Floralia (3 page)

Livia knew, though, that
the notion that they could be together was pure foolishness. They were simply too different.

She heard the words of her father again.
“Know well who you are, my dear Livia, and what you are.” They sounded clear in her mind, as if she had first heard them yesterday. “Do not be foolish and strive for more; for more wealth or a higher station. We are happy with what we’ve been given. This is who we are. Who you are. Do not forget.”

Livia
was only a simple plebeian, while Felix was a wealthy and blue-blooded patrician.

Furthermore
, Felix was a charming and gorgeous young man with a gift for the cithara. A veritable Apollo; an Adonis. He could have any woman he desired, he just had to choose. It had been Livia’s night last night; he had decided that she would be the one to warm his bed. Tomorrow it would be some other girl. And – without doubt – there would be another fawning, wide-eyed girl the day after that.

Livia was the “true goddess” of his Floralia, apparently. How many other women had he whispered that to
, between the bed-sheets?

Of co
urse he was so fond of the six-day Floralia festival – it was his time of year for conquering. And Livia, it seemed, had been just another conquest.

Carefully, she crept through the door.
She met a servant walking down the hallway outside Felix’s chamber. He wished her a good morning and offered to serve her breakfast but Livia declined, instead asking to be shown out.

She would
always fondly remember Felix and the time they shared, but she had to go on with her life.

***

Felix attended the third day of Floralia. And the fourth.

But he did not play his cithara, or sing any
of songs. He drunk no wine, and did not attempt to pursue any of the young women who eyed him. He would not even speak to them – nor look at them, for the most part.

The festival that he loved so dearly passed him by in a
welter of colour and noise.

Livia was all he could think about, and the
constant thought of her pained him to no end. Sorrow and anger filled him to the brim. He felt like she had stolen a vital piece of him that morning, when she had climbed out of his bed and snuck out of his house while he still slumbered.

Livia
was gone, but there was so much that he had wanted to tell her, that he
needed
to tell her. He wanted to make her see how precious she was to him. He wanted her to know that after just one sublime evening in her company, she was all he could think about and all he wanted.

All the other women faded into obscurity at the thought of her. They were dim, flickering candle-flames in his mind, but Livia was a
raging inferno.

He found himself lingering close to the stage where he had first seen her, and also the wine-seller’s stall where he had first spoken to her.

Felix knew, however, that he was being a fool. It was all useless. He was searching for her in the wrong places. He had met her at the festival but Livia, he knew, was not the type to return. She had experienced what Floralia had to offer her – the sights, the sounds, the delectations – and had had her fill of it. He would not find her here.

He
wracked his mind, thinking about where he could find her. He paced about this way and that, thinking intently, trying to recall.

The
Augustan market! They had passed close to it on their way to Felix’s house, and Livia had mentioned that she went to market almost every afternoon, and that her residence was only down the street.

There was no other choice.
He would be there, tomorrow afternoon. He hoped Livia would be there too.

*

Sure enough, Felix found himself at the market the very next afternoon. He picked out a vantage point just outside the easternmost entranceway, a thoroughfare with much with foot-traffic.

It was a large and
busy marketplace, and a cornucopia of foods, spices and various goods – from the city itself, the hinterland, and from far-flung corners of the Empire – could be bought or bartered for there.

Felix, however, was not interested in any of that.
He was only interested in Livia. So he planted his back to a wall and simply stood and watched, hawk-like, the various comings and goings. He saw farmers driving herds of cattle and pushing carts overflowing with cabbages. He saw shoppers, hauling large baskets filled with foodstuffs in either hand. He even saw Floralia revellers, still wearing the bright garments and flowery crowns, coming and going from the market stalls. Livia’s beautiful shock of flaxen hair, however, was what he wanted – no,
needed
– to see.

And so he watched, and waited.
He could not say for how long, but the sun was readying itself to set by the time he realised that he had been standing and watching for nearly two hours.

And then he saw her.

Emerging from the entrance, clutching a wicker basket in her hand. Wearing a plain white stola. Felix had no doubt that it was her.

He rushed towards her, weaving through the
crowd like a darting hare.

“
Livia!” he exclaimed.

“Felix,” she said, shocked and sad at once.

“Livia,” he said again, suddenly feeling very foolish. He had thought about this moment all day, but now that it was occurring he could simply not find the words.

“Yes, I know,” she admitted, sullen. “I left. I disappeared... The time we shared was truly wonderful. I mean that, I do. With you I felt things I’d never felt before...”

“Then come back to me,”
Felix urged.

By then a small crowd of people had stopped to watch the drama unfold.
Felix felt a multitude of eyes on him – watching, scrutinizing – but he ignored them.

“
It will never work,” Livia murmured. “It cannot work. We are just too different, you and I.”

“I don’t care about your class, Livia,” Felix
blurted. “I don’t care if you’re a plebeian. I don’t care about how many coins you have in your purse. It doesn’t matter to me.”

The remark gave her pause, and a gleam of pained sorrow appeared in her eyes. His words seemed to strike a nerve.

She took a deep breath, and set her mouth into a hard line. “I’m sorry, Felix. We’ll always be able to remember our one night together. But it can only ever be one night. I’m sorry.”

