What Remains of the Fair Simonetta Read online

  “I thought I’d make use of the looking glass while I can. I’ve heard Savonarola is trying to get rid of them,” I said, priding myself on my meager knowledge of Florentine Renaissance history.

  “Savonarola? Who is Savonarola?” Antonella queried.

  Oh, crap.

  Girolamo Savonarola was a Renaissance-era Dominican Monk who was responsible for The Bonfires of the Vanities, in which the masses were convinced to burn many items during the Martidi Grasso festival. The incinerated items included: jewelry, books, cosmetics, gaming tables, and mirrors. History would report that the Dominican zealot had even influenced Botticelli—either out of piety or fear—to burn one of his own mythological paintings that Savonarola considered a sinful vanity. A painting of his most beautiful, important genre doused in flames and lost for all time. But Savonarola clearly wasn’t an issue quite yet.

  I could change history. I could save Botticelli’s lost painting.

  Then I had a sudden flashback to the Back to the Future movies, where Doc Brown warns Marty McFly, when he lands in 1955, that he mustn’t interact with anyone because anything he did could have serious repercussions on future events. But it was too late for Marty. Since there was no apparent way for me to become invisible, and I’d already spoken to Antonella, it was too late for me as well. Marty inadvertently changed a number of moments occurring in the past, and in his case, the outcome was a better future. What else might I be doing in the Renaissance if not to change something—for better or worse? I refused to believe the cosmic universe put me here simply because of some silly fantasy I once had. Certainly, there was some bigger purpose.

  “Are you going to tell me or not?” Antonella demanded. “Who is this Savonarola who would threaten your looking glass?”

  “He’s a Christian zealot from Ferrara,” I replied, because that was the extent of what I knew that would likely not cause more damage. I then decided to divert Antonella with a more mundane topic. “I’m starving! What’s for breakfast?”

  “You are delicate, but hardly starving, my lady,” Antonella corrected. “Ask the peasants at the tavern what starving feels like.”

  “I suppose that was insensitive,” I muttered.

  I had to curb the colloquialisms, or possibly just shut-up entirely.

  Antonella set down the tray of cheese, bread, and a single goblet. No utensils in sight. I eagerly tore apart the aromatic cheese and crammed it into my mouth, insisting Antonella join me. To my surprise, she indulged without question, and we ate together in silence.

  The lukewarm cheese was good, but the bread, dry and unsalted. It tasted like a delicacy, though, since I hadn’t eaten in eleven years. With the “no carb” craze of the twenty-first century, a morsel of bread hadn’t crossed my lips for eons even before that. I ate slowly to allow each taste to register on the different parts of my palate, savoring each bite. Antonella dipped her sapless bread into the goblet, so I decided to follow suit. I quickly realized it wasn’t olive oil we were plunging our bread into, but instead, wine.

  I soon became parched and wondered what I was supposed to drink. I stopped eating for a moment to follow Antonella’s cue. She eventually picked up the goblet and drank from it, crumbs and all, then handed it to me.

  I’d never been much of a drinker, particularly not at the crack of dawn, but it seemed there was little choice. It wasn’t what I would’ve considered a good wine, although I was no connoisseur. I had to prevent myself from spitting it out. But again, I decided to savor it, and as Antonella shared the goblet with me, I asked that it be refilled.

  “The hour is almost upon us. We must prepare you for the sitting.”

  I had no idea who or what I was sitting for, but I decided it would be a bad idea to ask questions if they had obvious answers. Instead I simply replied, “Of course.”

  Antonella dressed me as though I were incapable of doing it myself. It very quickly became apparent that I was, in fact, quite incapable. She removed my nightgown, which she referred to as a “shift,” and placed it neatly on the bed. She then had me step into a stiff petticoat followed by a pale red chiffon dress. It was a diabolically complicated mass of fabric featuring a stitched-in corset, which Antonella tightened with the force of the Incredible Hulk from behind me.

  I continued to nervously sip wine from the goblet, when Antonella instructed me to sit on a gold velvet chair and plucked stray hairs from my hairline.

