Conversations
with a stranger….
Let's take a long walk around the park
after dark
Conversations, verbal elation, stimulation
education, Relaxations, elevations
or maybe we can see a play on Saturday / feel the breeze and listen to a symphony
or
maybe we can chill and just be or maybe/
and listen to
The Roots
Or maybe we can just be silent.
Jill Scott: Who is Jill Scott…Words and
Sounds. Vol. 1
Stef sat down at the sidewalk
of the Café De Bongiono nursing her cappuccino. What is it with this place, she
thought, she didn’t seem to want to get up. Café De Bongiono was a quaint tea
and coffee shop that also served meals, but at specific times. It was located
amidst the line of shops that lined the canal in Venice, Italy, with inner and
outer seating provided for its customers. It had slight entertainment in the
manner of the many tourists who boarded the gondolas opposite and a couple of
spectacles that were apt to happen now and again, in a lovesick city like
Venice.
She had taken a vantage
position in the café, ready to behold the sights and spectacles that day had to
behold, seated facing the river entrance, watching the various people board the
boats, backing the café but with a side view - enough to observe the goings-on.
She looked at the couple a
few tables from her. They barely looked away from each other’s faces, closely staring at each other; nose to
nose was the appropriate term to describe them. They must love each other
uncontrollably to feel the need to express their love out here in public without
a care in the world.
The
atmosphere in Italy was such that required an immune system to the passionate demonstrative lovers that
pass you by or you would end up bawling your eyes out that you don’t have a
companion of your own. However, that wasn’t what she came for. She came to
relax, to get her head in gear, to breathe in the sweet serene air as it
unclogged her pores.
Then, a tall young man walked
in through the river entrance. He had just gotten off a boat, shaking off his
clothes to dry out some water just as he alighted. He was tall and fine, his
face full and healthy, with glinting blond hair that messed up
his face, a casual demeanor and baby blue eyes. His blond hair made her think, he’s
not European, I think. What a surprise, hope he’s American.
He
looked around the exterior of the café for an empty table, a spare seat but he couldn’t find any. His eyes brushed past Stef’s
empty seat. He gave her the
look that asked, “Are you expecting somebody?” She blushed, flirted with her
eyes girlishly, stared down into
her cup, and looked up to face him with a chuckle, shaking her head in response.
He
looked pleased, so he strutted over to join her, all 6
foot 1 of him was now face to face to Stef with just a couple of feet between
them.
“Hi.”
His voice was soft. “Is
this seat taken?”
Stef smiled. He was American,
good clean cut American. His accent was refreshing to her after a month of
French, Italian and Spanish speaking dialects that had begin to bore into her
second skin. “Yeah, well, no…em… I’m
sorry, no one’s here. Sit down. I should be leaving soon too.”
He pulled up the chair and
sat down facing Stef, his side to the river entrance, and her back to the inner
café. “I hope it’s not on my account?” he asked politely flashing her a
lovely exhilarating smile.
“No, of ‘course not.
I’ve been here all morning - well not all morning - but the better part of the
morning. You really should come here by 7 o’clock - that’s when you can get good seats for your self, and watch the sun dancing on the river. It’s
beautiful.”
“So, you’ve been here
since 7?” he asked, adjusting his tall frame into the small wooden chair of
the café.
“Yep, I have, that’s how
I could get this seat,” Stef replied, proudly like it was feat of nature to
sit this close to the water.
He smiled and looked up to
catch the waiter's eyes, when he did he called his attention. “Would you
like another cappuccino, Miss?” he asked Stef.
“No,” she looked down at
her cup, this one should be stone cold by now, she thought. “Yeah, sure why
not.”
He ordered a cappuccino for
Stef and a latte for himself. The waiter, a young man in his teens with a gaunt
frame and jet black hair, pretended like he couldn’t grasp the order properly underneath the
slurred accent, then Stef lent her Italian skills to the aid. He was
pleased and left with their orders in mind.
“Thanks,” he
said.
“I’m so not good at speaking this stuff.”
“Really, I could have
assumed you were French or something when I saw you,” she teased.
“Yeah, really, like my
blond hair didn’t give me away,” Stef laughed, she had been thinking the
same thing too.
“How was your boat ride?”
She pointed to the gondola on the riverside.
“That, phew,” he
squealed excitedly. “I absolutely loved it, LOVED IT,” he yelled out. “Everything about
it was exactly how I had imagined.”
“You should try it at
night,” Stef remarked.
“Really…can anything
possibly top this?” He leaned closer, keen with interest as if to hear her describe the most
pleasurable experience known to man.
