Pasta Imperfect - By Maddy Hunter Page 0,77

way back through the streets of Florence toward the Arno, with the dome of the cathedral constantly to our left. Outside the baptistry, Philip stopped for a slug of water and immediately spat it out. Unh-oh. Must be the expensive hotel water that Jackie had said tasted like liquid sewage. But instead of discarding the bottle, he gritted his teeth and chugged half the contents. Ick. Some people were obviously too proud to admit they'd just blown twenty-thousand lire.

We marched in the hot sun down streets lined with designer clothing stores and expensive salons, and when Marla made a detour into a gelato shop, Philip whipped out his bottle again and drained it.

"Just like I always told your brother," Mom said in a hushed voice as she watched him throw the bottle away. "Excessive drinking not only gives you a raging headache; it makes you thirsty. Then you end up going potty all night."

You could tell Mom was originally from Minnesota. Her proficient use of the word "potty" in both its noun and verb forms was a dead giveaway.

While Marla slurped her gelato, we arrived at the insanely crowded Piazza della Signoria where we stopped to shoot pictures of an impressively naked Neptune rising from a really big fountain and an equally naked David without the fountain. As Duncan motioned us toward the arcaded walkway flanking the Uffizi, Philip lost his footing and went sprawling onto the pavement in a graceless heap. "I'm all right. I'm all right," he assured us, as Duncan helped him to his feet. But he didn't look all right. The sweat from his body was soaking through his shirt, and his eyes had that vacuous look that sometimes appeared in Mom's when she was talking to Jackie.

"You want to rest?" Duncan asked him.

"Tripped is all," he growled, pressing a hand to his stomach. "My shoelace. Get me to the restaurant. I'll be fine."

The liquor was obviously starting to impair his thinking. His shoes didn't have lacings. He was wearing loafers.

We dodged around people queued up in long lines for the museum and fought off young East Indian men hawking artwork and questionable articles of clothing. "You buy this, Madame," one man urged Mom, shoving a fishnet shirt in her face. "It look very nice on you. I have large size."

Mom offered the man a courteous smile and stopped to hold the thing up to her. "What do you think, Emily?"

I eyed it critically. "I think it would look great...at the end of a pole." I craned my neck to keep track of the rest of the group. "Come on, Mom, we're losing everyone."

We pushed, and shoved and beat off more men selling postcards and gaudy scarves. By the time we reached the end of the arcade and stepped into the sunlight, we'd lost sight of the entire group, except for Philip, who was staggering across the street, unmindful of the scooters that vroomed past like angry gnats.

"What's he doing?" asked Mom.

I cringed as a Vespa squealed to a stop just shy of plowing into him. The helmeted driver flipped him an obscene gesture and gunned around him, leaving him to fend off a half dozen more.

"Watch out, Philip!" I yelled, but he seemed not to hear me as he stumbled toward the opposite sidewalk and collapsed onto the low stone balustrade that overlooked the river. "Don't move!" I screamed at him. "I'm coming!" Then to Mom, "Stay right here and wait for the others, okay? I don't want to lose you, too."

I stepped into the street, leaping backward as a scooter nearly clipped me. I darted an anxious look at Philip. He was crumpled on the balustrade, his arms and legs dangling lifelessly. Oh, God.

I charged into the street again, stiffening as a pack of Vespas wishboned around me, their helmeted drivers shaking their fists at me amid the deafening buzz of their motors. I glanced back at Philip.

I did a double take.

He was gone.

What?

I looked right. I looked left. WHERE WAS HE?

I heard a sudden scream. I saw a teenage girl in a bandana and hiking boots point a finger downward at something on the opposite side of the ledge where Philip had been lying. Her female companion leaned over the barrier, her hand flying to her mouth. I battled through traffic toward the sidewalk and raced toward the ledge.

I looked down.

I squinted into the sunlight, blinded by the reflected glare of the river, but not so blinded that I couldn't make out the