Page 15 of Italy Can Bite Me

I climb aboard, flowers and cookies in hand, doing my best to breathe through my mouth. The interior of my beloved bus tells the tales of a thousand adventures—the floor scuffed by hundreds of shoes, the worn seats a result of countless dreamers rushing to see the next marvel of Italy. Sure, she’s not the sleek, air-conditioned luxury liner the major players use, but she’s got character.

And maybe mold… probably.

I make my way to the back, to my secret compartment where I keep the only things that really matter. My fingers find my mother’s old Nikon digital camera, reliable as ever and effortlessly elegant—the last thing she ever gave me, before… well, before.

I flip through the photos from my previous tour group. There’s that happy family at my best friend Enrico’s vineyard, the kids purple-mouthed from stealing grapes when they thought no one was looking. Then there were the Sullivan teens, learning bocce from locals in that hidden piazza—they’d even kicked their ass by the end of the afternoon. That sweet couple from Maine sharing their porchetta with the fishermen in Puglia, not a word of Italian between them but somehow speaking the same language of food and laughter.

This. This right fucking here. This is what it’s all about.

Too bad the bank doesn’t accept “magical moments” as currency.

The repair costs are piling up faster than a Roman traffic jam, but looking at these shots—the pure joy on their faces, the way Italy transforms them—I can’t give this up. The big-name operators might have their fancy buses and laminated itineraries, but they don’t capture moments like these. They don’t take tourists to the real Italy, the places off the beaten path. They don’t make magic.

“Lorenzo?” I call, arranging the flowers in a vase I may or may not have stolen from a café in Turin. “Scale of one to ten. How fucked are we?”

“Otto.”

“Eight? Come on, she’s not that—” The motion sensor air freshener puffs out a cloud of Ocean Mist but smells more like Public Restroom Surprise. I choke back a gag. “Okay, maybe eight.”

I hear a grunt from below that sounds suspiciously like “told you” in Italian.

“But she’ll run?” I ask, straightening seats with practiced efficiency.

“Sì.”

“Safely?”

A longer pause than I’d like. Then:“Sì.”

“You’re not making me feel better.”

He peers up through the doorway, holds up five fingers, then points to the engine.

“We have five?” I wave my hand, encouraging more words. “Days?”

He makes a so-so gesture.

“Five days until what? Total breakdown? Explosion? The smell becomes sentient and takes over Italy?”

He almost smiles. “Sì.”

“To which part?”

He shrugs and disappears back under the hood.

The thing is, I can handle a bus held together by dreams and duct tape. I can deal with mysterious smells and temperamental air fresheners. But what I can’t handle? What keeps me up at night?

The thought of letting these people down. Of not giving them the Italy they’ve dreamed about.

Because that’s the real magic of this job—not just showing them Italy but helping them fall in love with her. The way I do, every single day.

Even if she sometimes smells like feet.

I pull out my phone to check the time.Shit.I still need to shower, change, and become the charming tour guide version of myself that doesn’t smell like bus mysteries and last night’s bad decisions.

“Just… do what you can?” I pat the bus’s side like an old horse. “She needs to hold together for two more weeks. Then I’ll have the money to get her fixed up.”

“Preghiamo.”Lorenzo mutters it under his breath, but I catch it. We pray.

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