“Yeah,” Stef nodded
with a smile. “You wouldn’t believe what the stars do to the river at night and
the air it’s so smooth and…” She closed her eyes to imagine it, and to
somehow let
the words jump into her mind that would appropriately describe the feeling she
felt the first time she rode on the river at night.
“Sensual,” he finished
for Stef appropriately while her eyes were still closed.
“Yeah,” she opened them
abruptly to behold his starlet blues staring at her. “Sensual. That’s the
word.” She turned back to her old, and now stale, cappuccino avoiding the
tension staring into them had caused in her.
“How long have you been
here?” he asked a pensive Stef.
“Here in Venice?” He
nodded in response. “Well,” she thought for about half a second. “It will be
at least a month on Thursday.” The day was Sunday.
“Wow,” he shrieked in his
chair. “No wonder you know the language. I’ve only been here a week day
after tomorrow.”
“That’s five days,”
Stef corrected.
“Yes, five days.” He was
stunned at her correction of his miscalculation of time but he shrugged it off.
“What do you do?”
A
cold glance from Stef was the response he got to this off setting question. Just then, the waiter brought their cups,
placed in front of them carefully and took away the
old one Stef had left to dry out.
“I’m sorry, I’m being
nosy, aren’t I?” he apologized.
“No, you’re not. I just
hate that question so much, you know. Back home it’s like THE all-important
question, everyone wants to know where you work. Is it a dot com, or is it in
entertainment? Do you have insurance, medicals, car payments, fringe
benefits? Gibberish work talk,” Stef lamented cautiously rolling her eyes,
guarding vital information about herself.
He shrugged his shoulders and
made for his latte. He took a sip carefully, and then dropped the cup clumsily on its saucer. It was steaming hot, too hot to grasp the taste of it.
“See, there’s a free
table over there if you want to move over?” She pointed to a table across
them. The occupants were a couple just like them who had been having coffee
together all morning like Stef.
He looked over his shoulder
at the table, “No, I like this place.” He looked at Stef and added, “I
like sitting next to you.”
She was
bemused so she let out a childish snicker. “Why,
because I’m the only American woman here?”
“No, not really," he began, and staring straight at Stef, he finished. "Maybe, ‘cos…you’re the most intriguing woman here, and for the life of me, I can’t seem to understand why you should be sitting here alone.” The dead on glint in his eye depicted the sincerity and honesty embedded in that statement. No doubt he wasn't speaking from his rear, it was thought out compliment that blew Stef's guards away.
Stef
was near shock and embarrassment at this, her face blushing uncontrollably.
“Th.thanks. Thanks so much,
but you know flattery won’t get you anywhere.”
“I’m not looking for it
to. I’m just trying to have fun, relax, and have a good time. Life’s too
short to be uptight.” He ran his hands through his cropped blond hair, causing
it to fall back over his face as unruly just as it did when he first walked over to Stef.
He leaned back on his chair, stretching his lengthy legs, arms and body,
extending it like a cat’s. “Wow, the air here is so nice. Reminds me of Miami
in the summer.” He let out a deep refreshing breath.
“No.” Stef laughed
objecting. “This place is nowhere near Miami, in any weather. They have so
much culture here and the people here, they are curious and nice.
Nice…Italians are nice, romantic ones, a bit rowdy at times but they do okay,” Stef corrected.
“You like correcting people,
don’t you?” he asked, sitting back up on the chair.
“Well, not all the time. I
just hate it when people don’t know what in the world they are talking about,
it just irks my ears.” She took a sip from her cup, lifting up her eyes from
it, awaiting his calculated reply.
But he didn’t say a word. He just made silent notes in his head about Stef and the direction their conversation was headed.
This lady is nice, a little older than I am
but she’s still nice. She has a pretty face, lovely brown hair that glitters
in the sun's rays, a nice enriching smile, beautiful full lips and a somewhat
friendly demeanor. But why is she so goddamned compulsive? Should I ask
her? I probably shouldn’t. I don’t even know her name. Besides I’m here to
have a good time, not to let anything bug me, so I don’t think I should ask
her. I don’t think she knows who I am anyway; if she did maybe she would have
asked me how it feels to be me, be in my business. Maybe, she would have made some
corrections about that too.
He took a sip of his latte
again. It tasted nicer now that it was colder, maybe the cold breeze had added to
the taste. It beats me, he thought.
“Are you going to take me
to the museum this afternoon?” he asked Stef confidently, maybe too
confident.
“You haven’t been?"
she gasped at the absurdity. Stay in Venice without viewing the museum that was
the first stop on her agenda, coupled with a midnight gondola ride, sipping some
margarita. "I
can’t anyway, you should ask one of your hotel staff to get a guide for
you,” she suggested, straightening the red polka dot mat on the table,
nervously. She hated to refuse people anything on a normal basis especially if
they had been nice to her, saying NO was definitely not one of her strong
points.
