The New Kid by Eliot Schrefer

Author:Eliot Schrefer
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Simon & Schuster
Published: 2007-01-15T00:00:00+00:00

When they do, Gretchen is taken aback to find Gita straddling a motorino. Gita glances down at her leather-clad legs and hitches her helmet tighter under her arm. “You probably think I am to be crazy. What a surprise! Leather goddess Gita.”

“Wow,” Gretchen says. “We’re not in America anymore, huh?”

“No, thank God. Let’s go.” She adjusts her black pants, sits higher on the cream Vespa, and pats the seat behind her. “Come on, get on. We’re going to have an adventure.”

Gretchen hesitates—she’s nervous to board a motorbike, and she’s also undone by the dramatic change in Gita’s appearance. Then Gita suddenly laughs at herself and peers at the vehicle like it’s a wild animal.

Gretchen rests her weight on the back of the seat. “I’ve never done this before,” she says.

“Here,” Gita says, “take the helmet. I’ll ride without. Wind in my hair and all that.”

“How dramatic,” Gretchen says. Gita laughs automatically. Gretchen wraps her arms around her soft torso.

“What have you seen?” Gita yells as they speed down Via Aventina.

Gretchen smiles under the helmet. What has she seen? But of course Gita is referring to landmarks. “The Colosseum, Circo Massimo, Palatine Hill. Those ancient baths nearby, too.”

They slow down for a light. “Via Appia Antica?”

“Vee what?” Gretchen has to yell to be heard through the helmet.

“Via Appia Antica. The Appian Way, you could say.”

“No, haven’t seen it.”

Gita suddenly veers. They race along a bowered street, light flashing to dark as they speed through dappled sunshine. Gradually the clogged traffic of central Rome gives way to smaller roads and, finally, dirt and paving stones. Gita pulls the Vespa into the grass. “Let’s get off and walk for some way. Full genuine Roman road.”

Gretchen follows her onto the broken path. She kicks off her sandals and feels the grit of old Rome beneath her feet. Gita walks a few feet ahead, staring at the sky. Ruins hem the road, tall and ragged brick pillars, stones cut by tendrils of rubbery grass.

“It goes all the way to Naples,” Gita says. “The central artery of the heart of the empire. So say the tour guides.”

“It’s like this all the way down?”

“More or less. I walk here on the mornings.” She flashes Gretchen a brown smile. “Never walked all the way to Naples, though.” Gita waits for Gretchen to join her. When she does, the unevenness of the flagstones puts Gretchen closer than she intended to be. Her shoulder presses Gita’s back and she’s subject to a flood of sensations: the heat from her torso, a whiff of her deodorant and the flavor of her skin, the rise of a curl of hair above her neck, and she can understand, easily, how Lansing once fell in love with her. Gita is self-possessed but not vain; she invites infatuation.

“This is my favorite part of all of Rome,” Gita says. “The city does not run on in this direction, knew to stop. There are tall buildings, and then there are fields and ruins and birds and grass, all this grass.

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.