I hooked my arm through hers and linked our fingers together. “You are too good to me. I do not deserve a friend like you.”
She stopped and held our hands up like a trophy. “Men are delightful, but we will never let one come between our friendship.”
I opened my mouth to respond but stopped when I heard raised voices behind us.
“You are so arrogant,” Lukas said. “Everything has to be so artistic with you.”
“The man was dressed in red brocade and a white wig. No self-respecting musician would wear that. Plus his phrasing was atrocious, pure melodrama. But you do not need to be pure, do you?” Filip’s voice was biting.
They were approaching us now and I saw Lukas curl his lip. “What do you mean by that?”
“How much commercial photography work have you done in the past year? And how much of your own?” Filip said. His eyes were small and mean in the lamplight, filled with bitterness.
Lukas flexed his shoulder and said in a deceptively soft voice, “Some of us need to make a living.”
“While entertaining our lovely cousins. You should stay the hell away from her.”
They had both stopped and now faced each other, bodies tense, their hands clenched.
Lukas’s nostrils flared. His voice was low and intense. “You have no right to tell me what to do. You can better take your own advice. I know what is going on here.”
Filip gave a harsh laugh. “Oh, really? You understand the situation so well, do you? Such a clever boy.”
They sprang toward each other as Estelle and I rushed toward them. They were grappling, swinging, kicking. Filip pushed Lukas up against the pole of a streetlamp. Lukas scrambled to his feet and shoved him back. Filip fell on the sidewalk and hit his temple. By now, Estelle and I stood between them.
“Stop,” Estelle cried, tears in her eyes. She helped Filip to his feet. “You will both have regret for this tomorrow.”
I already did. What had I done to our group of friends? The two men straightened and, without a word, Filip turned on his heel and walked back toward the center while Lukas stalked off in the direction of our hotel.
Estelle and I did not speak after that and I made my way to my hotel room, alone.
Despite my fears and worries, I hoped Lukas would come to me that night. Was he sorry for what we had done? Had it been an impulse of the moment? Should I go to him? Perhaps he was not alone. Maybe I would not be welcome.
When I had felt his hand underneath the table—indeed, when I let Estelle and Filip leave—I understood there was no choice to be made. It had always been Lukas, from the beginning. Filip was sexy and delightful company, but it was nothing more than a flirtation, a way to pass the time, to keep our demons at bay. But now the doubts crept in about Lukas as well. Was I merely feeling weak and unbalanced and Lukas was here? I had never felt so connected to anyone, not even Jim. Maybe Helena was right about me: maybe I was only a taker, using people. Perhaps I should not have given in to my rash desire. Now I had wounded the people I loved.
I lay awake for hours, still hoping for a knock on my door. But this lonely night in Venice, it never came.
When I finally slept, I dreamed that death was near, like a great wind carrying my beloved Grandma away from me. Then Grandma turned into Amy and Ma and Estelle and Filip and Lukas, their faces shifting from one to the other. They were in an abyss, crying out my name. I was afraid of the storm and then I was the storm itself, destroying all that touched my periphery—Jim, sitting in his office, menacing, violent, jealous, a mean drunk; the faces of my former colleagues; professors who had believed in me. A stack of unpaid bills toppling, the look on Amy’s face when she too realized I had failed.
When I cracked open my door the next morning, I found a perfect red rosebud, half-open, caught right at the moment of blooming. He had not forgotten me after all. I brought it inside the room and cradled it in my hands. The scent was sweet, intoxicating.
I was already packed to check out, so I pressed the rosebud carefully between the pages of a notebook and slid it into my handbag with a little prayer. I cannot afford to nourish you, but may you survive regardless.
I was the only one of our group on the restaurant terrace. I leaned out over the water, thinking of the anger and disappointment of the previous night, wondering if I had ruined all of our friendships for good. I heard a click and there were Lukas and Estelle. They stood a few meters away from me—Lukas and his photography again. I had been swallowed by the lens of his camera the entire trip.
“You look so sad.” He seemed tired and his T-shirt was wrinkled, but my heart still leaped at the sight of him.
“More people drown in the glass than in the sea,” said Estelle, rubbing her temples. She wore her sunglasses on top of her head and the lines around her eyes seemed deeper this morning.
“Did you drink last night?” I asked.
“We had a few before going to bed,” said Lukas.
I pinched my lips together. I tried not to feel left out and failed. So he had been with Estelle instead of me. Had they talked about me? Had Filip been there too? Was that why I had been left alone? So much for the new Sylvie.
Lukas saw what was written on my face and came to stand beside me. His voice was gentle. “You should have joined us.”
I gave a little airy laugh. “You guys are a bad influence. Those who associate with dogs get fleas.”
I was not fooling anyone. Breakfast was quiet and Filip did not come at all. He met us after we had checked out. His face was closed, an angry scrape on his cheekbone below his dark sunglasses. When I touched him on the elbow, he shrugged my hand away.
Piazza San Marco was packed with people waving the Venetian flag in celebration of Liberation Day and Festa di San Marco. Men and women worked the crowd selling single roses to couples and lovers. Estelle and I chattered about meaningless things. The guys did not exchange a single word.
I sat in the water taxi, speeding toward Marco Polo Airport, and breathed in the salty air as the sun shone relentlessly upon the turbulent waves. Venice was hauntingly beautiful. I would never forget the images of the limpid canals and sparkling sunshine during the day, the labyrinthine alleys at night, redolent of passion and secrecy, flickers of bright gold against absolute black. Small details returned to me: the ice that came in a separate little bowl when you ordered a soft drink, signs forbidding gondolas from certain waterways, the way Lukas’s lips had felt against mine. I watched as the magic of Venice faded behind us, and wondered when I would come back and if I would return with him.
Chapter 22
Amy
Saturday, May 14
The rest of the week crawls by, the spring sunlight slowly turning into wind and rain, until it is finally Saturday and Epsilon can do a full search. It has been two weeks since anyone has seen or heard from Sylvie and I am a quivering wreck, worn thin by despair. Every morning, I wake certain that Sylvie’s safe and I imagined the whole thing. Ma and Pa sound more helpless each time I speak to them. I want to go home to New York but I won’t leave without Sylvie. I have a faint spark of hope that she’s run off. But deep inside, I know something has happened to her. I am beginning to realize we might never find out the truth. It’s like the Sylvie I knew has slowly spiraled away from us, out of sight and hearing and memory—the center of our little domestic world unraveling with the vacuum of her absence.