girls …” She shakes her head. “No shame, at all. Sending him notes of what they fantasized doing with him. I found one in his schoolbag at the start of his sophomore year. A girl who claimed she’d adored him since elementary. Respectable daughter of a bank CEO. Yet, she described an addiction she’d developed to … doing things, while thinking of him. Disgusting.”
A part of me wants to chuckle, while another part of me feels as if her words are directed at me, somehow, though I have nothing to do with her son. “Sometimes … a person just wants to be noticed.”
“For the wrong reasons.”
“Of course.”
“Some, he did ignore. Others, I’m sure he indulged. Boys will be boys, and all that. He was handsome, athletic, and it didn’t matter what age they were, women just gravitated to him.”
“Did he ever love?” I don’t know why I’m asking these questions. I shouldn’t be asking, but I slept with the image of his face, his sad, morose face, and I can’t stop thinking about it.
“Lucian loves, in as much as he’s capable. Whether it’s for an hour, a day, or a week. But I don’t think any woman will ever have his heart completely. The closest was his only son.”
Studying her for a moment, to be sure she doesn’t slip into another hallucination at the mention of Roark, I nod and rise up from the piano bench. “Would you like to go for a walk, or something?”
Following a light knock, Giulia stands in the doorway, straightening her posture when Laura twists to face her.
“Pardon the interruption, ladies. Miss Amy is here for wardrobe.”
“Ah, fantastic!” Laura turns around, her eyes as lit with just as earlier, when the doctor stood flirting at her side. “Time to find you some proper clothing.”
Oh, Christ.
“I don’t know …” With her finger pressed against her cheek, Laura tips her head in the reflection of all three mirrors that are set before a fitting platform, where I stand on display in her bedroom. “Looks too garish, if you ask me.”
I’m guessing Amy is in her thirties, considering the youthful, wrinkle-free glow of her face. Her style reminds me of something more bohemian, in patterned pants and an airy, off-the-shoulder top. Strings of necklaces dangle from her neck, different sized beads that match the colors of her pants.
I stare down at the outfit she’s chosen for me: a white, flowy peasant top and jeans, with a thin braided leather necklace. A little too hippy for my taste, but better than the tweed suits I imagined she’d show up with.
“You asked me to choose a wardrobe appropriate for a nineteen-year-old. Not you, Laura.”
I’m guessing this chick is one of few who gets away with talking to her like that. In some ways, I envy her. Her hair is flipped to the side, highlighted from the strands of darks and lights weaved together, and when she smiles, it’s the straightest, whitest set of teeth I’ve ever seen. “Don’t worry, I’m not going to steer you wrong,” she whispers, leaning in as she tucks only the front of my shirt into the jeans.
“What else do you have? Any dresses?”
“Oh, I … I don’t do dresses.” In truth, I stopped wearing dresses when I was about twelve and Abigail Watson told everyone in the class that I had too much hair on my legs. I began shaving soon after, of course, but never bothered with dresses, or shorts, for that matter. Not even when I worked a summer at a marina.
“I did bring one. But I’m guessing you’d think it too garish.” Amy rolls her eyes, clearly offended by Laura’s earlier comment.
“I want to see it on her,” Laura insists, and I’d give anything right now for the platform below me to open up and swallow me whole.
When she turns around, Amy’s eyebrows lift in silent apology.
With a huff, I step down from the platform and make my way to the bathroom for the dress, which I find hanging on the rack beside the wardrobe of clothes Amy brought with her.
White and linen, with thin straps and a hook and eye closure bodice, it’s everything I loathe. Reminds me of what the rich tourist women wear on the beach, when they’re trying to update their social media. I reluctantly change into it, horrified to find it fits me perfectly. My only hope at this point is that Laura will hate it as much as I do. The lines on my forearms practically