One Step to You Read online

  This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, or persons, living or dead, is coincidental.

  Copyright © 1992 by Federico Moccia

  By agreement with Pontas Literary & Film Agency

  Reading group guide copyright © 2021 by Federico Moccia and Hachette Book Group, Inc.

  Cover design by Black Kat Design LLC

  Cover copyright © 2021 by Hachette Book Group, Inc.

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  Originally published in 1992 as Tre metri sopra il cielo by TEA Libri in Italy

  First U.S. Edition: March 2021

  Grand Central Publishing is a division of Hachette Book Group, Inc. The Grand Central Publishing name and logo is a trademark of Hachette Book Group, Inc.

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  Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

  Names: Moccia, Federico, author. | Shugaar, Antony, translator.

  Title: One step to you / Federico Moccia, [translated by Antony Shugaar].

  Other titles: Tre metri sopra il cielo. English

  Description: First U.S. edition. | New York : Grand Central Publishing, 2021. |

  Series: The Rome novels ; 1 | Originally published in Italian as Tre metri sopra il

  cielo in Italy, 1992.

  Identifiers: LCCN 2020042933 | ISBN 9781538732779 (trade paperback) |

  ISBN 9781538732755 (ebook)

  Classification: LCC PQ4913.O23 T7413 2021 | DDC 853/.92—dc23

  LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2020042933

  ISBN: 978-1-5387-3277-9 (trade paperback), 978-1-5387-3275-5 (ebook)

  E3-20210119-DA-NF-ORI

  Table of Contents

  Cover

  Title Page

  Copyright

  Dedication

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  Chapter 28

  Chapter 29

  Chapter 30

  Chapter 31

  Chapter 32

  Chapter 33

  Chapter 34

  Chapter 35

  Discover More

  Reading Group Guide

  About the Author

  Praise for Federico Moccia and the Rome Novels

  Your Book Club Resource

  To my father, a great friend,

  who taught me so much

  To my beautiful mother,

  who taught me to laugh

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  Chapter 1

  Sophia’s ass is Europe’s finest. That bright red graffiti, the work of some stealthy hand armed with a can of spray paint in the dark of night, now gleamed in all its brazenness on one of the massive columns lining the Corso di Francia bridge.

  Nearby, a Roman eagle, carved long ago, had doubtless seen it all, but wasn’t about to name the guilty party. Just beneath the fearsome bird of prey’s marble talons, like a baby eaglet sheltering in its protective shadow, sat the boy.

  His hair was short, practically a buzz cut, with a high fade at the nape of the neck like a US Marine.

  His dark Levi’s jacket was missing a button, scraped off along with a stretch of blue paint when he and his motorbike had wiped out on the asphalt of a curve that turned out to be tighter than expected.

  Collar turned up, smoldering Camel dangling from his lips, and a pair of wraparound Ray-Ban Baloramas—these accessories all buttressed his tough-guy pose, but none of it was really necessary. He had a dazzling smile, but only a select few had ever had the pleasure of seeing it.

  He glanced down the span of the bridge to the cars poised menacingly at the stoplight. Lined up, waiting motionless, like race cars at the starting line, except no racetrack had ever seen such a motley assortment of makes and models—a Fiat 126, a VW Beetle, a Ford Fiesta, some other nondescript American car he couldn’t identify, and an Alfa Romeo 155.

  He smiled.

  A few cars back, in a Mercedes 200, a slender finger with a badly bitten nail gave a gentle push to a cassette tape protruding slightly from the latest-model Alpine stereo. The sound of a tiny motor seized the tape and drew it into the tape deck. From the twin Pioneer speakers in the doors, a young female vocalist’s voice burst suddenly to life.

  The Mercedes gently moved forward, following the flow of traffic. The scent of the driver’s aftershave wafted through the air in the car’s interior.

  The girl in the passenger seat mused to herself that, even if she’d wanted to, there was no one she could tell, “Go away, love,” like the words to the song. If anything she’d have happily kicked her sister out of the car rather than listen for one more second to her pestering demands for a different song: “Change it to Eros, come on, I want to listen to Eros.”

  The Mercedes rolled past precisely as the cigarette, smoked down to the butt, was hitting the sidewalk, propelled through the air by an expert flick of forefinger against thumb and lofted a little bit farther by a chance gust of wind. The boy strode down the marble steps, adjusted his 501s, and swung one leg over the saddle of his dark blue Honda VF 750 custom motorbike, with a few slight dents and scratches on the front mudguard. He twisted the key, barely tapped the ignition button, and pushed down hard on the kick-starter.

