He slipped it beneath the lip of the desk where I couldn't see it anymore. My throat tightened, suppressing my impulse to tell him to give it back, that I'd changed my mind.
"Don't worry, it will be safe here," the concierge said, interpreting my expression as concern over whether or not I could trust the hotel with my note. An idea that he clearly found more than a little amusing.
"Okay," I said.
"Is there something else I can assist you with? Perhaps I can call a taxicab for you?"
Ah yes, I've completed my business here and now I should get out. This place isn't for people like me.
"No, thanks. By the way, you should really get someone who knows what they're doing to fix that copy of the Mona Lisa," I said, pointing towards the facsimile hanging on the wall behind him, "In the real one her right hand is over her left. In yours she has her left over her right."
"What?" he said, looking back at it even as his neck and cheeks flushed red.
It was nitpicking, and most people would probably have never noticed the error. Then again, most people hadn't written a paper in their sophomore year of college discussing the layering technique Da Vinci had used in creating that particular masterwork.
It also gave me a sense of satisfaction and superiority as I walked away from the concierge desk, leaving him flustered as he examined the facsimile.
It was a short-lived victory with an even more ephemeral sense of triumph as I walked back out into that drizzle.
When would Liam receive the letter? Had it been a mistake to get that jab in on the concierge? He could retaliate easily by "forgetting" about the letter, "accidentally" putting it through the shredder. Or something along those lines.
Besides, I didn't know when Liam would even get it. I checked my phone, shielding the touch screen from the rain by leaning over it. It was coming up to 10 in the morning and he hadn't texted or called yet to confirm our date for the day.
So I went back to the flat (I no longer considered it my flat) to pack and to leave a letter for Mrs. Rosselini.
I had a plane to catch. And a class this afternoon to miss. I wondered what Dr. Aretino would think of my absence.
Mostly, though, I wondered about how Liam would react to my letter and to my leaving.
Chapter 14
I hadn’t submitted my withdrawal forms to Sapienza. I figured I'd leave that until I'd touched down on good, solid American soil.
It took a full hour to get through all the traffic on the A91 to the airport. Leonardo Da Vinci-LIRF International Airport was in the Fiumicino district of Rome, and was pretty much right on the water. As the taxi crested one large hill I got a view of the Mediterranean stretching away into a haze.
A 747 roared by over us, seemingly so close that I thought I could reach out and touch the un-retracted landing gear if I wanted to.
"She is beautiful, no?" the driver said.
I didn't know whether he meant the shiny metal underbelly of the jet or the ribbon of the ocean in front of us, but I answered "Yes," anyway.
A numb sensation had started at the base of my spine as soon as I'd climbed into the cab, and throughout the ride it had progressed through the rest of me.
I kept telling myself that this was the right thing. Not only for me but for Liam. I thought that if I just kept repeating that, I could make myself believe it and be okay with it.
The driver took the exit to the airport, and soon its tall concrete terminals came into view. A small private jet screamed down its runway and launched into the air, one of its larger Boeing cousins lumbering down a spur to taxi into its position.
I could still remember the takeoff and landing involved with my trip to Rome. The takeoff, a sudden dislocation from the earth that left your stomach several feet below your seat. The landing, a jerk that rattled the whole plane and the concurrent screech of the wheels as they scrambled for purchase on the tarmac.
Nothing at all like the gentle floating of the hot air balloon.
"Which terminal?"
"Sorry?" I said, coming back to reality and seeing that the driver had slowed the cab to a crawl as we passed the first terminal.
"The terminal. Which airline?"
"Oh. Alitalia, please."
The driver pulled up beneath the green and white logo of the airline in question and he helped me pull my luggage out of the cab's trunk.
Then I was alone among all the other travelers, waiting my turn as the velvet ropes corralled us through the line.
The place smelled of the sharp disinfectant used to clean all the surfaces everyone touched, with a hint of sweat below that. Everything had been polished to a high shine, it seemed: the handrails, the scaffolding holding all the light fixtures in the vaulted ceiling.
And there was glass everywhere. Massive windows that let you look out onto the tarmac and the gangways.
