There was an incessant ringing beside my head when I woke this morning and a similar, though much more painful ringing, inside my head.

With the little strength that I had, I reached out for the phone to answer it. It wasn't my cell phone, but the hotel's room phone. Strange, I'm not sure who could be calling.

"Hello?"

"Good Morning Madame Andrews. This is the 9 am wake up call your-" it was the concierge.

"Wrong room, you should be calling 426 not 422." I told him.

"I apologize, Madame, would you allow us to send you a complimentary breakfast for the trouble. We're terribly sorry for disturbing you."

"No, that's okay, I needed to be up anyway, I have a train to catch." I mumbled with a half hearted laugh.

"Enjoy the remainder of your stay, Madame, and thank you for your generous understanding."

"Thank you, bye now." I hung up the phone and rolled out of bed. My back wasn't aching which felt like a miracle, after all the train rides recently it had begun to hurt like crazy.

"Lili? Lili, what time is it?" I heard a sleepy voice from the other side of the bed. My face started to burn as I realized I was not alone.

As Thomas sat up, I slammed a pillow down over his face, nearly smothering him.

"Woah!" he yelled, suddenly wide awake as he grabbed my wrists, pulling the pillow from beneath them and letting them fall back down to the mattress on each side of his head, "Good morning, Lili."

He gave me the same kind of look Laura gave to Nath and I felt my cheeks start to burn.

"What are you doing in my room?" I asked him trying to change the subject and distract myself from the embarrassment I was feeling.

He laughed and sat back on his side of the bed. He was wearing the same shirt from last night, but all the buttons were undone. I didn't dare look further down after the color registered with my groggy mind and I recalled he had not been wearing bright blue pants.

"This isn't your room, Lili," he was still laughing at me.

"Yes, it is, this is room 422! Why are you here and not with Laura?" I stood from the bed and headed over to the closet. I was still in my skimpy dress from last night, I thought putting a robe over it might make me feel better.

The phone rang and Thomas leaned over to answer. He waited for a moment as I heard the muffled voice of the concierge desk on the other end.

"Good Morning, yes this is room 426. Sorry for the confusion, my wife was the one who answered the phone, she mixed up the numbers."

"I am not your wife!" I yelled and threw a pillow at him.

"Oh, don't worry about her, she's just exhausted and not looking forward to another long train ride. We're heading down to Rome today to see her uncle." Thomas was waving his hand at me all innocently like he wasn't just lying about our relationship to the concierge.

I threw my hands up and the frustration started to take grip on me as I paced, waiting for him to get off the phone. I wanted to grab it and slam it down, but they would probably call us right back.

"Breakfast sounds wonderful, what do you have?"

At least he was getting food. After the screaming match that was about to ensure I would definitely want that food.

"Petit Déjeuner for 2 please, and when can we expect it? ........ 10 minutes, fantastic! Merci Phillipe!"

Tommy hung up the phone, scooched over to sit on the edge of the bed and looked up at me, waiting for the inevitable earful. I was determined to make this the worst ten minutes of his life.

My throat hurt when I was through with him. Tommy whispered something about honey lemon tea to the staff member that brought out food up while I grabbed some of the food and headed over to the couch, switching on the tv. The newscaster spoke is rapid and elegant French. I wished mine sounded as lovely as hers.

I heard a ringing coming from the night stand. Tommy picked it up, a phone again.

"Uncle Leo's assistant." he said

"Answer it." I told him through a mouthful of almond croissant.

He spoke to her in Italian. I wondered when Tommy had the time to learn Italian between already sucking at English and living in a French speaking country where he couldn't even sound out the words correctly.

Eventually he hung up and I waited for him to tell me what it was about but he didn't.

"What time is our train today?" I asked.

"3pm on the dot out of Monaco. We get to Genoa by 6:30-7:00 ish, then we switch trains." he replied.

"Cool." I wasn't really sure what to say to him right now, so I kept eating even when I was completely full. I didn't have to speak to him if I had a full mouth.

I started to think about where he had just said we were going.

"Genoa, Italy?!" I yelled at him.

"What's wrong now!" he looked ready to run for cover.

"That's just..." I put my hand to my head and let out a sigh. I was having such a good time. I didn't want to think about Dad now.

"Lili, we don't have to talk about it," he said as a knock came on the door, "It's open!"

"Your tea, Monsieur," he wheeled in a cart with blue patterned tea cups and a fresh pot of tea.

"Merci, my friend," Thomas tipped the man and locked the door behind him. He poured me a steaming cup of tea with a generous amount of honey and put it in my hands, a silent order for me to drink it.

