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‘I could come...’ She moved to touch his cheek. They had been playing with each other’s faces for hours, as if they had only just discovered touch and sight.
‘Where?’
‘To Rome.’ She tried to keep the wobble from her voice. ‘There’s nothing to keep me here and...’
Her voice faded as he removed her hand from his cheek.
‘There’s nothing for you there.’
Alicia had bowed out gently once before—with Beatrice she had lied to make her leaving easier. She didn’t want to repeat that mistake.
‘You’re there.’
‘Alicia...’ He closed his eyes. ‘I knew you’d regret it.’
‘I don’t regret it. I just don’t like...’ Alicia knew that she was being by far too needy and she tried to reel herself in. ‘I don’t like this part, Dante. I don’t want to say goodbye to you with no prospect of seeing you again.’
‘I have no prospects,’ he said.
‘I don’t care.’
‘Well, you should,’ he said. ‘Alicia, I don’t want anyone in my life. I mean that.’
‘You don’t.’
‘I do. I’m like my mother...’
‘No!’ She did not accept that for a moment.
‘Yes.’
‘So you want to be without a family? Banished to a lonely grave?’
‘Alicia, she wasn’t banished...’ He pulled on his clothes, his shirt pink from the rain and muddied. ‘My mother chose to be buried alone.’
As she dressed her reluctant body in damp clothes she did not want to put on, Alicia recalled the priest saying how specific her instructions had been.
‘Put on your tights,’ Dante told her.
‘It’s too hot.’
‘Alicia...’ he warned, for she knew he could guess at the trouble she might find herself in if she returned bare-legged after spending time with him.
Reluctantly she sat down, pulling them on, and then stood, angrily hitching them up.
‘What are you going to tell them, Alicia?’
‘That I took shelter from the storm,’ Alicia said. ‘I just won’t mention with whom.’
‘God, no. And remember to wear your hair down for the next few days.’
They did hold hands through the rushes, but near the edge he dropped all contact. It was so hot and sticky, with steam rising from the street, and it was such a sad ending—but still she did not regret what had happened.
‘I’ll leave you here,’ Dante said.
‘Where are you going?’
‘To the cemetery. And then I’ll see if I can hitch a ride to the station.’ He looked at her burnt face. ‘I hope you don’t get in too much trouble.’