  Suddenly the green light vanished from behind the NEUTRAL on the instrument cluster and, as if by magic, he found himself moving through the line of cars. His right boot shifted through the gears, reining the engine in or letting it roar, as its torque shoved him powerfully forward like a breaking wave, sliding now right, now left. He leaned gently into each curve, slaloming through the narrow spaces between one car and the next like a series of ski gates.

  The sun was rising, it was morning, a bright beautiful morning. She was on her way to school; he was still up from the night before. It would have been just another day if that morning, at that stoplight, they hadn’t come to a halt side by side.

  Red light.

  He glanced over at her. An ash-blond lock of hair fluttered out the open car window. As the hair tossed gently in the morning air, it inter
mittently left her neck uncovered, revealing a faint golden down that followed the direction traced by the wind. Her determined profile was punctuated by the blush of her cheeks and the blue of her eyes, gentle and serene, as she listened dreamily, half-lidded, to the second song, “La vita mia.” The sight of such tranquility struck him forcefully, and maybe that’s why:

  “Hey!”

  She turned to look, caught off guard, opening her large, innocent bright blue eyes a little wider. She stared at him. A stranger, stopped beside her on a motorcycle, with broad shoulders, his hands too tan for the mid-April sun. His eyes, concealed behind sunglasses, would surely have had something to add to the already utterly shameless face.

  “You want to go for a ride with me?”

  “No, I’m on my way to school.”

  “So just pretend to go, why don’t you? I’ll swing by and pick you up out front.”

  “Pardon me.” She gave him a tight, forced fake smile. “You must have misunderstood. What I meant to say was, ‘No, I do not want to go for a ride with you.’”

  “No, listen, you’d have fun—”

  “I very much doubt that.”

  “I’d solve all your problems.”

  “I don’t have any problems.”

  “Okay, now it’s me who very much doubts that.” Green light.

  The Mercedes 200 shot forward, leaving the boy’s confident smile anchored to the spot. Her father turned to give her a glance. “So who was that? A friend of yours?”

  “No, Papà, just some idiot…”

  A moment later, the Honda motorbike pulled up next to the pretty girl for a second time. This time, the boy reached out and grabbed the open windowsill with his left hand, revving the motor slightly with his right hand, just enough to keep from having to lean too hard on the moving car, though that shouldn’t have been a challenge for those sixteen-inch biceps.

  The only one who seemed to be struggling with the situation was the father. “Hey, what’s that reckless fool up to? Why is he driving so close to the car?”

  “Don’t worry, Papà. Let me take care of this—”

  She swiveled decisively around to glare at the boy.

  “Listen, don’t you have anything better to do?”

  “Nope.”

  “Well, find something.”

  “I already have.”

  “You have?”

  “Yes. I want to take you for a spin. Come on, we’ll go for a fast ride on the Via Olimpica, open her up so you see what this bike can do, then I’ll take you somewhere nice for a quick breakfast and drop you off right in front of your school. I promise.”

  “I doubt your promises are worth very much.”

  “True, true.” He smiled. “So you see, you already know all about me. Admit it, you like what you see, don’t you?”

  She laughed and shook her head.

  “All right, that’s enough now.” She opened a book she’d just pulled out of her Gherardini bag. “I need to think about my one and only real problem.”

  “Which is what?”

  “My Latin test.”

  “I thought it was sex.”

  She turned toward him, shocked. This time, without a smile, not even of feigned courtesy.

  “Get your hand off my window.”

  “Why, where do you want me to put it?”

  She pressed a button. “I can’t tell you, my father’s listening.”

  The power window started to close. He waited until the last second and then, yanking his hand out of the narrowing gap and shooting her one last glance, pulled away from the car. “See you later.”

  He didn’t stick around to hear her curt reply: “Oh, no you won’t.” He leaned slightly to the right and veered away. As he took the curve, he shifted gears and revved the bike’s engine, accelerating sharply until he’d vanished into the line of cars. The Mercedes continued straight ahead, with no one left to interfere as it carried the two sisters to their school day.

  “Wait, you know who that guy is?” Her sister’s head suddenly popped forward between the two front seats. “They call him A-Plus.”

  “As far as I’m concerned, he’s nothing but a moron.”

  Then she opened her Latin textbook and started reviewing the construction of the ablative absolute. Suddenly, though, she stopped reading and gazed out the window. Was this really her only problem? Certainly not the one that guy had said. And anyway, she’d never see him again. She went back to her textbook with renewed determination. The car turned left, on its way to Falconieri High School.

  “That’s right, I have no problems, and I’m never going to see him again.”

  Little did she realize how wrong she really was. About both things.

  Chapter 2

  Their motorcycles were powerful and so were their muscles. Step, Pollo, Lucone, Hook, the Sicilian, Bunny, Schello, and lots of others. All with unlikely names, and challenging histories. Statuesque and smiling, quick with a wisecrack, their rough hands bore a few extra marks, reminders of past brawls. Okay, so maybe some of them didn’t have much money in their pockets, but they knew how to have fun and they were friends. That was enough.