I took a sip. I love lemon flavored things and the honey was perfect for soothing my throat. My voice had already been scratchy before I yelled at Thomas so I figure I must have snored all night.

"My parents met and later got engaged in Portofino, right next to Genoa." I told him, "27 years ago, they met when my father was traveling and my mother was on break in college. Mom went to college in London and one of her flatmates had a family villa in Portofino so they all decided to spend a week there on vacation at the end of the term. Dad was already doing work for the Vatican with Uncle Leo, but they were still considered rookies. They were sent to the Genoa area to look into a series of disturbances at a castle and report their findings. Father Angellucci was still in charge of the paranormal investigators at the time and he didn't trust the two of them to go on a job farther than a few hours away. You remember Father Angellucci, right?"

"I think so, that's the old guy who sat in the corner at the gala every year and got wine drunk with Sister Lucia and Brother Vasili."

"Yes!" I laughed, "I miss him, he was awesome. He always sent gifts for me an my siblings for Christmas every year."

"I'm pretty sure he sent my dad a set of blessed rosary beads when he was given his first station as an ambassador." Thomas said, "I think they might have been blessed by the Pope."

"Not surprised, that is a pretty standard gift from him." I looked out glass French doors to the balcony. My view from the couch was a bit obstructed, so I stood and walked towards it. I could see the mid morning sky settling onto the ocean from the doorway, but I didn't go farther. It was pretty windy outside and I was not dressed warm enough to be out there. I could feel goosebumps spreading on my arms and legs as the cold seeped through the window panes. Thomas came and stood beside me.

"So what happened? How did they meet?" he asked, wrapping the curtain around me. I was a bit worried he might accidentally yank the curtains off the rod, but I let them warm me up so I could stay and see the view just a bit longer.

"Dad was visiting San Fruttuoso before he and Uncle Leo went back to the Vatican. There's a Benedictine Abbey there. He wanted to tour it and see Guido Galletti's Christ of the Abyss statue, but it's underwater and you have to dive down about 30 or 35 feet. Mom, Dad, and Uncle Leo were all in the beginners scuba crash course. They became friends and Uncle Leo kind of had a crush on my mom but she liked Dad. She invited them to her friend's villa because they were having party as one last hurrah before going back to London. He asked for her address and they started sending letters. She has them in an old hat box and they have postage from all over the world. They talked like that for 4 years and came back on a vacation. He proposed and they got married in '98, had me a year later, settled down in the US and had my siblings in the years after that."

"That's a nice story. Do you want to make a pit stop?" he asked, "Let's go see Christ of the Abyss."

"How about after we go see Uncle Leo? I don't think I want to fly, scuba dive, or do anything even relatively dangerous until we figure this out and I feel safe again." I stepped back from the window and the balcony and sat back on the couch.

"Trains can crash too." Thomas joked and I threw something at him, I think it was a half eat croissant. What a waste.

"What else should we do to get there? Get in a car? Those crash all the time. Take a bus? Those crash. A boat? We could capsize. We barely ever have train crashes in the US, I feel most safe with them."

"So much for being a wild woman! I thought you had gone absolutely bat shit crazy when I heard YOU of all people got involved in the paranormal again. It really must have just been an accident." He laughed and cannonball jumped back onto the bed, pulling a whole lot of covers over him. I thought he was being shy until he started complaining about the cold. He still hadn't really put clothes on over his undergarments.

Phantom pains started in my wrist as I thought about what had happened. I felt gross. I needed a shower.

"I'm going to Laura's room to use the shower." I told him and gathered up my phone.

"Use the shower here, your bag is in the corner. Laura threw it at me last night and slammed the door in my face. She told me to take care of you." he laughed.

"Oh my God, who is with her?" I had a feeling I knew who it was but I didn't want to say. It was weird to think that she hooked up with-

"Nath. She drunk texted him pretty early last night and he caught a flight down to Nice and took an Uber. Whole thing probably cost him 150 bucks. Laura thought it was very romantic."

"Oh! Really? That's adorable!" I was laughing hysterically now. I really thought she had hooked up with Jake for a second.

"Yeah, I don't really want to think about it." Thomas seemed a bit disturbed that one of his best friends traveled 600 miles to hook up with his little sister. I was surprised he hadn't punched Nath in the face. Honestly, he probably tried. Even black out drunk I was a pretty good wing woman, keeping her brother busy so she can get some. I was mentally giving myself a high-five at the thought.

"Alright, shower time. If you try to come into the bathroom I will kick you so hard in the crotch you'll throw up your balls. See you in 25, Tommy!" I pulled the door closed behind me and my suitcase and didn't give him another thought.