenth, a C for Silvia Festa,” she said. “I’m starting to think that you really enjoy receiving disciplinary notes.”

“That grade is for Francesca Servanti. You made a mistake, and you put it down for Festa.”

Signora Giacci seemed to explode with rage. “Oh, really? Well, I know that you mark down everything in your notebook. But it’s just your word against mine. And if I say that I tested Festa on that date, then that’s the way it is.”

“And I say it’s not. On March eighteenth you couldn’t have tested Silvia Festa.”

“Oh, really? Why not?”

“Because Silvia Festa was absent on the eighteenth of March.”

Signora Giacci blanched. She pulled out her general ledger and started leafing back through it.

Sitting at her desk, Silvia Festa opened her notebook. She turned to the last pages, where her justified absences were all noted. That’s what Babi had wanted to see. She leafed through it rapidly. The whole class sat in silence, waiting to learn whether that final confirmation would be forthcoming.

Silvia found her mother’s signature. There it was, gleaming in all its reality, on March 19, the day after her absence.

Signora Giacci stopped and stared at the page in the ledger that bore that awful date: March 18. She frantically checked the absences. Benucci, Marini, and then, there she was. Signora Giacci slumped onto her desk. She couldn’t believe her eyes. Festa. That surname, written in her own hand, stamped before her in letters of fire. Her agonizing shame. Her mistake. Nothing more was needed. Signora Giacci glanced at Babi.

Babi slowly sat down. All her classmates turned to look at her. A general buzz of voices stirred in the classroom: “Good job, nice work, Babi, good job.”

Babi pretended not to hear. But that soft buzz of whispers reached Signora Giacci’s ears, those words as chilling as needles of ice hitting her, cold and cutting, like the burden of that defeat. Looking like a fool in front of the class. In front of her class. And then the words that issued from her lips, so heavy and painful, to underscore her mistake. “Servanti, please be seated. Festa, come up to be tested.”

Babi lowered her eyes to her desk. Justice had been done. Then she slowly lifted her face to look at Pallina. Their gazes met, and a thousand words flew silently between those two desks. Starting today, it was possible for Signora Giacci to make mistakes. The golden rule had been shattered. It collapsed before them, crumbling into thousands of shards like a fragile crystal glass slipping out of the hands of a young and inexperienced waitress.

But Babi didn’t see anyone step forward to dress her down. Everywhere she turned, all she saw were the joyful eyes of the other girls in her class, proud and entertained by her courage.

Then she looked farther on. And what she saw terrified her. There sat Signora Giacci, staring at her. Her gaze, devoid of any expression or sign of life, was as hard and grim as a slab of gray stone on which someone had labored mightily to carve the word hatred.





Chapter 9



It was noon. Step walked into the kitchen wearing a sweatshirt and a pair of shorts, ready for breakfast. “Good morning, Maria.”

“Good morning, sir.” The housekeeper immediately stopped washing the dishes.

Step took the coffeepot and the pan of hot milk off the stove and sat down at the table, but then the doorbell started to ring. Step lifted a hand to his forehead. “Who the fu…”

With tiny footsteps, Maria hurried to the door. “Who is it?”

“It’s Pollo! Would you let me in, please?”

Maria turned to look at Step with an inquiring expression. Step silently nodded his head so Maria opened the door.

Pollo came rushing in. “Hey, Step? You don’t know what an incredible thing! A fairy tale, the coolest shit ever!”

Step cocked a brow. “You brought me sandwiches?”

“No, look at this.” He showed him that day’s edition of Il Messaggero.

“I already have the newspaper.” He lifted a copy of La Repubblica from the table. “Maria brought it to me. By the way, you haven’t even said good morning to her.”

Pollo turned to look at the housekeeper impatiently. “Morning, Maria.”

Maria smiled. “I’ll go and tidy up your room, sir.” And she left the kitchen.

Step sipped his hot coffee. Pollo opened the newspaper and laid it out on the table. “Have you seen? Take a look at this unbelievably cool picture! A legend. You’re in the newspaper.”

Step put his hand down on the page with the local news. It was true. It was him on his motorcycle with Babi on back as they were pulling a wheelie in front of the photographers. Perfectly recognizable, but luckily it was impossible to see the license plate. Otherwise there would have been bitter repercussions. There was a whole article. The illegal street races, the surprise arrival of the police, some of the names of those arrested, and a description of the chase that ensued.