Timothy (6 page)

I imagined what the call would be like when I finally reached Carlo Romaniello:

“Mr. Romaniello? Hi, I'm sorry to bother you, but Valerie Franklin has to cancel lunch. She's not feeling well.”

“How unfortunate, please give her my best wishes. Is this the handsome young man who was with her yesterday in the café?”

“Yes, sir, it is.”

“Please call me Carlo. I was serious, of course, when I told you I wanted you to join us for our lunch date today. I would be most appreciative if you would still join me. Please don't leave me to lunch alone.”

“I would like that very much, Carlo.”

It was an enjoyable little fantasy to indulge in over breakfast.

Around eight, I started calling hotels. But after trying three with no luck, I conceded defeat. He'd never said he was staying on South Beach. He could be in a hotel on the mainland—he could be in a hotel in Fort Lauderdale or Palm Beach, for that matter. I didn't want to waste my free morning making futile phone calls to every hotel in southeastern Florida. I knew where he would be at one o'clock—La Mirada restaurant—so I would just show up there at twelve thirty and wait for him outside. Valerie wouldn't like it, of course—I could already hear her screaming
“I told you to call him!”
once she found out—but it wouldn't be the first time she screamed at me, nor would it be the last.

So, I took care of the e-mails and other business I needed to do for her, and at ten o'clock I walked out the front doors of the hotel onto Ocean Drive. I crossed over and walked through the dunes and stood there, watching the green foamy waves coming ashore on the beautiful beach. It wasn't very crowded—it was a midweek morning in mid-May, after all—but there were some people taking advantage of the sun and the heat. I decided to buy a swimsuit and spend the afternoon in the water. I crossed back over to Ocean Drive and spent the morning haunting shops looking for an affordable bathing suit—one that wasn't too immodest. Some of the guys on the beach I'd seen had been in bikinis or square-cut trunks—but I didn't have the kind of body that could pull off something skimpy or sexy. I wanted something that would cover me up and hide my lack of tan and muscles, like board shorts. I wasted some time going into expensive shops, where I was completely ignored by the sales clerks—who apparently had some kind of radar or sixth sense that let them know I couldn't possibly afford anything in their store—before finally finding a discount shop with something I could afford—a fifteen-dollar pair of navy blue board shorts.

It was exactly twelve thirty when I made it to La Mirada.

It was getting hotter, and I was damp with sweat from all the walking around. I finished the large iced mocha I'd gotten at a ubiquitous Starbucks and tossed it into a garbage can.

La Mirada wasn't that expensive, actually, according to the menu mounted under glass on the wall to the left of the glass doors. The food seemed to be some kind of funky fusion of American staples and Caribbean food, and the smells wafting out made my stomach growl. I was starving, so I made up my mind. If Carlo Romaniello's invitation the day before had merely been politeness, I would go ahead and treat myself to lunch there.

It was about five minutes before one when a town car with darkened windows pulled up in front of the restaurant. The back door opened, and Carlo Romaniello got out. He was wearing white linen pants and a lemon yellow pullover shirt. He smiled at me, lifting up his sunglasses as he looked around. “I see you, church mouse, but I don't see Valerie.” His tone was light and jocular, and his smile got broader. “Has Lady Luck smiled on me this fine May day in south Florida? Does this mean the Dragon Lady won't be joining us?”

“I—” I had planned out everything I was going to say, spent the better part of the morning working on witty opening lines in my head as I wandered from store to store, coming up with clever bons mots that would impress him with my sophistication and intelligence.

But now that he was standing directly in front of me with an amused smile on his handsome face, my tongue tripped over itself and I couldn't remember anything I'd planned to say—even the stupid lines I'd dismissed. I could feel my face turning red, and I finally managed to blurt out, “Valerie's not feeling well. I would have called…”

“But of course you didn't have my number, nor did you know where I was staying,” he finished for me, his smile never wavering. His face relaxed and his eyes lit up. “I do hope that you will take pity on me under the circumstances, and join me so I won't have to lunch alone? I really don't like eating alone, Church Mouse. It would be an enormous favor to me.” He sounded completely sincere.

