Uffizi ticket is for nine forty-five a.m. tomorrow, local bus can’t get me there on time. So I’ll go this afternoon, stay the night and, bam, be on the spot when I wake up. Except everything’s fully booked.’
‘Late August,’ he said. ‘Tourist Central. Why can’t you drive? It’s only an hour.’
She hesitated. ‘Don’t judge, but I’m nervous about driving into Florence. They’re loons on the road here, and there’s all these rules. You need a permit for the centre of Florence and I can’t do it, not on my own.’
‘I’ll come with you.’
Another fool. Seriously, who had she wronged in a past life to deserve this visitation of fools?
‘I’d like to see “art”. Sammie said I was a cultural wasteland. There’s a Da Vinci museum as well, with some of the machines he designed. That would be cool. Hey!’ He stalled her protests. ‘I’m not being nice. I want to go – there’s a spare ticket, so let’s go. I can even drive.’
‘I don’t know … I’d better talk to Jessie.’
‘I’m twenty-one. Nearly twenty-two. I’m not a kid, Nell. If we’re “talking” to my mum, shouldn’t you “talk” to your husband?’
She scoffed and rolled her eyes. ‘Seriously, I need to okay this with Jessie.’
‘Then I want to “okay this” with Liam.’ With a swaggery walk, led from the hips, he said, in a deep, dorky voice, ‘“Hey, Liam, seeing as you’re a selfish arse to your wife, I’m guessing you won’t care if I drive her there.” Ha-ha, that’d be gas.’
‘You don’t like him, do you?’
‘Nell, I utterly fucking hate him.’
A thought occurred. ‘Aw, Ferdia, no! Are you doing this to get back at him because of Sammie?’
‘I’m totally not. I want to visit the gallery because I want to visit the gallery. Nothing shady.’
She felt mistrustful. ‘You might get bored. I don’t want to have to stop mid-tour because you’ve had enough.’
‘If I get bored, I can leave. We have phones! I’ll wander the streets of Florence, without a plan, like in a movie.’
‘You might meet a girl who’s leaving Florence on the five p.m. train. You could fall in love for the day.’
‘I’m so there for that. But basically you can stay in the gallery until they kick you out. Okay?’
Nell was still feeling doubtful. ‘I need to talk to Jessie about the car. I don’t think you’d be on our car insurance, so you’d have to borrow Jessie’s.’
‘Okay, let’s do it.’ With a flourish, he ushered her to the door. ‘Andiamo.’
‘If it’s the driving you’re worried about, we could get you a car and driver,’ Jessie said to Nell. ‘Do-I-Amooze-You could probably sort it.’
‘I couldn’t deal. I wouldn’t know what to say to the man. I simply couldn’t.’
‘Okay. Ferdia can drive you. But, Ferdia,’ Jessie was stern, ‘you can’t change your mind half an hour in and start whinging that you’re bored.’
Nell expected him to kick off but he simply said, ‘Maybe Nell could bring colouring books and crayons for me.’
Which was so unexpected that Nell exploded with laughter.
‘So it’s decided?’ he said. ‘Right, I’m off to be waterboarded by Vinnie.’
Jessie held Nell by the arm until he was fully gone, then hissed, ‘Find out what happened between him and Barty, will you? Good girl.’
Cara was standing at the marble food sink, washing lettuce leaves for lunch, when Johnny appeared.
‘How’s things?’ she asked.
He seemed uncomfortable. ‘Grand.’
‘Are you okay?’
‘Look. I want to apologize. We’ve asked a lot of you, me and Jessie. Doing our accounts and that. If all the stress pushed you over the edge, you know …’
She’d been hoping for a chance to extricate herself. Here was her opportunity and she needed to be brave. After a breath, she said, ‘Would you mind if I stopped doing your monthly accounts? I feel slightly … uncomfortable. Knowing all that stuff about your money.’
‘Sure. Grand. Of course.’ Johnny looked mortified. ‘Sorry for –’
She put a hand on his arm. ‘Let’s not make a thing of it. Anyway,’ she managed a smile, ‘the pair of you never even look at them.’
‘But we knew if we were in terrible trouble you’d tell us. So, with the Airbnb, could you give me a lesson in running it?’
‘I’m okay to keep doing that. It nearly runs itself. Hassan does the heavy lifting. All I do is throw an occasional eye over it.’
‘Well, that’d be great, but if it ever gets too much, just –’
‘I will. I promise.’
After an awkward pause, he blurted, ‘It’s going great, isn’t it? The apartment?’ He sounded so