Getting the Boot (12 page)

“She's working the overnight shift at the ER to cover for another one of the nurses. She's not home yet.”

“Oh.” She'd just have to tell him and get it over with. “Actually, Dad,” the words rushed out, “it's Grandma's locket. I was out with a friend the other night, and it must have slipped off my neck. I don't know how. Mom's gonna hate me.” Kelly's voice quavered.

There was silence on the other end of the phone. “Dad?”

“I'm here, hon.” Kelly heard him sigh. “Your mom will love you no matter what, but she is going to be upset. I'll talk to her when she gets home.”

Kelly felt a rush of guilt. If she hadn't been so intent on partying with Joe, she might have noticed when the locket fell off.

“I know how much it meant to Mom. I can't believe how badly I've messed up everything.” She sniffled.

Her father sighed again. “Listen, everyone deserves an appeal now and then, so consider this your get-out-of-jail free card. I'll let this slide for now. But I don't want to get another call from Dr. Wainwright, unless it's to tell us how great you're doing. Understand?”

“Completely,” Kelly said, nodding into the phone.

“Honey? I've got a brief to write this morning for a new case. Can we talk again later?”

“Sure,” Kelly said, relieved that the conversation was almost over. “And Dad? Tell Mom I'm really sorry.”

“I'll make sure to.”

Kelly shut off her phone, wondering what else she'd have to apologize for before this summer was over.

Kelly smiled as Andrea loaded her six mural painters onto the metro for a trip to an art-supply shop near the Pantheon. She was excited not to be spending the afternoon cooped up at school. Having her free time so strictly regimented was actually a big relief. At home, her weekend plans were usually squared away by Tuesday afternoon, dinnertime at the latest. Only a week after her split with Joe, Kelly was already feeling the same odd desperation—loneliness, mere mortals called it—creeping up on her again, as it had when she first arrived in Rome.

As they rode the train, Kelly checked out the other members of the group. The male-female ratio totally sucked—five to one—and the lone guy was Dai, an intense Japanese kid from Kelly's Italian class. He was absorbed in sketching a wildly detailed, sci-fi creature of some sort on the back of his notebook. Gabriela, whose sneakers were spattered with paint, was obviously a serious artist—Kelly had seen her stuff hanging up in the art studio. Hildy and Veronica, whom Kelly had never seen talking to anyone except each other, were deep in a heated discussion about the “lines of incongruity” evident in Botticelli's works. Compared to them, Sheela was a party animal. Kelly was almost relieved to see Goth Girl, otherwise known as Marina, finishing off the group. At least Kelly had spoken to her before, even if the conversation had failed miserably.

Andrea laid out her plans for putting together the mural. “This week, we'll travel around the city, choosing landmarks to include in the piece. Then you'll each make preliminary pencil sketches. When those designs are finalized, you'll ink over the lines, copy them onto film, and project the images on the wall. When that's all done, we'll be ready to paint.”

The group followed Andrea several blocks to a pretty little art store hidden away on a cobblestoned alleyway. Outside the door, an easel held an oil painting of the street they were standing on. The art shop was the central focus of the painting.

Kelly leaned over it, admiring the artist's deft brush-strokes and the way hues were subtly mixed to perfectly capture the warmth of the stones and the brightness of the red geraniums that sat outside the door. She didn't realize how absorbed she was until Andrea put a hand on her shoulder. “What do you think?”

“I wish I could paint like that,” Kelly said. “I wonder who did it?”

Kelly thought she saw a hint of color rise in Andrea's cheeks. “Actually, I painted it. Whenever I'm in Rome, I stock up on art supplies here. Signor Carelli has always been so kind to me, I made this as a thank-you.”

“It's amazing,” Kelly said.

Andrea ushered them into the store, where an elderly man—presumably Signor Carelli—kissed Andrea noisily on both cheeks. He gave them the run of the store, and Andrea showed them all different kinds of materials: chalk sticks called Conte crayons, glass bottles filled with jewel-colored inks, and a variety of paints and pigments.

Hildy and Veronica ran over to a shelf of antique print books, while Dai browsed through some posters by a modern artist named Giorgio de Chirico. Marina had picked up a book on angels, and was studying each picture so closely her nose ring practically scraped the page. A Goth who was into angels? Go figure.

Kelly wandered around the store, picking up brushes and pens and examining the artwork on the walls. Everyone else in the group seemed to have a real passion for art; Kelly didn't even know if she had her own style. Maybe with this mural, she could really make something that was special, like Andrea's painting of the store.

Finally, armed with large pads and a handful of pencils and Conte crayons, the group continued on to the Pantheon, which Kelly hadn't seen yet. Andrea explained that the building combined a Greek-style temple with a Roman dome. It was pretty amazing: a huge, impressive hunk of stone plopped right in the middle of a crowded piazza.

