Love in Italy

-4-

The week seems to go by fast, and it is already Wednesday. I am currently sitting in Photography waiting for the class to start. Today is the day we present our projects. And I am kinda excited to see what everyone did.

"Hey DelGatto." Rafael says sliding into the seat next to me as the bell rang.

"Hey loser. You were close to being late." I whisper.

"Yeah, I would have got here soon, but Emma kept pestering me with questions about you. So I had to hide from her for like 2 minutes." He whispers back.

"Ah got it. Has she already started bothering you? It's only day 3?"

"Well, it's Emma. What do you think?" I just nod my head. Mr. Zanetti called up the first person to present and I don't wanna be rude and talk while they're talking.

Soon enough, it is my turn to present as he is doing it in alphabetical order.

"Hi everyone. I am Natalia DelGatto and as you can see, this is my project..." I say nervously. Rafael gives me a thumbs up from the back, which oddly enough gives me confidence. "For my project, I wanted to add pictures that capture my personality and life. I have a few pictures of my family and me, for example, this one of my cousin Bella eating ice cream. She was 5 at the time and I thought it was hilarious how much of a mess she was making trying to shove down her ice cream before it all melted. I also included this picture of my aunt, uncle, and cousins Matteo, Bella and I seated in our family restaurant which was owned by my grandparents and passed down to my aunt. I live with my aunt and uncle since my mom passed away when I was ten, which was kind of sad at first, but they have made my life amazing. Matteo and Bella are like my siblings. Next to that picture, I added a picture of the sign outside our restaurant. I like to help my aunt there after school and during summer break. I am a pretty excellent cook if I do say so myself, however I like to bake more, sadly I forgot to add pictures of my creations on here. However, I added pictures of sunsets, sunrises, periwinkles, and cornflowers because they're my favorite things to photograph. Well, I like to take pictures of flowers but cornflowers and periwinkles are my favorite. I also added a picture of the beach and one of a butterfly because I thought they were cool. The last two pictures are of me with friends. One is a selfie of me with my two best friends, Gabby and Amara. The other one is a picture of Matteo and his best friend Rafael making funny faces. They both didn't realize I was taking the picture until after and chased me all around the house, trying to get me to delete it. Eventually they gave up. So yeah, that is my project, and I hope you all enjoyed learning a bit more about me."

"Very well done, Miss DelGatto, you may go sit down." Mr. Zanetti says. I nod my head and walk back to my seat, where Rafael is waiting for me.

"That was awesome." He whispers. "I thought you deleted that picture, though."

"Thank you. And I never deleted it. Was too funny to get rid of." I whisper back. Rafael mutters something to himself, but it's too quiet for me to hear.

Eventually, it is his turn, and he slowly gets up and makes his way to the front. Well, this should be interesting.

"H-hello e-everyone I a-am R-Rafael R-Russo." He stutters. Guess he's nervous too. "A-and this is, um... My project. I included a lot of pictures of family and friends because they're what I care about most. I also enjoy taking photos of people and landscapes. In this corner I put a picture of my younger siblings Clarisse and Carlo. They're twins and always get up to mischief. In this picture, they were attempting to bake cookies and ended up getting flowers all over the kitchen. After I took the picture and cleaned up the mess, I had to call Matteo and Natalia over to help as I can't bake. However, while they were baking, I could take a few wonderful pictures of them." He says, pointing to a corner of his project where the pictures are. There is one of Matteo shoving a cookie in his mouth, the twins mixing batter along with the picture of them covered in flour, and then there was one of me with icing on my nose. I still remember that day the twins were 9, and we were 14. Rafael was home alone with them and decided it would be a great idea to bake cookies, even though he was a terrible baker. "Now on this side of my project there are a ton of pictures of the town, beach, and sea. My favorite activity in the summer is going down to the beach. Along with some pictures of the sea and beach, I also have pictures of my family and friends there. I have a picture of Matteo holding a football, as one of our favorite things to do is kick it around in the sand. Then I have one of my sisters, Anita and Sofia, in the water, and I have one of Natalia and Bella building sandcastles. The last picture I have on here is a picture my mom actually took of me and Matteo playing Calico last year. I hope you all learned a little about me and I am very excited to be in this class with you all." Rafael says and then comes and sits back down next to me.