The next morning, when I woke to my sister’s form in the other bed, I was disoriented. We had slept in parallel for weeks and bedrooms were beginning to fuse into each other. I was feeling stronger and now the events of the previous evening seemed like a dream. I got up, slipped on my skirt and jumper that I’d laid over a nearby chair and crept out the door. The sounds of pots, cutlery and the smell of freshly baked bread and salty fried meat met me at the bottom of the stairs.
In the dining room, the large table was set for four at one end. The smaller table from the previous night had been removed and I stood in the space created trying to recall what had led me to collapse. The French doors opened on to a chaotic and enchanting herb garden flanked by another section of the villa set at