I bought the ticket, wincing at the cost and wondering if my Visa would clear the charge. It did, and the smiling woman handed back my passport along with my ticket and credit card.
"Terminal 13," she said, leaning over the desk a little so that she could point down one of the mammoth halls.
One of the wheels of my rolling luggage kept squeaking, the sharpness of it cutting through the din of the announcer on the PA and the conversations around me.
I passed a long row of flat screen TVs, each displaying a different channel, stock quotes and quick infobytes scrolling by beneath the talking heads.
I had to hurry to get over to my terminal. That taxi ride had cost me a lot of time. I thought I had barely enough time to clear security and board.
I shuffled into the line to pass through the metal detector, putting my keys and wallet and phone and shoes and luggage into the provided bin.
The security guard had just grabbed my bin to pass it through the X-Ray machine when my phone started ringing.
My heart leapt. It had to be Liam.
I got cold feet then. I mean they were literally cold, my thin socks letting all my body heat out through my souls into the thin rubber mat beneath me. But also metaphoric cold feet about leaving.
I'd known he'd try to call. However, I'd thought I could deal with it. Except I'd forgotten to put the phone on silent so that I could ignore it.
And it wouldn't be ignored. It blared and blared, even while the guard picked through my belongings and then passed them through the machine.
"Miss, step forward, please," the guard on the other side of the metal detector said. He had a wand in one gloved hand. The other waved me through.
I didn't move, though. It felt like as soon as I stepped through that freestanding doorway, I'd be well and truly done with my trip to Rome and on my way home.
"Miss," he said more insistently, his hand waving becoming more vigorous. I'd begun to attract the attention of a few other guards who'd been watching the lines. The people behind me began to grumble about being held up in a multitude of languages.
My phone quieted, but only momentarily. It started blaring again.
"Come through or go back," the guard said, "But you can't stand here." He gave another look to the guard who'd looked at my stuff, and he shook his head to indicate that I hadn't been trying to slip anything by them.
Then I happened to glance over to one of those big bay windows, my attention dragged there by the unmistakable roar of jet engines. The big airliner took wing as I watched.
The bottom of my stomach fell out. This is wrong, I thought. I shouldn't be here. I shouldn't be doing this.
The thing was, I didn't know what else I could possibly do.
However, I also knew that I didn't want to be locked in a tiny, windowless room at the airport, detained for suspicious behavior.
"I'd like my things back, please," I said.
The guards conferred for a while. Long enough that I thought that I'd definitely be asked to accompany them to answer a few questions.
One of them even looked at me while he tugged the radio handset on his shoulder closer to his mouth and spoke into it. I imagined that all the cameras in the area had turned on me, that someone in a back room filled with computer monitors was going over my travel records, checking my passport.
They could have been calling my mom to ask about my fifth grade report cards for all I knew.
"Come with me, please," the guard who'd been conferring on the radio said. I stepped out of line and he handed me my things over the barricade.
I'd just started wheeling my way back towards the terminal entrance when the announcer came on. "Alitalia Flight 713 to St. Louis final boarding call."
Instead of going to get a taxi right away, I went over to the waiting area and stood by the window. The glass kept misting with my breath.
I watched Flight 713 take off.
My stomach twisted, and I didn't know whether it was from relief or fear.
I did know that I probably would have been on that plane at that moment if I'd remembered to put my phone on silent, if I hadn't heard Liam's calls.
The phone chirped again. A text, not a call.
I pulled it out of my pocket.
Please tell me you weren't on that.
He was here, at the airport. I looked around, my heart pounding against my ribs. However, it had seemed a few inbound flights had begun disembarking and the terminal had flooded with passengers and I could see nothing but a steady flow of people.
Suddenly I needed to see him. The impulse came on so strong that I almost left my luggage by the window.
I'm here still, I texted back, joining the surge of people through the terminal, almost running into a slow-moving older gentleman with a cane in front of me.
My stomach tightened up as I cast my eyes about, searching for his familiar features. I wanted to see him so badly, but I also felt embarrassment, too. Would he be disappointed in me? Would he tell me that I'd been foolish to try and leave?