“I—of course, I'm sorry, I—” I stammered, wishing a hole would open up in the sidewalk and swallow me. I had hoped—but never dared to believe he would actually want my company.

“Let's go inside, then, and get out of this sun,” he replied. He took me by the hand and led me inside. He caught the attention of the hostess, and we were seated a table with a lovely view within a matter of minutes.

As soon as I sat down, I hid my reddened face behind a menu.

“Do you intend to hide behind your menu until we order?” he asked in pleasantly amused tone, and I didn't need to see his face to know he was smiling at me.

Now even more mortified, I lowered the menu. He was indeed smiling, but had lifted his left eyebrow and cocked his head to one side as he looked at me from across the table. I could feel even more blood rushing to my face—which surely was by then turning am even darker shade of purple.

I wanted to get up and run out of the restaurant.

He laughed, reaching across the table and patting my hand. “You need to just relax and enjoy yourself, Church Mouse,” he said in a soothing tone. “I'm not going to bite you. It's a beautiful day, we're about to have a wonderful meal, and we can use this time to get to know each other better.” He tilted his head to one side again, narrowing his eyes in an appraising way. “Surely you're not this shy?” He said it almost like he was talking to himself. The delighted smile on his face grew even wider. “Perhaps you are, at that. How old are you?”

“Twenty-three,” I replied, raising my chin a little defiantly when he laughed yet again. I bristled a little. I knew I looked younger than my age—I was always carded when I went out to buy Valerie's cigarettes for her. It was annoying.

“But you're just a baby!” He sounded delighted, and his eyes twinkled, his amusement growing as I shifted in my chair.

“I'm not.” I managed to get the words out as our waiter placed glasses of ice water in front of us. He started laughing, and I felt myself growing more indignant. “Please don't laugh at me. I'm a college graduate, and I've been living on my own for the last year in New York.” I couldn't decide whether I was angry, embarrassed, or just plain foolish.

Things were definitely not going the way I had hoped.

And my words didn't have the desired effect. In fact, he only laughed harder. My cheeks burned with mortification until he finally wiped at his eyes with his napkin and got hold of himself. “I'm terribly sorry,” he said, a contrite look on his face. “There's nothing worse than being laughed at, is there? It's just—” He let his voice trail off. His eyes got serious. “I haven't laughed much in a very long time.”

I felt both my anger and embarrassment fading away.

I bit my lower lip and looked down at the place setting. Of course he hadn't been able to laugh since his partner had died. I couldn't imagine that kind of suffering, the pain he must still be going through. It had to have been horrible to lose the love of his life in such a terrible and unexpected way.

“It's okay, I really don't mind, really,” I finally said, running my index finger through the condensation on my water glass. “Valerie laughs at me all the time.”

“I'm sure she does.” His face darkened. “How can you stand working for that awful woman?”

I shrugged. “She's really not that bad, Mr. Romaniello. She—”

“If we're going to be friends, Church Mouse, you're going to have to call me Carlo.” He interrupted me with a kind smile. “I don't eat meals with people who call me Mr. Romaniello.”

I felt my cheeks reddening again, and I couldn't stop myself from smiling. “Thank you, Carlo.” I nodded politely. “But seriously, she isn't that bad, really. She's more bite than bark, and she's used to—”

“You sound like a wife defending the husband who's just broken her arm,” he interrupted me again. “Seriously, Church Mouse, the first step to getting out of an abusive relationship is to admit that you're in one.”

“But—” I stopped my protest when I saw the twinkle in his eyes and the sly smile playing at the corners of his mouth. “You're teasing me.”

“I'm sorry—you must think I'm terribly unkind,” he replied. “How about we find something else to talk about? I won't say another word about your employer—but I have to ask, however did you end up working for her?”

