Chapter Eighteen

“I recommend the octopus alla griglia to begin,” says Noa Callaway’s Italian editor when we meet for lunch the next day.

When I emailed Gabriella late last night and asked if we could talk before the launch, she suggested this open-air trattoria on Positano’s sea-facing Via Marina Grande. We’re sitting at a shady corner table with a prime view for people watching.

The scene along Via Marina Grande is the opposite of my hotel terrace vista. Down here, you get the sense of being nestled in the arms of Positano’s craggy coastline, crammed with Technicolor houses stacked into the hills. It’s the kind of cozy beach vibe I’d usually find charming—but today I’m so jittery, it’s making me claustrophobic.

Gabriella studies her menu, unaware of my knees bobbing beneath the table. “And then, the smoked mozzarella tortellini con brodo di parmigiano,” she says. “My six-year-old son calls it ‘cheese soup of the gods.’ ”

I run my finger along the edge of my fork, dig my sandaled toes into the pebbly sand under our table, and listen to the bees buzzing around terra-cotta pots of sunflowers. Ever since last night, I’ve needed touchstones to confirm that this is not a dream, that what I read in Chapter One was real. Real words Noah Ross really typed onto a page. And really sent to me.

It was a code. A not very secret one. A writ large and gorgeous code, illuminating what our first meeting in Central Park had meant to him. And yet, if anyone else in the world had read it, they would think the scene was purely the start—or in this case, the end—of a grand and fictional love story.

I know it’s more than that. It’s a question: Do you feel the way I do?

“I do,” I say aloud—then catch myself as Gabriella meets my eyes across the table.

“You do what?” she says.

“I do . . . want octopus. And cheese soup.” I can’t imagine eating anything, but I’m trying not to let it show. “I see a career in marketing for your son.” I stop pretending to look at the menu and raise my glass of chilled Ravello bianco to clink with Gabriella’s.

As the waiter sets down a tray of lemony tomato bruschetta, Gabriella stretches her long legs from beneath our table until her square-toed white sling backs nestle in the sand. She is bright and charming, with wavy red hair she constantly tucks behind her ears, a long string of black pearls around her neck, and a flowy midi dress the same turquoise as the sea. Under normal circumstances, we could be friends, but I know as soon as I tell her about Noah’s op-ed, and that it’s probably landing in people’s New York Times notifications . . . right about now—our lunch will go from pleasant culinary lark to Fellini-esque firing squad.