“Let me get this straight,” I say, fixing Fanny with my most petulant, on-the-verge-of-a-tantrum toddler face. “We’re riding eighteen miles—”
“—one way.”
“We’re riding eighteen miles, one way, just to tour an olive farm? I don’t even eat olives. They’re gross. They look like black eyeballs.”
Fanny chuckles. “You’ve only had those nasty canned olives the Leaning Tower of Pizza puts on their pies. You’ve never tried a ripe Tuscan olive.”
“If they don’t taste good covered in pizza sauce and molten mozzarella, they’re not going to taste good at some stupid old olive farm.”
Fanny crosses her arms and stares at me. It’s her “I’ll be indulgent for so long, you snotty little brat” look.
“I’m not trying them.” I cross my arms, but stop myself from sticking my tongue out. “I’m not.”
“Fine,” she sighs. “You don’t have to eat an olive, but at least try bread dipped in olive oil.”
“That’s your incentive? Eighteen miles, and all I get is some oily bread?”
“You’re right.” Fanny moves toward the door. “I’ll just go let Jean-Luc know you’re incapable of riding today. Then I’ll ask Mrs. Rosenthal if she has some knitting you could work on.”
“Low blow!”
“Look,” Fanny says, softening. “I know cycling is not your thing. It’s okay if you want to stay back today. No shame.”
I don’t know if Fanny is using reverse psychology on me, but now the prospect of sitting at the Agriturismo and watching the others ride away seems lamer than riding eighteen miles to visit an olive farm.
“I’ll go.” I shove my foot into a cycling shoe. “But I’m not eating an olive.”
* * * *
The route from the Agriturismo to the olive farm is eighteen miles of steep inclines, blind curves, and deeply rutted dirt tracks. Remember that scene in Under the Tuscan Sun, when Frances is on the bus, gazing out the window at rolling hills ablaze with sunflower fields? Remember how the bus meandered down the dirt road, never encountering another vehicle?
I love that scene. Love the bucolic imagery. Love the romantic musical score. Love the supportive peppy Gay and Away group. Love, love, love it all.
I don’t know which route Frances and her meandering bus traveled, but it sure as hell wasn’t the road from Agriturismo La Luciana to the Poggibonsi Olive Farm.
I’m sorry to be the one to shatter the celluloid fantasy, but I’m pretty sure that entire scene was created using CGI.
I am not Frances and this is not Under the Tuscan Sun. There are no peaceful drives through the Tuscan countryside, no amber-hued filters to give the scene a golden glow, no stylists waiting offstage to fix my hair and makeup.
I am Vivia Perpetua Grant, unemployed, jilted, cranky, covered-in-dust Vivia. I have a tattoo of a sushi roll on my ass and stubble burn from having crazy-hot monkey sex. I hate olives and I hate cycling, but I am riding eighteen miles to eat a Tuscan olive and impress a French man.
The road I am on is not bucolic. It is littered with empty limoncello bottles and sheep shit. I am not joyously navigating my way through a labyrinth of picturesque pastoral roads. I’m dodging my way around potholes and speeding Fiats.
“Why am I even doing this?”
“Because you want to prove to yourself that you can,” Fanny says between breaths. “Veni, Vidi, Vici. You came, you saw, you conquered.”
“Veni, vidi, vici. That was easy for Julius Caesar to say; he crossed Italy in a chariot, not on a stupid bike.”
When Fanny doesn’t respond, I resume my rant.
“Besides, Caesar’s reward for conquering was riches, fame, and a place in history. Am I getting fame or riches? No, I’m getting a stupid olive!”
“That’s it.” Fanny stops pedaling and puts her feet down.
I stop pedaling, too.
“Look, Vivia, I know you hate cycling. Everyone knows you hate cycling. But we’re here. We’re committed. I want to finish these rides, but your incessant complaining is making it difficult.”
“That’s harsh.”
“I don’t mean to be harsh, but you haven’t stopped whining since we left the Agriturismo. You’re in Tuscany, one of the most beautiful places in the world, and you’re miserable. If you’re not having fun cycling, don’t do it. This trip isn’t about you becoming a world class cyclist; it’s about you being you.”
