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Kee lay on the sand in the cove a few miles north of Quercianella, wherever that was. Italy was all she knew. West coast of.
Dilya worked industriously on a sand castle near the water line, trying to copy the one perched atop the cliff above the cove. The fluted square tower collapsed several times and was erased several times more before the girl was content and moved on to the high walls. Her stuffed, orange cat, wearing a small blue scarf of her own, watched the entire operation from atop on overturned plastic pail safely on the landward side of the castle.
Dilya had consented to wear the one-piece bathing suit but refused to show her legs. They’d compromised with a lightweight pair of cotton trousers that clung near transparently to her legs with seawater and sand. The scarf that
