There are very few words one can say after such confession. Ones that don't sound sincere or flippant.
"Well, for what it is worth, I am glad you are here, and I am sure that your family is as well," Alec says to her taking hold of one of her hands.
"You're not going to tell me I need to forgive myself or have some magical saying that makes me realize there is no reason to forgive myself or that I already have?" Una asks him.
"There is little point in that knowing you don't feel that way?" Alec tells her simply. "It's more compassionate at this point to just let take comfort when you want or need it?"
Una nods looking down at her, gelato, stirring it with the stick it came with. "I'm sorry this happened on all days."
"Don't be, I rather be here than have you go all quiet again," Alec shakes his head. "Why don't we just take it easy today? Find some museums or we can eat our weight in pasta and tiramisu? Make use of that huge tub in your room if you're comfortable with that sort of thing?"
"Where are we?" Una asks looking around.
"I think they call it the Orange Grove park?" Alec says.
"Let's just walk around for a little bit?" Una says.
So they do, wander around the terrace and orange trees. It's upon a hill that looks over the city, giving breathtaking views of the city below them. The Oranges are a bright and beautiful fruit, but inedible. There is even an old masked fountain at the entrance that Una missed on their way in.
When Una spots a church he takes her hand and finds the path down towards it.
She becomes more subdued inside, mindful of her actions and words are more mindful and quiet. Clutching her ruby cross as she wanders. Marble, wooden doors, things older than what they can imagine in many ways. With old stone columns and tiled archways, it is just one long building with a fresco above the altar. It was no Sistine or Michelangelo but it was breathtaking to look up and admire either way.
When they make their way down they go to the Pantheon, because how does one not see that as well? Una's mood brightens throughout the afternoon, as she walks the ancient temple. Much like the morning, it's seen with fresh eyes, unlike the Colosseum he gives her space to explore. He's always in reach, always two steps behind her a reach of a hand away when she needs a moment of support. A squeeze of a hand, when she reaches for him among the painted tiles and archways, marble floors that seen millions—billions of feet had walked before them on this day, or even before. For a moment if Una had believed in such things she was sure that spirits still walked this place among everyone else.
They stop by the hotel to rest and clean up before going out for dinner, washing off the grime and tears of the day alone in their separate rooms. Dinner is the simple fare of pasta and tiramisu from a small restaurant nearby that they managed to get a table at. While back at the hotel, for the first time it doesn't go past kissing and cuddling in the hotel bed.
Instead, there is whispers of poetry and promises.
"My soul is tortured and broken at this point and yet you're still here?"
"Your soul is a mixture of chaos and art and I would never try to separate them. Plus you warned me at the beginning, I can't run now can I?"
They wake up early, still draped in each other, they don't mess around wanting to get out to sight-see what they can and they make it to the Vatican as they as still eating their breakfast.
Una has it all planned out, what she wishes to see and do and Alec just follows her around.
"You know, one day I'm going to marry you," Alec tells her quietly in a corner of the church. She was wearing her dress again because it covered her shoulders and it was to her knees, but also it wasn't black or need tights and a shirt underneath it. While Alec had thrown on a pair of tan pants and a polo shirt because it was the Vatican of course and they had a dress code.
"Don't go proposing now," Una tuts him as she is busy exploring something of interest. "You don't even know my family yet, and neither I yours."
"Well, so far my grandmother is thankful you are not catholic and Irish," Alec teases her as she had Irish heritage. "Though please don't hold that against her, she just doesn't know much better than being close to ninety."
"They know about me?" Una asks rather surprised.
"In the context of things I had to tell them something before I randomly took a solo trip to Italy?" Alec says shrugging sheepishly. "Only the good things of course, excluding the passionate nights of course." He nips at her neck, kissing it.
"Faith knows about you but a night in Paris isn't something I tell my father about," Una says blushing. "As for the Catholic-ness, that can be debatable these days," She teases him.
"Well, we just won't tell her that part," Alec says shaking his head. He sneaks a kiss on the back of her neck once more. "Though, you didn't tell me no," he grins.