She’s right. I have been whining all morning.
“I hate bike riding, but I don’t want to disappoint you.”
Or Luc.
“Pffft, don’t be silly,” Fanny says. “The only way you will disappoint me is if you let pleasing others keep you from pleasing yourself. Forget about keeping up with the others. Forget about disappointing me. Forget about impressing Luc. What do you want to do?”
“What do I want to do? Well, I’d like take a little break, wipe the dead fly from my sunglasses and the sheep shit from my tires.”
“Okay,” she says, getting off her bike. “Let’s take a break.”
“No, you go on.” I get off my bike and walk along the side of the road. “I’ll rest by myself and then catch up with you.”
“You’re pissed, aren’t you?”
“No.” I look over at my best friend and smile. “I’m too sore to be pissed. Go on. I’ll meet you at the olive farm.”
Fanny tilts her head. It’s her “I am sorry I went from zero to bitch mode” look.
“You’re sure?”
“Absolutely. Go on.”
Fanny gets back on her bike and gives me the thumbs up before riding off. I walk along, pushing my bike, maneuvering around piles of sheep poo, until I come to a fork in the road. An orange boulder stands between the two roads. It’s big and flat. I secure my bike, climb atop the sun warmed boulder, sit cross-legged, and contemplate Fanny’s advice.
Forget about keeping up, disappointing, impressing. Do what you want to do.
What do I want to do? What do I want to do?
I stretch my legs out, lean back, and stare up at the cloudless sky. Well, I want to rent one of those zippy Fiats and repeatedly drive it over my bike until it resembles a piece of installation art. I want to find a plastic surgeon to remove the cartoon sushi roll tattoo from my ass. I want to live large, love deeply, and have many, many accidental adventures.
I don’t want to ride another mile on that miserable, freaking bike, but I don’t want to be the last one to finish the ride either. I don’t want Luc to think I am a quitter, but if I have to get back on the bike I think I will burst into tears. My bum hurts that much.
To ride or not to ride, that is the question.
I have resumed my cross-legged position and am contemplating this conundrum when I hear a vehicle approaching. It sounds heavier than a Fiat, with a louder engine.
I look down the road and see a rusty old Chevy truck rumbling toward me, gears grinding, shocks screaming.
The driver pulls to a stop in front of me and sticks his head out the window. “Do you want to ride me?”
“Simone!” I say, sliding off the boulder. “What are you doing here?”
“Remember, I say you sleep on top of me?” He grins at me innocently. “I go now. You want to ride me?”
“With.”
Simone frowns.
“Ride with you.”
“Ah, yes! That’s what I say, no?”
“No.”
“Where are you going?” he asks.
“The Poggibonsi Olive Farm.”
Simone smiles.
“But that is where I am going! Come, you ride with me.”
“Really?” I ask, skeptically. “You’re going to the Poggibonsi Olive Farm?”
“Yes. Of course.” He gets out of the truck. “You want to ride with me? I take you to Poggibonsi.”
“What about my bike?”
“It is no problem. I put her in my bed.” Simone grabs my
bike and hoists it into the back of his truck. “We go now, yes?”
My Mum would have an apoplectic fit if she could see me now.“Don’t you remember my Stranger Danger lectures? Sure, he’s just a kind man offering you a ride, until he hog-ties you, tosses you in the back of his trunk, drives you to an abandoned farm, and slaughters you like a pig.”
Simone is still grinning at me. I search his face for signs of brutality or perversion, but he doesn’t look like a serial killer. There’s something sweet and innocent about him. That’s what they said about Ted Bundy, and look how that turned out.
“You’re not related to Ted Bundy, are you?”
“I don’t know this person. You meet him at Poggibonsi, maybe?
“Never mind.” I takeoff my helmet and tossing it into the back of the truck. “I would love a ride, Simone.”
“Yes?”
I can’t help but laugh at his eagerness. “Yes.”
