The Purple Room by Mauro Casiraghi Read Free Book Online Page B

cram the whole thing in this summer.” She grabs all
seven volumes and thrusts them into my arms.
    I don’t dare say anything else. I pay and we leave, loaded down like
mules.

 
 
    Michela sucks up her milkshake with a straw and flicks through the Paris
guidebook. She’s totally absorbed in it, marking things that interest her with
a felt tip pen. Every so often, she says, “Wow!” but never tells me why.
    “How did it go this morning?” I ask.
    “What?”
    “The checkup.”
    “Oh, yeah… Everything’s fine.”
    “Just a routine check, right?”
    “Yep.”
    “Did you have lunch with your mom and Ugo afterward?”
    “Uh-huh.”
    “Where’d they take you?”
    She shrugs.
    “You don’t know the name of the restaurant?”
    “No… I mean, we ate at home.”
    Bullshit. What a load of bullshit. And how easily it comes to her.
    “Did they leave to make their usual round of antique shops?”
    “Yep.”
    “When did they go?”
    “Around two thirty.”
    “That’s odd,” I say. “They were already in San Gimignano a little while
ago.”
    Michela’s head snaps up.
    “You talked to Mom?”
    “I called her, yeah. I had to ask her something. They were on one of
those long road trips that Ugo likes. You know, the ones that start early , like around the time you woke me
up this morning.”
    Michela goes back to sucking up her milkshake like nothing’s the matter.
    “What’s his name?” I ask.
    “Whose?”
    “The guy who dropped you off. I saw you before, in his car.”
    Michela narrows her eyes at me. She looks exactly like her mother, ready
to defend herself tooth and nail.
    “You spied on me?”
    “I happened to be there,” I say. “Why did you lie to me? If you had
something better to do this morning, you could have just told me.”
    Silence. Michela goes back to flipping though the city guide. She
somehow manages to be hostile just by turning pages.
    “Okay. You did something wrong, and you know it. But I get why you would
do it. It’s your birthday, and you didn’t want to spend all day shopping with
me or driving around with your mom and Ugo looking for banged up end tables,
right?”
    No reaction. She’s studying a map of the Paris metro.
    “I only asked his name.”
    Michela completely drains her milkshake, making that slurping noise I
must have told her a thousand times not to make when she was a little kid.
    “Daniel,” she says after an endless pause.
    “He’s the one who gave you the necklace?”
    Michela nods and touches the Japanese pendant to make sure it’s still
there.
    “ Yu . It means ‘peace.’ ”
    “How long have you and Daniel known each other?”
    “Almost a month.”
    “Do you go to school together?”
    “No. He goes to a private school.”
    “Is he into books?”
    “His house is full of them. His mom’s French. She’s a translator.”
    “And I bet Daniel is spending his summer in France.”
    “They have a house in Paris,” Michela admits.
    It all makes sense now.
    “Have you told your mother?”
    “No way. She has no idea Daniel even exists. And she can’t find out.”
    “That doesn’t seem right.”
    “If I tell her, she won’t let me go! You can’t do this to me!”
    Her eyes get huge, damp, bright. For a moment, she’s my little girl
again. But just for a moment.
    “Fine. We won’t tell her.”
    “Thanks, Dad!”
    “But on one condition.”
    “I knew there’d be a catch. Out with it.”
    “No more lies.”
    “But Dad, I…”
    “Even if it’s something you’re ashamed of, or that scares you, or that
you can’t imagine telling anyone about. I want you to promise to always tell me
the truth. And I’ll do the same.”
    Michela considers it. Seriously.
    “It won’t work,” she says finally. “It’s not a realistic deal.”
    “Why?”
    “No one can tell the truth all the time.”
    “Not even the two of us?”
    “Especially not the two of us.”
    “Why not?”
    “We never have.”
    “Well, let’s try