Wishful Thinking (a journey that will change lives forever) by Melissa Hill

competitive sports, including chariot-racing, had been held from the fourth century BC. 
    He had not been impressed however, by the catacombs at San Callisto where they had been led through a series of eerie passageways stacked with thousands of ancient human bones. Dara had found his discomfort amusing – a sports physiotherapist by profession, she had been sure he wouldn’t bat an eyelid at the sight, but instead he’d found it all decidedly creepy.
    But this morning, the newly-weds had gone to visit the Vatican museum and the Sistine Chapel, and after the first few hours of wandering around looking at sculptures and paintings, and then standing for ages “just looking at the ceiling” Mark admitted he’d had enough.  “I think it’s the crowds that are wearing me down more than anything,” he’d said apologetically, before kissing Dara on the forehead and letting her carry on alone with her ‘staring’.
    Dara had to agree. She knew Rome would be busy – it was, after all, one of the most visited capital cities in the world – but even she had been taken aback by the number of tourists on the ‘Dan Brown Trail’; people visiting the sights and locations made even more famous by the American thriller writer’s immensely popular novel.  From where she sat, just across from Giacomo della Porta' s fountain, with the Pantheon to her right, she could, at that very moment, make out at least three different people studying a copy of the bestseller, and looking up at the Pantheon with delighted interest.  Notwithstanding the crowds, she thought it was wonderful that a simple book could get so many people interested in European history and architecture.
    Dara had always been interested in history.  In school, she’d been fascinated by stories of Egyptian scribes, Roman emperors, and Italian painters and sculptors – much to the anxiety of her mother, who didn’t think it right that her eldest daughter should be interested in ancient gladiators and such like, when it would be more in her line to read about princes and princesses and happily ever after.
    But Dara found it all incredibly romantic, these ancient and glorious accomplishments and exotic languages; she couldn’t get enough of it.  In class, she loved hearing about the European conquistadors who set off around the world hoping to discover new lands and cultures, the powerful popes and kings who commissioned beautiful paintings and sculptures that still stood the test of time.  Upon visiting the Sistine Chapel that morning and seeing for the first time Michelangelo’s famous ceiling fresco above her – still there six hundred years after Pope Julius II first commissioned it – she had been completely awestruck.  Mark agreed that it was very nice indeed, but also pointed out that it “needed a bit of touching up”. 
    Studious by nature, and having achieved record marks in her school exams, it had been Dara’s father who suggested she put her talents to good use, and take up studies in Law or Medicine.  She had very much hoped to study the Classics at university, but he had put the kybosh on that notion from the very beginning.
    “What would you get from that rubbish?” he’d said at the time. “What kind of living could you make knowing nothing about anything other than all these nancy-boy painters and chippies who are long dead? You need to learn a good trade, Dara, something useful.” Eddie Campbell remembered only too well the periods of unemployment this country suffered for over a decade, and if he could help it, no daughter of his would ever have to join that soul-destroying queue to the dole office. 
    “At least until you get married, pet,” her mother added, quickly.  If Hannah could help it, no daughter of hers would ever be one of those high-powered career women who had no time for looking after their husbands or raising families. 
    “But it’s what I love, Dad,” a teenage Dara had protested, but no-nonsense Eddie