The Girl in the Glass (4 page)

I barely remember him. He died when I was three, and all I can remember of him is the feel of his tunic against my skin. It was smooth and warm and smelled of mint and limes.

There is a painting of him in the Uffizi by Master Bronzino. He is young, like me, and he wears armor, and his gaze is off to the right, as though he might have to don the helmet he is holding and rush off to direct a battle. But that is not how I imagine him. I imagine him silver-haired and smiling and ready to chase away the mere shadows of imps and goblins that would conspire to threaten a little girl’s dreams.

3

I pushed the photo of the Amalfi coast across Geoffrey’s desk. “Lorenzo really wants this photo on the front. People who’ve the money and motivation for an Italian destination wedding already know about Venice and Rome. He’s thinking they’ve probably even been to those places already. They want a place that is romantic and special. And not crawling with a million tourists.”

Geoffrey glanced at the photo. “Yes, but this book isn’t just for people who’ve already decided they want an Italian destination wedding. It’s to entice those who’ve never even considered it to consider it. Those people have never been to Venice and Rome, Meg. And that group of buyers is the bigger group. Exponentially bigger.”

He pushed the photo back.

“So it’s a no? You want me to tell him it’s a no?”

Geoffrey sat back in his chair and rubbed an eyebrow. “Let me talk to Beatriz. I doubt she’ll change her mind, but I’ll talk to her. In the meantime you need to inspire confidence in that Venice photo. It’s a good photo. Or the Florence one. That’s the one you like, isn’t it? The cover has to sell the book, Meg, not plan the wedding. Big difference.”

“I think Lorenzo appreciates that, Geoffrey. He thinks this one
will
sell the book.”

“He’s a photographer.”

“He’s a romantic.”

Geoffrey laughed lightly. “My point exactly. Photographers and lovers
don’t sell books.” He turned to his computer. “Assure Lorenzo we will make the best decision for the book. We always do. And tell Gabe to start on the cover using the Venice photo for now.”

I stepped out of Geoffrey’s office. My cell phone in my skirt pocket began to vibrate, and I pulled it out.

My father.

I let the call go to voice mail. Whatever it was my dad wanted to tell me, I didn’t want to talk about it in the hallway. When I arrived at Gabe’s office, I found him standing over his desk, comparing two cover mock-ups of our latest guide to urban getaways. He smiled at me when I stepped inside.

Gabe is only a few inches taller than I am with short, curly brown hair that would probably grow in ringlets if he let it. He is missing two fingers on his right hand from a motorcycle accident when he was sixteen, but that hasn’t hindered his skill. Sometimes I find myself a little jealous of his obvious artistic talent. The walls of his office are covered with his designs; some of them he drew freehand.

“Can’t go wrong with Boston,” I said, nodding toward the design at Gabe’s left.

He pointed to another mock-up featuring a toned-down urban landscape. “Savannah’s not on your bucket list?”

I cocked my head to look at the Savannah skyline. “I’d go. I guess I’d go to either.”

“Savannah’s pretty cool. Great art school there. Almost went to it. Guess we’ll just have to see where Beatriz lands on it.”

“Speaking of Beatriz, it looks like she wants you to go with the Venice shot for Lorenzo and Renata’s book.”

He regarded me for a moment. “Not one of Florence, eh?” His smile was subtle and knowing.

My face grew warm. “Everyone knows my secret loves. Not fair.”

Gabe gathered the two mock-ups and sat down at his desk. “Everyone thinks you should just go, Meg. What are you waiting for? Just go.”

His candor stung a little. And I knew he didn’t mean for it to.

“I want my dad to take me. You know that. He said he would. I’m not ready to give up on him. I don’t like giving up on people. Hey, want to join me and my mom at the Melting Pot tonight?” The invitation flew out of my mouth before I had a chance to consider it fully. But it was a safe enough request. Not a date. Not with my mom there.

Gabe looked down at the folio in his hands. I had taken him by surprise. “I, uh, can’t do it tonight.” He looked up. “I’ve got plans, I’m afraid.”

“Oh. Too bad.”

“I’ve a date, actually.”

Gabe had a date.

“Oh. Well. That’s … that’s cool. Anyone I know?” My voice sounded distant in my ears, as if the question came from someone standing behind me.

Gabe shook his head and smiled. “I don’t think so. I met her at my sister’s party last weekend.”

A party Gabe had casually invited me to and which I had casually declined.

“Sounds like fun.”

Gabe’s smile widened. “Does it? I didn’t even say where we’re going.”

Increased embarrassment warmed my face further. “Legoland, right?” Time to go. I turned to leave. “Have fun.”

I heard him laughing behind me. “Another time, Meg?”

“Sure. The Melting Pot with my mother and me. Round two. Check.”

More gentle laughter.

I chanced a look back at him, supposing he had returned his attention to the mock-ups on his desk. But he was watching me leave.

My phone vibrated in my pocket, reminding me I had a voice mail waiting. The distraction was a welcome one. I pulled it out as I walked away. “Voice mail,” I said.

Gabe nodded thoughtfully.