  “Ouch!” I cried, as my sips became gulps.

  “Noblewomen must have a high forehead, Netta. Now sit still!”

  I grudgingly cooperated, and when she deemed my plucking complete, Antonella brushed my golden tresses with about the same brute strength she used to tighten my corset. If nothing else, I needed the subpar wine simply to dull the pain.

  Antonella skillfully created all sorts of complicated braids in my lengthy hair, then tied the plaits into a complex updo, after which she adorned the coiffure with strings of jewels. She brushed a white powder over my face, then added a red powder which she rubbed vigorously onto my cheeks and lips— causing me to gag from the horrendous taste. Vanity, apparently, was very much alive.

  I wasn’t sure how I was expected to behave at whatever event this painstaking process was preparing me for. There was no time to dwell on it, however, because as soon as the concern entered my sculpted head, there was a knock on the door. I started down the stairs to answer it.

  “Remember, I must answer the caller for you,” she scolded as though this wasn’t the first time she’d corrected me on the matter. “Your job is to sit. You must feign as though we follow the rules of lady and attendant.” And with that she pointed a stern finger at the gold velvet chair. I pouted my way to the plush throne as though I’d been put in timeout.

  My simple job of “sitting” was not as easy as it was cracked up to be. The corset prevented me from taking a deep breath and the petticoat had a mind of its own, forcing its way up in front when I sat on the back of it. And worse yet, the wine had gone to my head, so while I hadn’t experienced the glorious sensation of being properly tipsy in eleven years, I sensed this would prove to be a most inappropriate time.

  I properly arranged myself in the chair just in the nick of time for Antonella to return up the stairs with my gentleman caller. It was his clothing that first attracted my attention. He wore a dark green, high-collared tunic with weird panty hose and brown leather boots. It was so strange to me that a man, even in this age, would wear tights on purpose.

  He set down a folded easel he carried under his arm. “Signora Vespucci,” he said, with reverence and gave a slight bow and a bend of one knee while avoiding my gaze. “It is a pleasure to make your acquaintance, my lady.”

  I cocked my head sideways, squinting as I stared at the bowed face of the handsome man. I couldn’t believe what I was seeing. I was afraid the early morning booze was fogging my brain, but I quickly realized that my eyes did not betray me. I wanted to rise to my feet to greet him, but feared what my dress might do, and my pounding heart caused me to skip the shallow breath or two my corset allowed.

  His hair was darker than it appears in the faded self-portrait in his Adoration of the Magi, although the rest was a fair likeness. His large, hazel eyes had heavy lids and his nose and chin— which featured just a slight cleft—were both strong and noble. He was hardly the frail and scrawny creature his father had described. His curvaceous lips stretched over a warm smile as he spoke, and I realized his self-portrait didn’t do him justice. I was glad to have the wine on board to calm my nerves, and prevent me from acting like a crazed movie fan meeting Brad Pitt.

  “I have been commissioned to paint your likeness for the banner. My name is Alessandro Filipepi, but most call me Sandro Botticelli.”

  “I bet your father hates that!” I blurted—a statement that sprouted from jitters and wine. I’d always lacked one of those filters that screen out the things one really shouldn’t say aloud.

  He looked at me curiously, before hesitantly rep
lying, “As a matter of fact, he does.”

  Chapter 4

  “I hate that they call him that!” Mariano would bark. He must’ve said it a thousand times over the last eleven years. His eldest son, Giovanni, was nicknamed Il Botticello, or the barrel, because he was rather rotund. When Giovanni became a stand-in father and tutor for Sandro—because Mariano just couldn’t deal with him—Sandro became Botticelli or the little barrel.

  Mariano was tortured by the awareness that in the twenty-first century, Sandro had a world full of adoring fans, and never had any knowledge of it. He never even knew his own father loved him. Mariano watched as visitors from around the globe came to the Ognissanti to pay their respects to his son, who was buried near his father. But Sandro always remained silent. The enthusiasts would leave notes by his grave expressing their devotion. The nuns would gather and remove them regularly, lest they disturb the serenity of the Ognissanti with their large numbers. In that respect, Sandro Botticelli is like the Jim Morrison of Renaissance art.

