Creases form at the corners of his eyes as he launches himself into a second, even more raucous laugh. He shakes his head as he comes down from it, staring at me bemused.
‘Oh, how I would love to live life through your eyes,’ he says. ‘Does this make me your Gordo?’
An innocent question for sure if one didn’t know how Gordo and Lizzie end up, but I know that movie by heart. I lived for their whole ‘will they, won’t they’. I squint back at him perturbed.
‘Don’t flatter yourself.’
I turn on my heel and start storming away from the fountain, not out of anger, but out of need for an escape from the crowd. He follows after me, calling my name with concern.
‘Wait, Amorie! I didn’t mean it! Thisiswhat dreams are made of!’
I turn my neck, my head responding to his voice on instinct before my body has a chance to catch up. Before I know it, I hit a wall. A wall of a person, that is. I gather my bearings.
‘I’m so sorry!’ I squeal.
‘It’s all righ . . . Amorie?’
My heart quickens at the utterance of my name. I quickly whizz through the plot of every internet stalker movie I’ve ever watched and try to remember how each victim escaped. But as I look up, I’m surprised by a face I haven’t seen since my first and only semester of uni.
‘Nigel!’ I say.
‘It is you!’ He smiles, coming in for a hug.
He wraps his arms around me and squeezes tight, his cologne wafting up my nose.
‘This is wild – running into you here. I mean, what are the odds? How are you? How’ve you been?’ He can’t stop smiling as he talks.
Nigel was, if I were to romanticise my life, the closest I ever got to having a ‘one that got away’. We were flirty flatmates who’d stay up late and watch far too muchNaked Attractionwhile the rest of our flat secretly cursed us for laughing too loudly. I don’t know if I’d call what we had an obvious spark, but it was certain that there was something that pulled us together. But then I met Tom in a seminar and I thought he was safer than dating someone I lived with, and then I dropped out. The rest is plain old boring, predictable history.
‘I’ve been good! This is wild. What are you doing in Rome?’ I ask.
‘I’m on a business trip, actually. What about you?’ he asks, quickly gasping before I can reply. ‘Wait! You’re doing that column thing, aren’t you? I’ve seen your posts – you’re killing it. TheNew Traveller? That’s big. You used to subscribe to them even back when I knew you.’
I feel my cheeks pinch, trying to bite back a telling smile. ‘You remember that?’
He bows his head bashfully. ‘You’re hard to forget, Amorie.’
He can’t stop staring. Specifically into my eyes with a big goofy grin slapped across his face. It’s making me smile too. Brighter and wider. What are the odds we’d find each other on this day in this place?
‘God, you can walk fast when you want to, can’t you?’
Noah’s voice, shaky and breathless, snaps me from my trance. I turn to see him standing next to me, hands shoved into the pockets of his cargo shorts as he pauses to pass confused looks between me and the man in front of me.
‘Am I interrupting?’ he asks, looking directly at me.
‘Oh! Noah, this is Nigel. Nigel, Noah.’ I prattle on, watching both boys tepidly shake hands. ‘Noah and I met on this trip and have been travelling together for safety.Nigelis a really good old friend from uni.’
‘I thought you dropped out?’ Noah asks, unamused.
Nigel stifles a laugh.
‘Idid,’ I say saltily. ‘But we lived together before it got to that.’
‘And I missed you a lot when it did get to that.’ Nigel has a fond smile on his face. ‘Felt very lost without my nocturnal partner in crime.’
We lock eyes again, reflecting the same hopeful smile back at each other.
‘I’d love to catch up,’ Nigel says, before I have a chance to voice it myself. ‘Any chance you’re free tomorrow night?’