"Don't be incorrigible, I think we both know that I am in no state to think about marriage in such a way. I like you, I enjoy your company, I hope somehow we can figure this out someway somehow, but I think it's a little early for such a thing?" Una tells him.
"I guess I will just have to propose every chance I can have until you decide you are ready to never miss the moment," Alec says impishly grinning as she shakes her head, amused by his plight.
Marriage?
Light, so low in the vale
You flash and lighten afar,
For this is the golden morning of love,
And you are his morning star.
Flash, I am coming, I come,
By meadow and stile and wood,
Oh, lighten into my eyes and my heart,
Into my heart and my blood!
Heart, are you great enough
For a love that never tires?
Tennyson rings through her mind at a sharp pace.
"What are you thinking of?" Alec asks her whispering in her ear.
"Just Tennyson," Una tells him simply before moving on to another thing to see.
Una finds herself short of breath as she sees the ceiling of the Sistine chapel once again for the second time in her life. If she didn't appreciate it five years ago when she was fifteen, she appreciated it now at twenty years old.
"Come along," Alec says dragging her back towards St Peters Basilica. "I also will have you know that my grandmother must never know of this," he says as he brings out two tickets.
Mass tickets. Free but often had to get in advance. He had planned this someway, somehow.
She watches him watch her, more than the ornate mass itself. It's shorter than the Anglican Mass he whispers ones that he was used to, also possibly less fussy. She shushes him, even if she doesn't understand a word of it, being in Italian.
When mass ends an hour later they make their way out of the crowds and throngs of people. Only stopping to look at souvenirs because Alec learned that Una always bought a little something when she could from any place she visited, it wasn't until they left that she excused herself to use the lady's room.
When she came back from the line, she took his hand, still wet and smelling of soap before then ventured off to another part of the Vatican.
They fell on the bed in a heap, her hands in his hair his hands caressed her thighs under her skirt.
"Wait," He says, as he fishes something out of one of their bags and holds up a velvet pouch. Una looks at him, leaning up on her elbows, eyebrows raised but tries to reach for what clearly is a present. She impatiently waits as he pulls whatever he bought out of the red bag, teal beads, and silver charms.
She doesn't have much time to look at it before he fastens it around her wrist.
"There," he says deeply before kissing her one more.
So let us melt, and make no noise,
No tear-floods, nor sigh-tempests move;
'Twere profanation of our joys
To tell the laity our love.
Moving of th' earth brings harms and fears,
Men reckon what it did, and meant;
But trepidation of the spheres,
Though greater far, is innocent …
Donne—As if he was bringing back Paris in her mind as he whispers in her ear. As if he didn't want to see her leave the next day.
They waste no time with clothing, wanting, or needing to feel each other's skin as if it was made of some sort of drug that they both craved. They cling to each other, breathing in each other's scent, committing it to memory so that when they part ways once more it will be ingrained in their senses.
He caresses the curves of her face and body gently, lips trailing over places. It is less poetic foreplay, but romantic in a way that Una had not expected. It was hypnotic the way their hips moved together, both sighing at the feeling that accompanied knowing one intimately in such a way. It was ethereal the way that the moon and streetlights filled the room with shadows that glowed over their skin. How the mirror near the desk caught what might have looked awkward in any other circumstance, a moment of truth as she starred in it as she gripped the bed sheets. She didn't want this to end.
She suddenly feels her stomach drop at the thought of them leaving this place not together.
She tugs on a light nightgown after cleaning herself up, Alec lying in his boxers head on her lap on lap. Her phone is ringing and it's her sister once again. She fixes her hair as it connects to the video. They get through the pleasantries before the real reason for the call comes out.
"You know I feel like I failed you as a big sister," Faith says through the speaker of the phone.
"Faith you are barely three years older than me," Una reminds her sister.
" I know, but I remember you and Carl in the hospital after the accident, and I promised that you would never hurt again."
"Faith," Una says quietly. "The accident was an accident."