  I would speculate to Mariano that Sandro’s silence must mean he’s at peace, but I didn’t always believe it myself, because there was another presence in the Ognissanti. I never mentioned the “other” to Mariano, nor did he to me, but something or someone was undeniably there. A silent, yearning, presence. I thought at first it was the particles of the being that had occupied the incinerator before me, or a combination of longing souls rather than a solitary one. But I secretly hoped that it was Sandro, and one day he’d make himself known.

  There would’ve been a number of reasons for Sandro to be disquieted in the afterlife. His last years were documented by the chronicler, Giorgio Vasari, to have been a torturous time for him. His fame had waned, and he’d been overshadowed by newer artists such as Michelangelo, DaVinci, and Ghirlandaio. Even if he’d been able to secure new commissions, old age had crippled him, rendering him unable to paint. Vasari accounts that, in the end, Botticelli died penniless and alone in obscurity. His brilliance not rediscovered until some four-hundred years after his death. But the pain of a waning career would pale in comparison to the heartache and longing he felt from an unrequited love—the object of that passion being one Simonetta Vespucci.

  Chapter 5

  My answer to the who-would-you-love-to-meet-dead-or-alive question was standing directly in front of me, and yet I couldn’t ask him any of the questions storming my brain. First, because I wasn’t sure of what had already occurred by that point of his life and history. And second, because I had just met him and I wasn’t myself. I couldn’t be myself. Every word I had the urge to utter would have a flaming red flag attached to it. But I didn’t know how to be her either. I wasn’t exactly nobility in life; raised by a single mother who scraped by as a cocktail waitress until her untimely death, orphaning me at the age of twenty-one. And even though they had just met, I was sure he had heard of Simonetta, and had some expectations of how she’d behave.

  Antonella excused herself to refill the goblet of wine. I sat there silently in my gold velvet chair trying to remain conscious despite my tight corset, my pounding heart, and my increasing intoxication—real and figurative.

  Sandro lifted his eyes and looked at me for the first time. His expression conveyed that he was perplexed by my very existence; perhaps aware I was a fraud. He rubbed his masculine chin and strolled around me, sizing me up and down, as if I were a meal he wished to devour.

  “Giuliano has spoken of your beauty on many occasions. May I say that his pontifications do not adequately describe the exquisiteness of your visage,” he gushed with a bit of a nod.

  Giuliano again.

  “You’re not so bad yourself.” I smiled, then averted my eyes as I felt the last bit of circulating blood rush to my face.

  “Ahh. She blushes,” he grinned.

  I was shamelessly flirting with Sandro freakin’ Botticelli! And despite the fact that I inhabited a teenage girl’s body, I was almost sixty years old when I died. I felt like a cougar preying on this nubile, twenty-something year old man, and yet I had all these teenage hormones coursing through my perky new veins. It was in equal parts disturbing and delightful.

  “I will go fetch the rest of my supplies,” he finally said when I didn’t reply.

  “Supplies?”

  “Yes. For the painting. They are back at my house.”

  “Oh. Do you have to go far?” I asked, not wanting him to leave so soon after he arrived; fearing I might vanish back into my realm before he returned.

  “No,” he laughed, “I live with my father around the corner. He rents a house from the Rucellai.”

  Sandro Botticelli lives around the corner. Mariano in the flesh! I’d never seen the actual person of Mariano, nor any likeness of him. We were merely spirits cohabitating in the Ognissanti. I couldn’t help but wonder if Mariano might have the answer as to why I was here.

  “I’ll help you. I should like to meet your father,” I replied softly, outwardly calm while my insides were screaming.

  “Are you certain? You have never heard one of my father’s tirades about nobility.”

  I’ve had the pleasure more times than you can imagine.

  “It’ll be fine. I can take it.”