The Pantheon was the best-preserved ancient building Kelly had seen so far. Pieces of the original marble facade still clung to the two-thousand-year-old walls, and a row of elaborate pillars framed gargantuan bronze entrance doors. But the most striking part was the vast, domed roof. Andrea said it was one of the greatest feats of engineering in the world. The builders had built it on a huge, round hill of dirt, and then took the earth away when construction was completed.

Inside, the dome was equally impressive—when Kelly looked up at it, a ray of sunlight beamed all the way down to her feet.

“The hole in the center of the roof is called the oculus,” Andrea told them. “It provides all the light in here, and as the sun travels west through the sky, the sunshine moves around the room.

“As an art historian, my favorite fact about the Pantheon is that the Renaissance painter Raphael is buried here.” Andrea walked over to his alcove, which was watched over by two stern men who looked like older versions of Swiss Guards. A bunch of other big shots were also entombed in the building, a practice that was pretty common in Europe. Kelly found it utterly creepy.

After they had checked it out completely, the group sat down at a café in the bustling square outside, ordered cappuccinos, and began sketching. “Remember,” Andrea said, “I want you to feel free to draw in your own style. Whether that's anime, Abstract Expressionist, or Pointillist, so be it. Don't worry about stuff like proportion and perspective yet—this is a warm-up. We'll draw first and decide how to put it all together later.” As they worked, she snapped photos of the building from different angles and occasionally peeked over their shoulders.

Marina leaned over toward Kelly. “What's your glitch, Katie? I didn't know Head Cheerleader Barbie was into mixing paint. Aren't you worried you'll ruin your pretty outfit?”

“Actually, it's Kelly.” She was a little miffed that Marina still couldn't remember her name. “Dr. Wainwright thought I had too much time on my hands. I broke curfew a bunch of times to go clubbing and he found out about it. So here I am. As for my glitches, I have way too many to mention.”

Marina looked impressed. “Killah Kelly. I think I underestimated you.” She held up a hand. “What do you think? 'Eighty-one Pontiac Firebird, graphite gray.”

Kelly tilted her head appraisingly. “It's okay, but wouldn't a nice Italian import, maybe an Alfa Romeo or a Ferrari, be more appropriate?”

The ice cracked, and Goth Girl giggled.

They roamed the city for the rest of the day, and Kelly discovered that Andrea seemed to know everything about Rome. She walked the city like a native, navigating little alleys where Kelly would have become hopelessly lost and leading her group through the insane traffic with calmness and skill. On the way to their destinations, she would often stop to point out a building where some famous author or artist had lived, or a particularly beautiful detail on a church that they would never have noticed otherwise.

“How do you know all this?” Kelly asked her.

“When I was growing up, I spent a month here every summer, visiting family. Hanging out with my Roman cousins was always the high point of my year. When it was time to go home, I would cry for two days straight.”

Kelly looked at Andrea's placid face and tried to picture it puffy-eyed and snot-streaked. Impossible.

Andrea read her skeptical expression. “You know, not everybody loves their high-school experience.”

Marina snorted. “You can say that again. You know Dante's rings of hell? My high school makes up at least three of them. And it's in Arizona, so it's even hotter than hell.”

Andrea laughed sympathetically. “I was miserable when I was a teenager. This was the one place where I felt I belonged.”

Kelly rolled her eyes. “Please, look at you. I bet you had tons of boyfriends and were super popular.”

Andrea raised an eyebrow. “Kelly, you wouldn't have given me the time of day when I was a teenager. I didn't go out on one date in high school, and if someone had asked me out, I probably would have died of fright. I was completely socially clueless.”

Hildy and Veronica, almost in unison, nodded understandingly. But Kelly's mind boggled at the thought of Andrea as a socially challenged outcast.

“Anyway, I'm living testimony that there is life after high school. Once I got to college, I found that people were a lot more accepting if you were a little bit different.”

“I'm not holding my breath for that,” Marina said.

Andrea waved the group across Via del Corso and down the street toward the Piazza di Spagna. “Enough of my life story. I want each of you to tell me who your favorite Italian artist is, and why. You first, Dai.”

Kelly inwardly groaned. Just when things were starting to get interesting, Andrea always sent them back to the drawing board.

Once again, Kelly found herself standing in St. Peter's Square. This time, the mural group had come to take photos and work on sketches. They had visited each spot to make drawings except Kelly's. Andrea had mischievously requested that Kelly choose the Vatican as her landmark, and Kelly had to admit it was a little bit funny. Still, even though they weren't going into any of the buildings, Kelly made sure to wear her linen drawstring pants and a T-shirt instead of a tank.

As they walked toward the Basilica, Kelly gazed up at the countless arches and columns, wondering at the intricacy of it all. How was she going to include all those details? There were like a hundred statues on top of the building alone.