“Hmm, maybe…” he had no
reply to that. He kept quiet for a while, staring at Stef sipping her coffee.
Her
lips pursed into a nice thin line each time she did, and when she swallowed
she would roll her eyes and lick her lips satisfactorily before she set the cup down. She did
it each time, with each sip, it was almost like a pattern for her, a system she had
developed and looked
forward to perfecting.
“I quit my job,” he
began.
Stef looked up at him
stunned, stumbling her cup on the saucer. “Wow! Why? No, em...not why, but how come…?” she asked stuttering.
She knew who he was, but she had pretended not to because this was Italy, not
America. Anybody here from the States was entitled to their privacy.
“Oh, you’re so
concerned?” he said in sarcasm.
“Yes, I am. I lost mine.”
He stared back at her, aghast. “I know Miss Perfection like me, how did I manage to fuck that up, right?” Stef expressed, waving her hands in the air. She was suddenly
at ease with this young man, so she felt comfortable telling him the truth, and
cursing in front of him.
“This had nothing to do
with your controlling behavior now, does it?” he inquired, careful ‘cos he
knew he might have been stepping on dangerous territory.
“Well, a little. I
couldn’t work under a man.” His eyes almost popped out at the belittling way she
phrased the male's species blatant superiority so she
went further to explain, “You see, I was supposed to get a promotion as the
Chief Media Executive for the firm. But instead of me, they bring in a man to take the
job from
another company who I am so sure has no idea what he’s doing.
It’s just so male chauvinist macho bullshit if you ask me. I couldn’t handle it. So they
let me go, nicely, with a good pay-off too,” Stef spat out.
He was stunned that so much
anger was inherent in this suffice charming young lady. He felt a need to calm her anger.
“I’m so sorry.” He brought out his hand and brushed it lightly across hers
on top of the table.
“Hey,” Stef was touched,
“it’s okay, and I’m so over it.” He stared at her disbelieving her words
of assurance. “No, really I am. After a month here, don’t you think I would
be?” Stef bent down her head to hide the tears that had started to percolate in her
eyes.
“Is that why you came
here?”
“Yeah, look at this
place,” she marveled, looking around she sniffed the air and let out a big sigh.
“You don’t ever wanna leave, and of course I always had this dream…” she
stopped abruptly.
“What?”
he reached forward as if to catch the words drop from her mouth any minute.
“Hold on a second. Let me order another latte. These things are great, aren’t they?” He
beckoned the waiter, the same waiter from earlier on. This time he just handed him the empty
cups and murmured “the same”, and the waiter nodded in comprehension.
“So what’s your dream?”
he enquired immediately the waiter left.
“Why did you quit your
job?” Stef asked changing the subject from her and referring to his
earlier submission about quitting his mega job.
He stopped for a moment to
collect his thoughts before he replied, “I didn’t leave, I just walked out.
I got tired of being ignored basically. Being the youngest person there all of a
sudden felt like no one wanted to listen to a thing I was saying. Everybody
else’s decision mattered, not mine.”
“But you are the
youngest?” Stef asked, intuitively.
“Yes, but…” he stopped, gave Stef an angry face which made her smile. It was just the anger written in the eyes but the fact that he masked it with a smirk, jolting smirk, the kind of expression one gave of while having intense sexual pleasure, you're angry but smirking. Angry but sexy, she thought, how intriguing.
Nick continued,
oblivious of the woman's private observations.
“I know I’m the youngest but…most times every mess we’ve fallen into -
if they had listened to any of my suggestions maybe we wouldn’t have fallen
into them, don’t you think?”
“Like what, pray tell
me?” Stef said with sarcasm.
“Well, the last album for
sure,” he snapped.
“Oh that…I’m so sorry
it was such a flop worldwide, critics had a field day with it. Everybody kept asking why you guys made the turn
in your music when the old method was working just fine for you all.”
“Exactly…and I
suggested…wait…you knew about that?” he asked, puzzled.
Stef nodded, “I’m in
media, aren’t I? It’s our job to seek people who need more publicity or a
new image or something.”
He nodded,
dismissed the answer and continued.
“Anyway, I suggested that since we’ve already started the crossover why
don’t we go all the way, put some hip-hop, rap, R&B, funk it up a little
bit, the works, but they said ‘No. It’s not us’ …what do you fucking
mean ‘it’s not us’? Right now I don’t even know what ‘us’ even sounds
like anymore.”
Stef was put aback. The
waiter heard caught his ramblings in anger and hurriedly dropped their cups of
coffee. He grabbed his and practically drained the cup. It was not as hot as the
first one, or maybe it was and he had just grown thirstier.
