Joya never thought that she had chosen to come all the way from Rome along the Apennine Mountains merely to escape the heat, and it was with great difficulty that she finally arrived at her destination
Florence has regained its sunny skies, and I nearly burst from eating two large bowls of pasta upon my arrival.
She didn't know whether this was her good fortune or misfortune.
She had initially wanted to put down her fork and quit, but when she saw the young girl standing across from her, clutching the hem of her clothes, her face filled with unease, she once again softened her heart, then struggled to swallow down the pasta with great effort.
I hope that after I am choked to death, my epitaph does not read "Here lies a young woman who died from being stuffed with Italian pasta".
The young girl who served Joya the second portion of the Totti family's traditional large portion of pasta is named Lisa. She is only twelve years old and is the youngest maid in the Totti family. Normally, she follows Martina, but after Martina fell ill, Ricardo was worried that she was too young to care for the sick, so he sent her to work in the kitchen. After Joya arrived in Florence, Ricardo transferred her out of the kitchen and assigned her to specifically care for Joya.
"Ricardo was smiling at Joya and saying: 'Lisa has been in the kitchen, her cooking skills have received one-third of my teachings, she will take good care of you.'"
Although Lisa, the chosen one, only received one-third of the family patriarch's true teachings, the weight of her knowledge is still one-third more than what the family patriarch has.
Joya feels that in the short term, she no longer wants to hear the two words "Totti" and "kitchen" used together.
Joya found this meal particularly difficult to eat, and it took an unusually long time. By the time she finished her bowl of pasta, it was the time when most people were preparing to turn off the lights and go to bed.
The table setting is neat and tidy. Holding a napkin in his right hand, he gently wiped the corner of his mouth and smiled at Lisa: "Thank you for the hospitality."
Lisa collected the utensils somewhat nervously, left the room, and also closed the door behind her.
At the sound of the slight click of the door and the doorframe, Joya slumped back in the chair, letting out a long sigh, and at the same time she heard the faint sound of Lisa outside the room quietly crying and saying, "Miss Joya is eating so slowly, she must not like the pasta I made, will she get angry and sell me?"
"....."
She gently caressed her round, protruding belly, feeling that she was truly struggling.
In the night of Florence, unlike the bustling and clamor of the day, the red and yellow that make up this city lose their vibrant and lively colors in the darkness, and the dim lights reflected on the Arno River gently sway with the undulation of the water flow, echoing the intoxication of the night on the already obscure city walls and rooftops.
This is a completely different cityscape from the one Joya saw atop the tower of the Orsini Palace in Rome.
She waited until her stomach felt less uncomfortable, then put on the set of men's clothes she had brought, tied her hair into two braids, and tucked them into her black and white headscarf. Then she opened the window blinds and stepped out onto the windowsill.
A gentle breeze drifts along the Arno River, causing the fringe of her headscarf to sway.
She gripped the wooden beams above the window with both hands and swung back and forth like a pendulum in mid-air, then, following the momentum, jumped to the nearby windowsill. This windowsill was located at the corner of the house, and a horizontal beam protruded from the brick wall at the corner, which she was able to grab with her left hand to climb onto the windowsill above.
Fortunately, the lighting of this era is not particularly penetrating, otherwise there would be someone across the river who would see a young man climbing a wall late at night.
She nimbly climbed up to the third-floor window sill, using both hands to grip the crossbeam, then relying on the protruding horizontal wood by the window, she climbed up a distance. With both arms exerting force, she leapt upward, and before reaching the peak of the jump and falling back down, her hands firmly grasped the roof eaves, and then with a burst of energy, she flipped herself up onto the roof eaves.
Compared to the scenery seen from the window, the view from the roof is a different world; no matter how bright the lights of each household, they cannot match the enchanting moonlight.
The young girl running on the roof under the moonlight in a crouching, stealthy posture is not quite as charming.
Joya quickly and cautiously stepped on the roof tiles, bent down to maintain balance, and also ensured that the movement of her feet was not too loud, so as not to disturb the people in the house below and the nearby alleys.
She quickly ran to the back street side of this building, then crouched down at the edge of the eaves, grasped the eaves with both hands, and placed her feet on the transom below the third-floor window. She climbed down like she was climbing up to the roof, descending along the transom, passing one window after another.
Until reaching the windowsill of the only window with the light on out of all the windows on the third floor.
Likely due to the hot weather, this window has not been fully closed, but left with a half-open gap, enough to allow ventilation. Joya is half-leaning against the window, turning sideways and glancing inside.
The warm candlelight of the chandelier is reflected several times between the quartz that surrounds it, then fills the not-so-large room.
Martina sat leaning on the head of the grand four-poster bed, while the old matron slowly lowered the colorful canopy that had been tied to the bedposts during the day. Martina was gently bowing her head, seemingly examining something she held in her hands. However, before Joya could take a closer look, the old matron had already taken a few steps towards the window, then immediately turned back, moving away from the window. The person's back was pressed against the brick wall.
After a while, Martina's voice came: "Aunt Eliza, you said... I didn't treat her very well today." She paused and then said, "I had chased her away before she even had a chance to speak to me."
Joya paused for a moment, then realized that these two people were discussing her.
The old woman sighed and said, "Madam, I know what you are thinking, and Miss Joya would not blame you either."
"You know, I'm actually quite timid and very selfish." Martina said, "I'm afraid the child will start blaming me the moment they open their mouth."
Joya was somewhat surprised, she didn't expect that the reason Martina urged her to go and participate in the carnival was like this.
Of course, she never imagined that she would sneak up to Martina's window in the middle of the night, just like a playboy sneaking into his beloved's bedchamber.
She was startled by her own idea, and just as she was about to return the way she had come, she suddenly saw a black figure standing on the roof of a house in the distance
The moonlight cast a cool, faint glow on the golden hair that fell over his shoulders, while his eyes, in contrast to the chilly moonlight, were a fiery red.
Joya felt as if she was being drawn into a vortex the moment she made eye contact with him, and within that vortex was the Tyrrhenian
The somber tides of the sea also have the most violently erupting lava of the Vesuvius Caldera.
Behind her was the cold brick wall, and she had nowhere to retreat.
Also not knowing how long it had been, when she came back to her senses, the roof opposite was empty, and the window next to her had already turned off the light, it seems Martina had already
He has gone to sleep.
She only felt a sense of confusion in her mind, like falling from the Apennine Mountains and feeling dizzy, and when the night wind blew, it made the back of her neck feel cold, and she became aware
He felt sweat beading on his forehead and the back of his neck. He realized that if he had lost consciousness even briefly, he might have accidentally let go.
She lowered her head and looked down at the narrow alley paved with stone slabs, swallowing hard.
She was now sweating all over, not just on her temples and the back of her neck.
This......is it an illusion?
If so, then she experienced two hallucinations within a single day.
Then these eye exercises that have been done for a hundred years are no longer useful.
She needs to think about whether she has some kind of problem in her brain.