Simone hurries around the truck, opens the passenger side door, and waits as I climb into the cab. He slams the passenger door, hurries back around to the driver’s side, and slides onto the bench beside me.
“Poggibonsi?”
“Poggibonsi!”
I wonder if the truck will need to be pushed to start, but it coughs to life the moment Simone turns the key.
“Wait!”
What am I doing? What will Luc think when he sees me speeding by him in Simone’s truck? I consider my options: A. Get out of the truck and back on my bike. B. Duck down just as we are passing Luc. C. Slash the bike tire and say Simone found me stranded by the side of the road. D. Ask Simone to take a different route to Poggibonsi.
“What is it?”
“Simone,” I say, fixing the handsome Italian with my most convincing damsel in distress face. “You wouldn’t know any shortcuts to Poggibonsi, would you?”
“I don’t know what this is…shortcuts.”
“Just a minute.”
I hop out of the truck, reach into my bike pack, and return with my map. Unfolding the map, I point to the squiggly red line marking the route our group is taking to get to the olive farm.
“Is there another route to Poggibonsi?”
Simone stares at me blankly for several long seconds, as if he doesn’t understand my request. I’m thinking of another way to word my question when his lips curve up in a mischievous smile.
“You are being a sneaky girl.”
“What do you mean?”
“Eh-eh,” Simone says, wagging his finger at me. “You don’t fool Simone. You want to pile the wool on top of the Frenchman, no?”
I laugh as I imagine Luc trapped beneath a mound of wool. “Pull the wool over! Yes, that is precisely what I wish to do.”
Simone pounds his chest.
“Leave it to Simone, bella.”
He slams the truck into gear and we’re off, lurching and bumping down the dirt road. The grammatically challenged Italian chatters to me in broken English while navigating a series of dizzying hairpin turns. Finally, we come to a four way stop.
“You see,” Simone says, pointing to a paved road to the right. “Your Frenchman, he goes that way, but we go this way.”
Simone slams his foot on the gas. The truck flies through the intersection and onto another winding dirt road. We drive a short distance when I see a round red metal sign with the words Strada Chiusa printed on it.
“Simone?”
“Sì.”
“What does Strada Chiusa mean?” I ask, sounding out the words on the sign.
“Strada Chiusa? It means the road, she is closed.”
“What? Why is the road closed?”
“The rain. It washed the road away.”
Stranger Danger! Oh my God! Mum was right. Simone is probably driving me to my death. They’ll find me hogtied, floating tattoo up in some river.
“Don’t worry, bella.” Simone grins and slaps his hand down on the truck’s dashboard. “My Chevy will get us to Poggibonsi. She is robust.”
Anxiously, I look out the window for landmarks that might help me navigate my way to safety if I am lucky enough to escape Simone Bundy. I see nothing but trees, trees, and more trees.
This is the perfect place to hide a body. If I were a serial killer, I would dump my ignorant, trusting hogtied victim in a place just like this. Dark. Remote. No one around to hear the screams.
“Hold on to your horse, bella.”
“What? Why?”
“Here we go!”
“Go? Go where?”
I clutch the door handle, ready to make a hasty exit, just as the Chevy drives head-on into a river. A geyser of muddy water shoots up over the hood and splashes down on the windshield. It’s like being in a car wash. We’re driving blind.
Simone pushes a lever. We hear a loud thump, followed by high-pitched squeaking as the windshield wiper moves back and forth across the grimy glass.
“You see,” Simone cries, pointing out the windshield. “We are in Poggibonsi! I told you my Chevy was robust.”
I lean forward and peer through the arc of cleaned glass. We are approaching a small, sleepy village. A blue directional sign on the side of the road confirms that we have indeed arrived at Poggibonsi.
Simone pulls into a parking space in front of an old stone church and kills the Chevy’s engine. He gets out, but I don’t wait for him to come around and open the door for me. Glad to have escaped a serial killing, I open the door and hop out of the truck.
“There,” he says, pointing down the road to a private drive with massive wrought iron gates. “That is Agriturismo Poggibonsi.”