She was putting up a stern, solemn face. But Felix could see that she was
beginning to fight back tears.

“Please, Livia,” he
entreated. He put out his hands in supplication. “Ask yourself. Is that truly what you want? Truly?”

“Truly, Felix.”
Livia replied. There was a single, shining tear in the corner of her eye. “Leave me be.
Please
, leave me be.”

With that, she dashed away.

Felix stood there, in a shocked and sad stupor, for what must have been a very long time. He was a sorrowful statue, there in the middle of the busy thoroughfare.

The crowd of people dissipated, each person carrying on with their business.
He heard a pack of wives chattering about what they had just witnessed. Someone slapped him on the shoulder, offering rough words of condolence. Felix did not react.

Livia, it see
med, had left him a second time. He was gutted. Distraught.

He felt the salty wetness at his eyes, and the anxious tremble of his hands.

Livia’s unhappy eyes had belied her stern words of rejection. She
wanted
to be with him, Felix knew. Perhaps just as much as he wanted to be with her. But she was lying about it – to him, and to herself.

He blinked the tears away, and he clutched his shaking hands into tight fists.

He could not give up on her, not yet. He had to help her to see.

Felix knew, then, that he had to do something daring. Something big and bold.
Something monumental. An elaborate gesture that spelled out, loudly and clearly, just how important she was to him.

He heard, then, a kindly voice at his shoulder.

“My friend?”

Something about the tone of the voice made him turn around.

A woman was standing there. Her hair was more grey than auburn and she bore lines of age about her mouth and eyes, but she was still beautiful to look upon. There was a knowing gleam in her brown eyes, and they seemed both sad and friendly.

“I s
aw what just happened, my dear.”

Felix did not know how to
respond to her. He could only sigh.

“Livia is a sweet and silly
young thing,” she said. “She doesn’t know what she wants. I’ve known her for a long time, you see, and I love her like the daughter I never had.”

A warm,
comforting hand settled on his shoulder.

“My name is Drusilla, my dear,” she continued. “And I can help you.”

*

It was morning, and Livia was in bed, engulfed in a protective cocoon of bedsheets.

She did not want to get out.

Since dawn she had heard clamour and chattering in the street outside. She did not know what it was. She didn’t care. Lately she did not – could not – care about much at all.

It had been almost t
hree weeks since Felix had confronted her at the market, and she was still rattled and upset by the experience. The handsome and passionate citharode had caught her completely by surprise.

She would tell herself, again and again, that it was not meant to be.
Their worlds were too different.
They
were too different. It had to be this way.

Why, then, did she feel so terrible about it all?
Felix had been constantly on her mind, and every thought of him came with a pang of pain.

Today she just wanted to stay in bed all day.

She heard, then, a knock at the door.

“Livia?
” came Drusilla’s voice. What could she want?

“You have to wake up now!
” her neighbour exclaimed. “Something wonderful is happening.”

“Drusilla?”
Livia replied, foggy with sleep. “What is it?”

“You’ll have to get out of bed and see for yourself, my dear.”

Perplexed, slightly annoyed, and more than a little bit intrigued, Livia climbed out of bed.

She opened the door, yawning and rubbing her eyes, to see Drusilla standing in the hallway, smiling at her serenely. Bundled in her arms was a heap of orange
linen: it was her Floralia stola, which Livia had worn to the festival two weeks ago.

“I’d like you to wear this again, my dear.”

Drusilla was asking a favour of her, not making a demand. Nonetheless, there was something about the older woman’s demeanour; her face, her eyes – a stark sincerity, perhaps – which compelled Livia to oblige and not argue.

Drusilla, invited inside, stepped into the room and closed the door behind her. Livia went to a small side-table, where she filled a broad bowl with water from a terracotta
ewer. She washed her hands and splashed her face with the cool water, dispelling the vestiges of sleep.

She dried herself with a nearby towel offered by Drusilla, and then they set about the business of
dressing: with hardly a word exchanged between them, Drusilla helped as Livia enveloped herself once again in the colourful stola.

Drusilla then took up Livia’s comb from the side-table and went to work, combing diligently; sweeping the kinks and snares from her friend’s hair,
working at it vigorously until the younger woman’s fair locks were straight and smooth.

Finally Drusilla gave
her young neighbour a long up and down look, and determined Livia to be ready. Ready for what, Livia did not know.

“It’s this way, my dear,” she announced, offering her hand.
“Come and see.”

Livia took it, but not without some trepidation. They
exited her room and walked down the hallway together, down the two flights of stairs, out the front door of their tenement and into the brightness of morning.

Livia’s breath caught in her throat when
she finally saw it all.

It was
Floralia
, right at her doorstep. Her whole street, it seemed, had been decorated as if the festival was in full swing.

One of her neighbours approached her with a
garland of wildflowers and placed it around her neck. Another bestowed a floral wreath on her head. Livia was too astonished to resist – she could only blink in disbelief at everything, her mouth agape.

There were wine-stalls, stages with
performing actors and musicians. All around, people were enjoying themselves; drinking wine or pouring it out in libations, dancing, watching drama performances and listening to singers and musicians.