One Step to You (The Rome Novels #1)(59)

They found themselves outside of the bridge itself, suspended in the darkness of a small marble cornice. Far below that ledge was the river, and a short distance away was the brightly lit Via Olimpica. Then, enveloped in the darkness and the slow whispering of the river’s current, they kissed again, passionately, with a surge of desire.

Step lifted her T-shirt and touched her breasts, freeing them. Then he undid his own shirt and pressed his smooth flesh against her chest. They remained there, breathing in each other’s warmth, listening to each other’s heartbeat, feeling their skin brush together, wrapped in the cool night breeze.

Later, sitting on the edge of the low marble wall, they looked up at the sky and the stars. Babi lay down, resting her head on Step’s legs. She stayed there for a while, in silence. Now she was calm and relaxed while he brushed her hair back off her face.

Looking around, she spotted a piece of graffiti that struck her fancy. “You’d never do anything like that for me, would you? You’d never write here on the side of the bridge.”

Step understood what she was referring to. Right in front of them, a brokenhearted spray can had etched its words of love, in English, just to be more romantic: Bambi, I love you.

“That’s true. I don’t even know how to spell, according to you.”

“Well, maybe you could find someone who knows how and tell them what you want written.” Babi tipped her head back, smiling back at him.

“And anyway, I’d write something like that, which seems better suited to you.”

Babi looked at the words that Step was pointing to. On a white column right in front of them was a piece of graffiti to which someone had added a brash insert: Sophia’s ass is Europe’s second finest. Second had been added with a small arrow.

Step smiled. “That’s a much more sincere piece of writing. Especially because yours is without a doubt the finest.”

Babi scrambled down off the wall and punched him with her small fist. “You pig!”

“Now what? You’re going to beat me up too? Oh, then you really can’t help yourself…”

“I don’t like this joke,” she said.

Step tried to hug her, but she resisted for a little while.

“I really don’t like you. It seriously bothers me.”

Step hugged her tighter. “All right, I won’t say it again.”

In the end, she let herself sink into his arms, believing his promise for a brief instant.





Chapter 25



When Step took Babi home, her folks hadn’t come back yet. He said good night to her at the front door. “Ciao, have a good night. Good job, I’m really proud of you.”

Babi smiled and disappeared up the staircase. But later, as she was going to bed with a handkerchief full of ice on her right cheekbone and little uprooted hanks of hair caught in the hairbrush in the bathroom, she thought back to those words. Right then and there, she hadn’t really thought about it. He was proud of her. Proud of what? That she’d beat up another young woman? That she’d punched her, hurt her, possibly disfigured her?

Babi slid between the sheets. She was suffering now, and not only because of the pain from having had her hair yanked out. Certainly it had been self-defense. It hadn’t been her fault; she’d been forced into it. But where had all that rage come from? Why so much hatred? Suddenly she didn’t recognize herself, she no longer knew who she was. There was only one thing she knew for sure. She certainly wasn’t proud of that Babi.

*



“Alessandri?”

“Present.”

“Bandini?”

“Present.”

Signora Boi was calling the roll.

Babi, sitting at her desk, was worriedly checking her note. Now it seemed not quite as perfect as it had.

Signora Boi skipped a last name. A student who was present and who was determined to be accounted for stood up at her desk and pointed out the oversight. Signora Boi apologized and started calling the roll again from where she’d made her mistake.

Babi felt slightly reassured. With a teacher like her, maybe her forged note would pass muster. When the time came, she brought her notebook up to the teacher’s desk, along with the two other girls who’d been absent the previous day. There she stood, her heart pounding. But everything went fine.

Babi went back to her desk and listened to the rest of the lesson, more relaxed now. She touched her cheekbone. It was swollen and tender. Her mother, who never missed a thing, no matter how groggy she might still be in the morning, had asked her what had happened first thing at breakfast.

“Oh, nothing. I hit my face last night in the dark when I went into my room. Someone had left the door half-open.”

Raffaella had fallen for it. Luckily, she didn’t have any other marks on her. But she’d told another lie. Her umpteenth in recent weeks. She hadn’t been caught yet. But at this rate, sooner or later, it was bound to go wrong. What she didn’t know was that the moment in question was hurtling dangerously toward her.

A note landed on her desk. Pallina smiled from across the way. She’d just tossed it.

Babi unfolded the paper. It was a sketch. A young woman lay unconscious on the ground, and another was standing over her, posing like a boxer. Above them, a title in large letters: Babi III. It was a parody of Rocky. An arrow pointed to the young woman on the ground. Above it was written Maddalena. Next to the other young woman was a different phrase: Babi, her fists were like granite, her muscles like steel. When she arrives, all Piazza Euclide trembles. Babi couldn’t help but laugh.