“Where’s Petermann?” Max asks as Lillian hands us our toiletries.
“He’ll be here soon,” she says. “He had a fundraiser to attend. In the meantime, I’m on duty. Just yell if you need anything.”
“Thanks, Lillian,” Max says.
“You’re very welcome,” Lillian answers, shooting me a mischievous look when Max turns his back for a moment.
I shoot a look back. What? How could she possibly know?
But when I walk into the bathroom, I see why. I’m a mess. My hair looks like I just woke up from a twelve-hour nap, and there is a redness around my nose and cheeks, no doubt due to Max’s slight stubble.
But that’s not even the most distracting part. Speaking of my cheeks, they are glowing. Not like I just ran six miles, more like I just swallowed six nightlights. I am positively lit from within, and my eyes are big and round.
Apparently love makes you beautiful.
I put on my pajamas, wash my face and brush my teeth, and finger comb my hair so it looks halfway decent again. Then Max and I climb into our side-by-side pods.
“I wish I could hold your hand,” Max admits when we are all tucked in.
“Me too,” I say.
“Do you want me to tell you a story?” he asks.
I smile. “Yes, please.”
“Okay,” Max says. “One day a little boy is sitting on the floor of his living room, playing with some toy trucks. Vroom!” Max makes the sound effect enthusiastically. “He shoots one across the carpet, but it goes too far, to the other side of the sofa. And then miraculously, it shoots right back. Surprised, the little boy peers around the sofa to find a girl around his age with a very attractive bowl cut, building a giant Lego castle. She asks him if he wants to play, before popping one of the Legos in her mouth, informing him that if he’s hungry, they are made out of chocolate.” Max pauses now, and his voice takes on a softer tone. “And the boy had never felt so happy in his whole life. They build the most incredible chocolate castle, with dragons and soldiers and a moat made of milk. And then they fell asleep side by side. The boy wakes up in his living room, and even though there is no castle or no little girl, he still feels just as happy. And he knows he will see her again.”
“Was that me?” I say with a yawn.
“That was you,” Max says, his voice a little hoarse. “The first time we met.”
“I like that story,” I sigh.
“I’ll see you soon, Alice,” Max mumbles.
“I’ll see you soon,” I say. And slide into a peaceful sleep.
OCTOBER 11th
“So what did you think of Nocturne?” Isabella Stewart Gardner says. We’re seated facing each other in her empty bathtub, fully clothed, sipping chocolate milk shakes.
“I thought it was the most beautiful painting I’ve ever seen,” I say breathlessly after swallowing a big mouthful of ice cream, careful not to spill on my plum ball gown. Isabella, in turn, is dressed in a gown made of deep-green velvet.
“I’m so glad you think so,” she replies.
“Me too,” Emmet Lewis adds. He’s seated in the corner in an orange wing-backed chair, wearing a teal suit and perusing a book titled Tweed, Tweed, and More Tweed!
“Come on,” Isabella says, hoisting herself out of the tub abruptly, before extending a hand to me. “I want to show you my latest acquisition.”
Raising the hems of our skirts around our ankles so we don’t fall, we tiptoe down the staircase to the third floor of the Gardner Museum, but when we reach the bottom of the steps, I see we’re back at the Met, in the Impressionist wing.
“Isn’t it lovely?” Isabella asks, pointing to a painting of a bright green field, where a purple hot air balloon is tethered to the ground. “It just arrived.”
“It’s striking,” I say. There really is something extraordinary about it, but I can’t put my finger on what it is. The colors and detail are so vivid they’re nearly lifelike.
“Touch it,” Isabella suggests.
“Are you sure?” I hesitate. “It’s against the rules.”
“Alice, I make the rules,” Isabella says. “And I insist. You haven’t seen the half of it.”
Biting my lip, I reach a hand out to touch the painting and find that suddenly I’m inside it. And the hand I extended has landed on Max’s cheek, where he stands in the basket of the hot air balloon.
“Wanna go on a ride?” he asks, a welcoming smile on his face.
“Okay,” I say, taking his hand and climbing over the top of the basket.
“Lillian, will you do the honors?” Max asks. Lillian appears, holding a giant pair of golden scissors, and snips the rope with ease.
And just like that we are rising, up, up, and away, slowly at first and then a bit faster. I look down and see there’s no longer a field below us but, instead, the city of Boston. Fenway Park, the Citgo sign, and a gleaming statehouse dome, the Charles River snaking through it all. Everything is bathed in a warm, dusky light.