There was still the coast, of course, but somehow even that was different from how they had pictured it. The fishing villages had no fishermen in them, and the little bars around the main piazza weren’t patronized by old people playing cards but by groups of teenagers with ripped bodies and blaring mopeds who would glare at Anna and Tom in a way that hardly encouraged them to pull out their shiny aluminum laptops. The restaurants all had laminated menus with photos of the dishes and chintzy sailing knots on the walls. There were the stunning views over the horizon at sunset and the small courtyards with potted lemon trees and ivy growing up the drystone walls, but they had already all been co-opted by the boutique hotels with SUVs parked out front. What they were looking for must have existed once upon a time, back when you only had to hop onto a train or a ferry to reach a whole other world, an authentic, uncrowded world of dark red house wine in carafes and quiet hideaways by the sea. But now they knew those days were over and that, whether due to a lack of foresight on their part or because they had simply been born a generation too late, they couldn’t afford that world today.