"It was my game you were driving too," Faith tells to remind her sister. "Still, I just—I watched him, I watched him with girls in college and it made me shake my head, but I never worried because you were off limits because you were different. He had to respect you because you were my sister and Jem And I was together. Instead, he treated you worse than every other girl. He knew how you felt and he used it to his advantage. I should have warned you about him, I have protected you more," Faith says trying to explain.
"Faith I knew," Una says quietly as Alec squeezes her hand. "I knew I saw it all and that didn't stop me, so don't blame yourself. You couldn't have stopped anything. I was naive, but I knew."
Another reason she had trouble with forgiveness. She felt Alec who was lying across her lap tap the pulse point of her wrist, where the small multi-stringed bracelet he brought with crosses and medallions of the virgin Mary.
She smiles down sadly at him, forgetting about the camera.
"Oh my god, your elusive guy is right there isn't he?" Faith exclaims. "That was a smile I have never seen you make before. Wait you are clothed right?"
"Faith!" Una exclaims. "And yes we are clothed, he is trying to prove that the bracelet he bought isn't actually a rosary and just a religious bracelet."
"It's not a Rosary," he says speaking for the first time shocking Una as she drops her phone, watching it flash to Alec for a split second.
"He's not even wearing a shirt Una!" Faith shrieks. "You know I was kidding Una when I told you the easiest way to get over someone is under someone, right? I didn't expect you to find some hot guy from Birmingham and actually do it.
"Oi I'm from Bristol!" Alec objects. "Completely different places thank you very much," Alec says insulted at the thought of being from Birmingham, sitting up enough for his face to grace the screen.
"Jesus Una you don't even know where he actually lives!" Faith says between laughing hysterically.
"I made an honest mistake, it's not like I was completely off, plus I am sure if you asked Alec where I live or where you live he wouldn't necessarily remember either."
"Your father and family live in Glen St Mary, a small town on Prince Edward Island, you also spent time out in a small town in the Rockies with your Aunt in Canmore, Alberta I believe you said, but you have applied to school in Calgary for English and Religious studies," Alec says cheekily.
"Oh hush you," Una rolls her eyes. "You just finished your master's and taught primary school last year."
"I did," Alec says amused at how to put out Una was at all the teasing. " I have a degree in education and as Una said I have a master's which is poetry and poetics," Alec corrects her. "Actually I just got a second interview for a job with the Wordsworth Trust that I interviewed for a few weeks back." He says slightly spaced out.
"Congratulations, though Una, haven't you learned by now to keep away from the poets?" Faith asks her sister and Una just shrugs.
"This one is different, he can hold a debate and doesn't get all huffy about different opinions," Una tells her before turning, "Wordsworth Trust? That's…a huge sort of job!" Una says. "If you get that, it would be momentous for you! Why didn't you say anything? Second interview? That's like almost having the job! We need to celebrate it!" Una goes off.
"And well that is my cue to cut this short should any more clothes come off," Faith says loudly and ends the call without warning.
"Sorry, she's a bit honest," Una says blushing.
"She seems nice though, and a caring sibling. Georgia my sister is…well she is fifteen and acts it" Alec says shaking his head. "Still not sure if I got the best or worse Christmas present that year she was born," Alec says questioning himself.
"At least you only have the one? I have three. And all of them have made out with someone from the Blythe Family. The job though, that sounds serious?" Una tells him.
"You know I haven't got the job just yet. But we can celebrate early? Or commiserate?" Alec grins naughtily.
"You are incorrigible," Una shakes her head.
"I think the word is insatiable, love," Alec says before blushing realizing his faux-pas before turning so he was more on his stomach and wriggling his nose in the divot where her two thighs met. Dangerously close—Una didn't have time to think as she felt a warm breath.
If you have any time to spare, I always enjoy hearing your comments and thoughts on this story!
Also i am aware that Faith is only technically a year older then Una, but i fave Cecelia a small break from back to back, to back babies!
First Poem is Marriage Morning By Tennyson,
The second is Forbidden Mourning by John Donne.