  “As you wish,” he said, then gave me an after you gesture. “I will retrieve the supplies myself, but do you mind if I have a bit of fun with my father? He is not used to my being in the company of women. Especially a beauty such as yourself.”

  “No?”

  “No. He thinks that I am a lover of men!”

  “Oh…are you?” I asked. “It’s all right if you are,” I added, as much as I wanted it not to be true. I had no problem with homosexuality, except when found in the object of my affection. Though it wouldn’t be the first time I loved a gay man.

  “No!” he scoffed. “I am just married to my work.”

  “Then why would he think that?” I asked perplexed.

  “Most artists in Florence are lovers of men or lovers of whores. I just love to paint. I form a bond with the subject, a relationships of sorts. I will not know how the rapport develops until the painting unfolds. Not all of these liaisons end well, but the painting is all consuming until it is done. I love the fanciful way I can combine beautiful things together on one canvas—an exquisite face and body, a lush, blooming landscape, and even a grand building from another time. My master, Fillipo Lippi, went to the bottle when he needed to escape, but I just need my brush and colors. I suppose that does not leave much room for the affection of a woman.”

  I sat there speechless with my mouth agape. I had fallen in love with Botticelli’s work the moment I’d laid eyes on his Birth of Venus in my senior high art history textbook. It was a love that never waned, and only grew, the longer I lived, and the more I knew about this glorious man. I’d traveled the world to see every work available to the public. I had begged and succeeded to see a few that were privately owned as well. I hadn’t studied Sandro in a scholarly way; instead, I followed his work around the globe like a crazed postmortem groupie. Yet, even if I’d never heard his name or seen any of his brilliant work, I would still have fallen in love with him right there and then.

  Chapter 6

  Sandro reminded me of Wilbur. He didn’t resemble him physically, or even behave much like him, but he had a genuine warmth and honesty reminiscent of Wilbur. He had the same passion in his eyes and the same zest for life without the need to conform to societal norms—no small thing in the fifteenth century. I felt an instant, familiar comfort with Sandro, just as I had with Wilbur.

  Wilbur and I would meet some six-hundred years in the future, when I was thirty-eight years old, during a tempestuous separation from my husband of seventeen years. Wilbur was compassionate and loyal, but he also had an insatiable need for adventure, bordering on extreme. Our future way of life was not for everyone. We never settled down until I got sick, and never married. It pained me to let him go, but I knew I must. When the cancer was close to ending my life, I insisted he fin
d someone new—the cliché request all dying people allegedly make, but never entirely mean. A tiny, selfish, tucked away part of my soul wanted him to pine over me forever. Despite this, as my final request, I asked him to deliver my ashes to Sister Josephine at the Ognissanti, and never look back. For the first time in our relationship, he didn’t listen to me.

  Every year on my birthday, Wilbur and my son, Alessandro—Alex for short—would visit me at the church. Eleven celebrations of my birth shared after my death. Each night, Sister Josephine would place my urn on the grave of Botticelli once the visitors had gone for the day and the last shred of light shined in through the vaulted windows. On each of those eleven birthdays, Wilbur and Alex conducted a nostalgic celebration of my life, which usually included cake and flowers—items not very useful to me as a pile of dust tucked inside an urn. No matter how hard I tried, each year I’d fail to conjure a ghostly breeze to blow out the flame of the candles, and would spend the next few days watching the flowers wither and die. It was wonderful to hear from them, but at the same time, it was a painful awareness that Wilbur hadn’t moved on. He’d relive the stories of our time together in a continuous dialogue that seemed to bore Alex. There were no new stories for Wilbur to tell because our time together had ended.

  I knew Alex came for Wilbur’s sake, not because he needed me anymore. He was a thirty-two-year-old man, who had outgrown the need for a deceased mother. He came out of obligation to Wilbur and to my memory. But I knew Wilbur still had that longing for companionship; the need for physical closeness I could no longer provide. He wasn’t moving past our life together. Even though I’d come to terms with my death long before I left the earthly realm, Wilbur was holding onto a past that could not be relived. That is, until this last birthday, he brought her. This year, there was no cake, no flowers—just her.