“Thank you, Simone.”
The Italian shrugs. “You can ride me anytime.”
“Ride with you,” I say, laughing. “You keep forgetting the with.”
Simone doesn’t respond. He just grins at me. It’s definitely an expression open to interpretation. He lifts my bike from the flatbed, hands me my helmet, and hops back into the driver’s seat.
“Simone,” I say, leaning in the open passenger window. “Do you think you could give me a ride back to Agriturismo La Luciana later? I’ll give you money for gas. Petrol. Diesel fuel. Whatever it is they call it here in Italy.”
Simone gasps. “Bella, why you insult Simone?”
“I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to insult you.”
“You no need to pay me,” he says, turning the key in the ignition. “Putting the wool on the Frenchman, this is payment enough.”
We make arrangements to meet at a spot somewhere up the road, and Simone drives off, the Chevy belching and dripping mud.
I look at my bike. The sleek, carbon frame is covered in mud. It hardly looks like a high-performance road bike. I’m going to have to clean it before Luc and the others arrive or risk them getting the make on me. I’m not going down like that. I didn’t risk death, dismemberment, and drowning just to have my duplicity discovered because of a dirty bike.
Remembering that we passed a gelateria before arriving at the church, I push the bike back toward the center of the village.
I prop my bike up in front of the gelateria and go inside. The small shop doesn’t appear to have restroom facilities—naturally—so I buy a bottle of water, grab a handful of paper napkins, and get to work erasing the evidence of my dastardly deed.
When I finish cleaning the bike, I splash a little water on my face to make it look like I’ve been perspiring, then head back into the gelateria and order un grande gelato al caramello. I’m sitting on my sanitized bike, casually licking my caramel gelato, when the group arrives.
I bummed a ride from Simone because I couldn’t subject my bruised and battered bum to another second in the saddle, but oh Sweet Jesus, the look on Luc’s face is the little ribbon of caramel in my already delicious gelato! A bonus! Totally worth risking death and dismemberment.
“What took you so long?” I say, licking my cone.
Luc stares at me in obvious baff
lement. “How…” He looks around for an answer to the question everyone in the group wants to ask. “How did you get here so fast? You didn’t even stop at the rendezvous point.”
“I took an alternate route.” I take another lick of my gelato and change the subject. “You were right, though, the gelato in Italy is outrageous. Want some?”
Luc narrows his eyes. I don’t think my story has convinced him, but he doesn’t press me further.
Chapter 27
Getting Caught
Up a creek without a paddle. That’s what I am. Quite literally. Up a Tuscan creek without a freaking paddle.
Operation Shortcut was going off without a hitch. I toured the olive farm and even tried an olive. What can I say? I’m obviously susceptible to peer pressure. When it came time to begin the ride back to the Agriturismo, I pretended to have a stomach cramp and told Fanny to go on without me. I waited until the coast was clear and then pedaled my sneaky sneakers off to meet Simone at the rendezvous point. We loaded my bike into the truck and took off. Honestly? Jason Bourne couldn’t have planned a smoother operation.
That is, until we reached the river. I say it’s a river, but Simone assures me it’s merely a creek. Just like before, Simone gunned the engine and drove straight into the river. Only this time, the truck stalled.
Remind me to cross espionage off my list of potential careers. A good operative would have planned for this unexpected variable. Jason Bourne would’ve packed an inflatable raft and used it to float down river to the Agriturismo.
We’re sitting inside the truck, murky river water swirling around us. Simone pumps the gas while turning the key in the ignition, but the truck just lets out a final asthmatic cough before dying.
“My Chevy, she is too wet to ride.”
“What do you mean she is too wet to ride?”
Sweet Jesus, did I really just say that? That’s a sentence I never expected to utter.
“She will not start. She is flooded.”
“What are we going to do? We can’t just sit here. We’ll get swept away by the river.”
“Creek.”
“Creek. River. I don’t care what you call it, as long as you get us out of it and back at the Agriturismo before Luc.”
Faking It Page 21
