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“Besides,” says Alessandro, raising his hand as if to cup the waning sun that bathes his corner of the room. “What good is an artist without his light?” Sabine stares at the handsome youth, bemused. “You say this now, when you’re still young and life seems endless. But one day, your beauty will wither, and your flesh will sag—” “And my bones will be buried in the family plot,” he says, returning to his work, “and if God sees fit, something good will grow from them. But it won’t be me.”
“For them,” he says, gesturing at the busy city, “age takes its toll in decades. For us, it is the work of centuries. And it is not measured in wrinkles, or gray hair. Where others rot without, we rot within.” He raps his knuckles against his chest. “We are hollowed, bit by bit, as all that made us human dies. Our kindness. Our empathy. Our capacity for fear, and love. One by one, they slough away, until all that’s left is the desire to hunt, to hurt, to feed, to kill. That is how we die. Made reckless by our hunger. Convinced we are unkillable until someone or something proves us wrong.”
“I’m sorry,” she said, trying to brush them away. But her mother caught her hands. “Never be sorry,” she said, “for who you are.” Charlotte understood then that burning the pages of her journal had done nothing. Her mother already knew. She looked back at her husband and son, standing on the steps. “Some people keep their heart tucked so deep, they hardly know it’s there. But you,” she went on, turning back toward Charlotte, “you have always worn it like a second skin.” She ran a hand down her daughter’s arm. “Open to the world. You feel it all. The love and pain. The joy and hope and sorrow.”
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Anger and resentment are the worst. They’re like rocks in your pockets. Too many, and you’ll drown.”
She crosses her legs and flicks her toes through the water. “To be out here, in the dark, alone.” Charlotte relaxes, then. “I could say the same to you.” “Ah,” says Giada, cheerfully patting her purse. “That is why I carry rocks.” “Rocks are heavy,” says Charlotte. “Your shoulder must get tired.” “It does. But the longer I carry them, the stronger I feel.”
smudging a line with the ball of her thumb as she presses on. “Now, some of the men she met there were handsome enough. Some were even kind. But looking at them all, she knew they were heavy. She knew she would be crushed beneath their weight.”