Back in my office, I slid into my chair, annoyed that Gabe’s date bothered me. He had every right to go on a date. So did I, had there been someone I wanted to go on a date with. I pressed the button on my phone for voice mail, ready to hear my dad’s message and then get on with the business of the day. I began to read an e-mail message as I listened but stopped when I heard his voice. He sounded tired. Old.

“Meg, it’s Dad. Sorry to bother you at work, but I need to talk to you about something. When you have a minute, can you call me back on my cell? Don’t wait until tonight. And don’t call me at the house. I mean, I’d appreciate it if you could call me back before I go home tonight. Okay. I guess that’s it. Talk to you later.”

I replayed the message, listening to the tone of my father’s voice, the strange ache behind the words. I couldn’t remember my father ever sounding so … defeated.

He was definitely not happy about something, and it was something he felt I needed to know about, something that would have some indirect effect on me.

I’d been up to see him and his wife, Allison, only a few months earlier at New Year’s. Everything seemed fine. The last phone conversation my father and I had was three weeks ago. Nothing seemed amiss then either. Whatever it was, it was recent, and something he’d been able to mask in his earlier phone call to my mother. She would have said something if she’d detected something was wrong.

I punched the button to call him back. When he answered, he seemed to exhale gently before saying my name.

“Dad, what is it? What’s up?” I asked.

He hesitated only a second. “Hey, I’m coming down to San Diego tomorrow. I know it’s really short notice, but I’d really like to talk to you. Will you be around? I won’t need more than an hour.”

My father’s voice was calm but thin, as if he was saving the air in his lungs for nobler purposes than a quick phone conversation.

“So you’re not going to tell me what this is about?” I laughed nervously.

“How about I bring breakfast over to your place? Around ten?”

He had ignored my first question and now my second. Something was very wrong. Maybe Allison had kicked him out. Maybe he was the one who’d had the affair. It wouldn’t be the first time.

“Dad, I think I deserve to know what the urgency is, don’t I?” I asked tentatively. “If this is about you and Allison, it’s not like it’s any of my—”

“I’d rather tell you in person, Meg.”

He paused a moment, waiting for me to agree to his terms.

“All right.”

“So is ten okay? I’ll bring poppy-seed bagels. That’s the kind you like, right? The poppy-seed ones?”

“Uh, sure.”

“Good. Okay. Then it’s all set.”

“All right, I’ll see you at ten. And Dad, honestly, you could’ve called me on my work phone to ask me this. Beatriz and Geoffrey wouldn’t have cared.”

“I … I wanted your new cell phone number. I know you gave it to me already, but I lost it.”

I was about to tell him he could’ve called me at work to get my new cell phone number and I would have been happy to give it to him, but I stopped before the words came out of my mouth. He had wanted to talk to my mother. It’s why he called her before calling me. I’ve always been amazed
that my father will still call my mother for advice and that she will still dispense it. But apparently he’d decided not to ask her opinion on whatever it was that was on his mind. Instead, he’d just asked for my cell phone number. The brief conversation with my mother had affected him somehow. Made him change his mind about what he wanted to say.

Poppy-seed bagels were not my favorite. They were my mother’s.

Sometimes when I visit my favorite of the country villas and I look at Master Botticelli’s
The Birth of Venus
, I can imagine that before my mother was made to marry and the unraveling began, her life was like that of Venus arriving on her seashell at the dawn of her being. In the painting, the gods of the winds are pushing Venus to shore under a shower of blossoms, and a nymph stands ready with a cape to cover Venus’s beauty lest the viewer be undone by it. Venus doesn’t appear to know the effect she will have on us. She is unaware of how stunning she is. And if that were not enough, everything in the painting seems to be gently moving, beckoning, and inviting us to step inside the canvas.

But in truth, it is only a painting. It whispers of a realm not meant for earthly eyes. The canvas is a window, not a door. But I thank God it is at least that. If we can’t step into that lovelier place, at least we can see that it exists. Sometimes that vista is the only thing that keeps us from collapsing into languid indifference under the weight of our circumstances, unable to appreciate anything truly marvelous.

With my marriage to a man I barely know only hours away, being certain there is grandeur beyond what I can see just now comforts me.

My grandfather chose a husband for my mother for political reasons, as all dukes must. Just as Ferdinando has chosen for me. But when my parents married, my mother did not want to join my father in Rome where his home was. I can’t blame her, though I feel badly for my father. She wanted to stay in Florence where she could live in her beloved palace,
enjoy the Medici villas, and have my grandfather nearby. And my grandfather, who had what he wanted in my mother’s marriage—a useful relationship with the Orsini family—gave her what she wanted: her freedom to live where she wished.

My parents saw each other infrequently. Sometimes my father came to Florence to see her. Sometimes she went to visit him.

Some say that is the only miracle of my being born.

4

A few minutes before seven, I stood on my porch with a cup of green tea. I saluted the sun as it clung coyly to the ocean’s horizon and wished Miles and Pamela a long and happy life. The day had been busy at work, and I’d not had time to muse much on the event that had sent Miles looking for another fiancée. Now as I stood watching joggers and surfers return to their cars from the beach two blocks away, the silence of my single life seemed shrill. I wondered what my life would’ve been like if I had ignored my instincts and married Miles.