I don’t check to see where I’m walking.

For a long time, I just follow my feet.

I walk past the lovey-dovey couples out and about, sharing gelato and recreating Lady and the Tramp over their alfresco breakfast.

I’m in Rome, but I can’t lift my head to sightsee.

Even in the shadow of the Colosseum, it’s hard to be excited. What’s the point of being in such a beautiful city if I don’t have anyone to share it with? Even Allison’s gone off with some boy, leaving me here all alone, on my wedding week.

Do I have a sign around my neck that says loser?

First, my dad leaves us for his new wife—his new daughter. Ryan can’t even be bothered to show up for our wedding.

Now Dante’s taking the same steps toward leaving me in obscurity. I bet even little Luciano is coo-cooing and having a right laugh about how he too can crap all over me before flying away into the clutches of some flashy dove with big…feathers.

I just really thought Dante would be different. He went through so much effort from picking out a beautiful costume, to save me from drowning, twice, and to making sure my first time was perfect.

I could’ve really believed he cared about me, that he loved me, but he’s just like Ryan. Except he’s crueller. And now I’m married to him.

I feel it call me, but I resist…for a while.

Eventually, I give in, and I wander through the archways of the Colosseum, doing a lap of the arena itself. I bet if I’d waited for Dante, he could’ve gotten us a private tour—so that the other tourists with their flashy cameras couldn’t capture my anguish in the background of their holiday pictures.

I stand in the centre of the arena, looking up at the stands and feeling all the hundreds of eyes bearing down on me like never before.

I’m used to being on stage, so I thought, but the invisible judgment from hundreds of dead Italians? I might as well have been walking naked on the stage when every other girl wore evening gowns.

I look around me at ground level, feeling another pair of eyes from the lower stands, and I try to find who it is that’s staring.

Maybe Dante’s caught up with me already—even though I told him to wait in the lobby—or maybe I was just imagining things. Either way, I pull my purse a little bit closer to my chest, holding it tight across my body.

It’s such a beautiful purse—a white Michael Kors leather tote bag. It was a wedding present, and I only peeled the stickers off the gold embellishments this morning. They sparkled in the early morning sunshine.

Dante’s words echo in the back of my mind—his warnings not to go anywhere alone.

Well, it’s too late to not be alone, but I can at least get out of sight from everyone. So I move out of the sun and into the shade, sitting down on the benches. For a moment, the echoes of other tourists vibrate through the ancient stones and ring in my ears.

I think I hear the screams of the slaves, alone and afraid, waiting to face their inevitable death for the entertainment of others. I guess some things never change—here I am, shackled and forced to perform.

But maybe…maybe I don’t have to suffer as the slaves did. They had no chance at freedom, whereas I do.

I could leave Dante—I could fly back to the States and go back to beauty pageants until I graduate.

If I leave him first, then Dante would never have the chance to hurt me by finding some other woman—if he hasn’t found one already, of course.

I wonder if he’s read my note yet—if he’s jumped at the opportunity to be alone, or at least to be without me.

It’s not like he’d ever have any shortage of women, if he ever looked to find one.

The screams seem to be getting louder and louder, echoing all around my ears and from across the other side of the Colosseum entirely. Except there are no other tourists in my immediate area, so I can’t see where any human source of the anguishes could come from.

That’s when I feel the fur rub itself against my ankle and a tail curling up my calf. Though I nearly scream at the sudden touch, the noise I heard rising through the stonework wasn’t the screams of desolate slaves—it was the cats.

Cats are everywhere in Rome; packs of them roam the cobbled streets, luring in tourists for a stroke or something to eat. They’re the true experts of the city—so of course they’d be all around the Colosseum, too.

They’re probably mourning their feline ancestors—the lions who suffered for all nine of their lives at the hands of the gladiators. So I scoop the kitty up into my arms—a sleek black cat, which is almost too hot to touch from the Mediterranean sun—and hold him against my body, nuzzling my face into the scruff of his neck. He doesn’t complain; in fact, he almost seems to relish the attention.

With the cat purring noisily in my lap, I’m reminded by something I read in one of my tourist guides about Caesar and Cleopatra. How Cleopatra—being the Egyptian pharaoh—absolutely adored cats, and so she gifted some to Caesar because she adored him, too.

Except, Caesar hated cats.

He loathed them.

Yet I look around this beautiful city, and they’re everywhere. Not only the cats, but Caesar and Cleopatra.

Despite all their differences, they were still one of the greatest power couples in ancient history. Ruling over Rome and Egypt—fighting together against everyone who would threaten their love and their reigns.

Would Dante do the same for me?

“What do you think, little kitty?” I ask, stroking the cat’s sleek head and running my fingers down its back and along the tail before starting the whole process again.

The cat, of course, says nothing in reply. It doesn’t even look at me.

Its green eyes are closed, and it’s lapping up my affection without so much as a thank you. The cat isn’t even startled when my purse vibrates on the bench next to me.

It’s probably my phone, and it’s probably Dante calling to find out where I am so that he can order me to come back to the hotel. Then we’ll go to wherever he wants to go and do whatever he wants to do.

Well, I don’t have to do whatever Dante wants to do.

So I ignore my phone and let it ring. When it rings a second time, I ignore it again.

Ever since I got to Italy, I’ve just been pulled this way and that, told where to go and who to go with and told—no, ordered—not to go out on my own because of some potentially imaginary bogey-men.

How naive did Dante think I was? If I want ten minutes, or even an hour, to myself, then I’m going to take it.

The tourist traffic feels lighter now, maybe as people peel away to go enjoy breakfast.

My own stomach begins to rumble, but the sounds of approaching footsteps drown out my hunger.

“Excuse me, la signorina?” a voice calls over my shoulder, and I turn to look at its source.

It’s a man, with dark hair and tanned skin. Italian, probably, with the way his tongue rolls over the language so fluidly and easily.

He takes a couple of steps closer to me, which is when the cat in my lap rises from my legs and leaps away, all but running from this stranger.

“Hiya, oh, ciao,” I reply, smiling politely up at him.

My lap feels cold without the cat sitting upon it, so I pull the white purse over myself to maintain some warmth. The stranger looks at me for a moment more, his smile widening to reveal pearly white, stereotypically Italian, teeth. His eyes fall onto my bag for a second, admiring the leatherwork and the stitching.

“I was wondering, la signorina, if you could perhaps give me directions to the Colosseum?” he asks. His voice is so silky and calm that for a moment I don’t question my response.

“Of course, it’s just…” I trail off, looking around the space where I’m sitting for rest. “Why, signore, you’re at the Colosseum,” I say, confusion evident in my tone. I immediately stand as I realise that this stranger is between me and my exit strategy.

“Oh sí, sí, so I am.” The smile that seems so innocent grows wicked, and his pearly white teeth almost turn into fangs. “You’ve been so helpful, signorina, but before you go, there might be one more thing you can do for me…”