Free A Florentine Death by Michele Giuttari Page B

Valentina said, taking one. 'They're delicious, as always.' She licked her fingers as she walked away.
    That evening, they had dinner in a room set aside specially for them and her father only got up a couple of times to talk to the guests at the tables, as he usually did, and make sure that everything was fine.
    'If you like,' her mother said during dinner, 'you can have a room on the first floor, no 114. We've just refurbished it and it has everything. Cable TV, fax, a well-stocked minibar . . .'
    'Thanks, Mummy, but I prefer mine.'
    'It's up to you. It's just so small and uncomfortable. But it's ready if you want it.'
    'I don't know how you can sleep up there,' her father said. 'There isn't even a toilet in the room, you have to go halfway along the corridor. And with all the work going on, it's a real mess up there.'
    'My things are there - my memories ... I like it. Don't worry'
    'If you're sure.'
    Valentina wanted to be back in that room she had known as a child, she wanted to take refuge in it and forget.
    Even though, as she herself had said, her memories were in that room . . .
     
    The sloping ceiling, the Spice Girls posters, the Barbies neatly lined up on a white shelf, the lilac wallpaper, the collection of cups and medals won in skiing competitions, the television with the built-in VCR, the stereo unit and the CD rack, the books, the comics. Valentina looked around, and did not find the welcome she had expected from these objects. They were no longer childhood companions: they had suddenly become silent but accusing witnesses of her betrayal.
    She had betrayed her family, her future, her hopes. She had brought it on herself, with all the unawareness of youth, and now she didn't know what to do.
    Everything had started right here, in this little room that had originally been intended for the staff, and which she had been determined to have when she was ten.
    She slipped into bed and turned out the light, but found it hard to get to sleep. Even the bed was accusing her.
    *
    It had happened on Christmas Eve 1994.
    Valentina was sixteen, Cinzia fourteen.
    The Robertis had arrived late in the afternoon. Valentina had been impatient to see Cinzia, eager for news of the city, and her friend had not disappointed her. After dinner they had all gone into the village, the girls to have snowball fights and the adults to drink the hot punch being distributed in the main square by skiing instructors dressed in Santa Claus costumes. There was a big Christmas tree, and multicoloured lights were strung from house to house. Music was playing, and people greeted each other merrily and exchanged wishes. Many of them, including their parents, were waiting for midnight mass, but the two girls had managed to wriggle out of it by promising to go to bed immediately. They had run back to the hotel to try and guess from the sizes of the packages under the tree what to expect in the morning.
    'Can I come to your room?' Cinzia had asked.
    'Yes. But you'll have to leave before your parents get back, or they'll notice we're not asleep!'
    'I have so many things to tell you,' Cinzia said. 'I'll just put my pyjamas on and I'll be right with you!'
    Valentina ran to get changed and clean her teeth before her friend joined her, because the bathroom was some distance from her room.
    When Cinzia came, she made Valentina's head spin with her tales of all the things she was discovering, all the exciting things that happened in a city like Bologna, the clubs she'd started going to even though she was underage, the new friends she'd made at school.
    'Do you smoke?' she asked suddenly.
    'No, do you?' Valentina asked.
    'I smoke these,' Cinzia said, taking from her pocket some cigarette papers, a bag of tobacco, and a small light brown cube which looked like a piece of plasticine.
    There was a sly look in her eyes, and her face was lit by a crafty smile.
    But she was only a child. A child playing at being adult, Valentina thought. Not that she herself wanted