  They were stopped there, in Piazza Jacini, most sitting on their Harleys, old 350 four-strokes with the original array of four exhaust pipes or with the classic four-in-one, which made a lot more noise. Motorcycles dreamed of, yearned after, and finally obtained from their parents after endless, relentless begging. Or else by making sacrifices out of their own pockets.

  Step smiled. “I hear that there’s a party on the Via Cassia.”

  “Where?” the Silician asked.

  “Number 1130. It’s an apartment complex. Wanna go?”

  “But will they let us in?”

  Schello reassured them. “I know a girl who’ll be there.”

  “Who’s that?”

  “Francesca.”

  “In that case, they won’t let us in,” the Silician said.

  Everyone broke out laughing.

  “Oh yeah? Wait and see. We’ll get in, and we’ll liven up the place!”

  “Come on! That’s the spirit,” Schello shouted like a lunatic. “Let’s go!”

  Everyone in the piazza exploded in tune with that shout, starting up their motorcycle and Vespa engines, honking horns, shouting.

  The windows of the buildings all around the piazza started creaking open. A distant burglar alarm began to blare. Old women in their nightgowns shuffled out onto balconies, shouting in worried voices, “What’s going on?” A voice yelled for everyone to shut up. A woman who believed in law and order threatened to call the police.

  As if by magic, all the motorcycles moved at once. Pollo, Lucone, and the others took running starts, leaping onto their seats as the mufflers spewed out white smoke. A few beer cans rattled and crashed as they rolled along, and the girls all went home.

  The other motorcycles joined formation, occupying the whole street, indifferent to the occasional car that ran up fast next to them, overtaking and honking loudly. Schello stood up on his beat-up oversized Vespa. Laughing, they all downshifted, practically in unison. Slamming on brakes, fishtailing across the asphalt, they all turned a sharp left. One or two popping wheelies as they went, all of them ignoring the red light. Then they roared up the Via Cassia at top speed.

  * * *

  At the sound of the buzzer downstairs, Roberta, euphoric for her eighteenth birthday and for the party that was going perfectly, ran to the intercom.

  “You’re here to see Francesca who?” Roberta asked the male voice over the speaker.

  “Giacomini, that blonde. I’m her brother, and I have to give her some keys.”

  Roberta pushed the button inside the intercom once and then, to make sure she’d opened the door, pushed it again. She went into the kitchen and pulled two big Coca-Colas from the freezer. They were cold enough, so she shut the freezer door with her right foot and turned to go back to the living room. There she crossed paths with a blond girl who was talking to a boy
with his hair slicked back with gel.

  “Francesca, your brother is coming upstairs. He’s bringing you your keys.”

  “Ah…” was all that Francesca managed to reply. “Thanks.” The boy with the slicked-back hair lost a little bit of his stiffness and allowed himself a faint sound of amusement.

  “France, is something wrong?” Roberta asked.

  “No, nothing’s wrong, aside from the fact that I’m an only child.”

  The Sicilian and Hook were the first to read the nameplate on the fifth-floor doorbell. “Here it is. This is the place. Micchi, right?”

  Schello reached the doorbell and pressed the button. The door swung open almost immediately.

  Roberta stood in the doorway and looked out at the group of young men, muscular and unkempt. They’re certainly dressed rather casually struck her as a good thing to think. “Can I help you?”

  Schello stepped forward. “I was looking for Francesca. I’m her brother.”

  As if by magic, Francesca appeared in the doorway, accompanied by the boy with the slicked-back hair.

  “Ah, there you are. It’s your brother.” Roberta turned and walked away.

  Francesca gave the group a worried look. “Which of you is supposed to be my brother?”

  “Me!” Lucone put his hand up.

  Pollo raised his hand too. “So am I. We’re twins, just like in that Schwarzenegger movie. He’s the dumb one.” They all laughed.

  Francesca took Schello aside. “What on earth were you thinking when you invited all these people, huh?”

  “This party strikes me as a morgue. At least we can liven it up a little bit. Come on, France, don’t get pissed off.”

  “Who’s pissed off? I just want you all to leave.”

  “Excuse me, coming through, pardon me…” Inexorably, one after the other, they all went through, Hook, Lucone, Pollo, Bunny, Step, and the others.

  Francesca tried to stop them. “No, Schello, come on. You can’t go in.”

  “Come on, France, don’t be like that. You’ll see, nothing bad will happen.” Schello locked arms with her. “In any case, you’re not at fault here. It’s all your brother’s fault, for letting all these people tag along.” Then, as if he were worried about letting in another group of party crashers, he shut the door politely behind him.