So I wound up telling him the entire story of my father's death and how I come to work for Valerie in New York. The waiter came—Carlo ordered for me—and he occasionally interrupted me to ask a question. At first, I spoke hesitantly—no one had ever shown such interest in me before—but the longer I talked, the more confident I felt. And by the time I was finally winding down the incredibly dull story of my life, the waiter was placing our salads in front of us.

“Interesting,” Carlo Romaniello said after watching me for a moment. He buttered a roll and tore it into little pieces.

“I'm not interesting.” I said, adding sweetener to the tall glass of iced tea I'd been too busy talking to drink. “You must be so bored—I'm so sorry to have run on this way. You must think I'm horribly self-absorbed.”

“On the contrary, I think you're very refreshing—a nice change from all the truly crashing bores I've unfortunately had to get used to spending time with.” He winked at me as the waiter presented a bottle of wine to him. He took a sip and nodded, and the waiter filled our glasses and left the bottle.

“I don't really drink much,” I confessed as I picked up the glass. I swirled the red liquid around dubiously. The truth was I didn't drink at all. Once, when I was in my early teens, my father decided to teach me about wine. I'd had several glasses, and spent the rest of the evening on my knees in front of the toilet. I didn't like liquor—the taste of it wasn't appealing.

But I wasn't going to tell Carlo Romaniello that.

I sipped the wine as he watched me. “What do you think?”

“It's kind of—” I searched for the right words. “Fruity and a little dry?”

“You're a fast study.” He smiled at me.

I don't remember what all we talked about, but it seemed like the time flew by—the next thing I knew the waiter was offering the check, which Carlo took, slipping a credit card into the leather folder. My phone vibrated—it was Valerie.

I frowned at it, excused myself, and walked outside to take the call. “Where are you?” she demanded before lapsing into a coughing fit.

“I went for a walk,” I replied, closing my eyes.

“Did you clear my schedule?” She coughed again. “God fucking damn it, I am going to cough up a lung here. The doctor has just left—I apparently have strep throat, damn it all to hell, and am contagious.”

“Oh, no!”

“Yes, well. I have to stay in bed for three days or so, and he doesn't want me to do anything other than rest. So you're going to be on your own for the rest of the week. But that doesn't mean I won't have things for you to do.” She went on to give me explicit instructions, as was her wont. The reality was what she wanted me to do would take me, at most, five minutes—but since she was always convinced everyone else was an idiot, she was still giving me instructions on how to properly carry out her wishes when Carlo joined me on the sidewalk, a big smile on his face. When she was finally finished, she said, “Get that done, and I'll be checking my e-mails…if anything comes up, I'll be calling you.”

“Thank you, Valerie.” I disconnected the call.

“Is she feeling better?” Carlo asked.

I shook my head, and he smiled when I told him the news. “Good, then you can keep me company for the rest of today.” He winked at me again. “I might just press you into service for the rest of the week. Can't have you getting bored.”

I felt a little thrill and hoped he wasn't teasing me again.

I couldn't help but think, as Carlo whisked me around South Beach the rest of that afternoon, from boutiques to art galleries to shops, that I could write an excellent article called “A Day with Carlo Romaniello.” When I commented on the fact that almost everywhere we went they knew him by name, he said, “When you have money, sales people working on commissions make it their business to know your name.”

It was a bit overwhelming.

It wasn't like I was unused to going into high-end galleries or stores; as Valerie's assistant I was in and out of them all the time running errands for her. But even the executive editor of
Street Talk
magazine who had everyone in the popular culture zeitgeist wooing her for column inches and mentions didn't command the kind of respect Carlo Romaniello got the instant he stepped through the doors of any shop. He asked me my opinion on everything—from sculpture to paintings to photographs. At the Versace store, he tried on suits and asked my opinions. He even had me try one on myself—a lovely charcoal gray suit that was more expensive than everything in my closet combined.

Once I removed it and put my own clothing back on, he wanted me to try on a suit of black wool, but I demurred. “Don't you want to see how you look in it?” he asked.

I shook my head. “No.” I fingered the sleeve longingly but didn't change my mind. “It would just make me sad.”