“I am sorry,” Stef said
genuinely, batting her eyelids.
“Why, you shouldn’t
be,” he snapped.
“No, I should, my company
campaigned to handle you guys’ publicity for a while but I guess we didn’t
really push for it then.”
“Maybe, you should have,”
he retorted amidst hisses.
“Yeah, maybe we should.
Maybe if we had, I would have still had my job by now, maybe they would have
made me Chief Media Executive if I had brought in your big account.” Stef
regretted that moment her intern secretary had mentioned his group and how they
needed a new image and some major publicity for their new album, but she had
reprimanded the girl, thinking she was young, daft and too "teen bopperly"
excited to understand what a major account meant. To the young high school crowd his pop group was the most exciting thing
to happen to them in decades, and they had studiously made it their duty to get interested in every bit of
news concerning them, something that worked for and against them. However,
considering their media fumble, and loss of their wholesome image, the intern
was right to point them out to Stef. Who knew she was acting on a good lead and an excellent
hunch, certainly not Stef.
“But you’re going to go
back, aren’t you?” Stef asked the impulsive young man.
“Yep,” he smacked his
lips till they turned ruby red. “Of course I’m going to go back. I have to,
but I wanted to disappear for a while, to give them some time to sweat it out,
look for me, miss me a little, you know the drill. You women do it all the
time?”
Stef was amused. “Do what,
disappear? Well I wouldn’t know anything about that now, would I? I’m just a
girl…” she sang out the No Doubt tune in less than perfect harmony. This amused
him greatly, her voice must be a far
cry from the lovely lead singers he had in his team.
“Yeah, yeah. You should
take your act on the road,” he teased.
“Yes,
The Porto Ilagiano would be very happy to throw me out.”
They both sat there and
laughed for a minute, cradling their cups. They had been chatting for close to 2
hours and the people on the café sidewalk were beginning to stare, needing the
free table for occupation.
“I’m getting kinda
hungry.” He patted his stomach, checking the watch, he exclaimed, “It’s almost
noon.”
“Yeah, that means I’ve
been here for five hours, and you’ve been here for two. You can order lunch,
they start serving it by noon anyway.”
“I can see you know
everything about this place.”
“A month, I said. No more,
no less than a month. If I don’t know anything about the place after a month,
then when would I?” Stef scratched her mass of hair that was being harassed by
the wind. She might need a shampoo later on
this week, she thought. Hope he doesn’t get close to me to get a whiff of it, it
really might
have an odor.
“What do you recommend?”
he asked.
“Well, the pasta in olive
oil sauce is pretty good with sautéed vegetables and Parmesan chicken, you
would go crazy,” she exclaimed, remembering the taste of the lunch she had
been having here for the past two weeks.
“You’ve eaten here a lot,
I can see.”
“Well, only for about two
weeks. At first when I got here I ate at the restaurant by the market square,
the shoppers were a bit too noisy for me. I couldn’t handle the intrusion and
the men asking me ‘Are you tourist?’ ever so often trying to hit on me like
my black self didn’t give me away.”
“They saw a beautiful
woman, what do they care?”
“I know men don’t think
sometimes. Italian men don’t, they just want someone they can fib to about
their inability to understand a word of English so they can use that as an excuse to screw her
brains out before she leaves,” Stef remarked, remembering the many Italian,
non-English speaking, suave young men that had approached pointlessly her trying to
chat her up for a date. “Miss, you so beautiful, so very beautiful,” she
mimicked in her worst male Italian accent, crucifying the language.
He burst out laughing at the
details and her very hilarious drama. He could barely sit upright on the chair,
his eyes went teary and his face turned red in hysteria. “You crack me up
sister,” he said, gasping in bouts of laughter, his stomach churned every
note.
Stef smirked. It all didn’t
seem so funny to her now. Maybe because she had spent a good portion of the
vacation chasing away their advances instead of relaxing as she had intended to.
“Well, you asked for it,
coming here all alone and looking fine as you are, you really can’t blame
them.”
Stef shrugged. “No, I
didn’t.”
“Yep, you did,” he wiped
the tears from his eyes. “Isn’t that what your dream is, about coming here
to have a lurid affair with some Italian hunk?”
“No…” Stef shook her
head persistently. “No, it has nothing to do with it. Well," she smirked.
“I wouldn’t mind an artist hunk who could paint nude pictures of me at the
beach all day long,
but there aren’t any, at least out of all the ones that approached me. My
dream cuts deeper than that, that is so shallow.”
“Uhuh, I hear you.” He
nodded darting his starlet blues.
“It’s to live
here, that's my dream. To
live here in anonymity, lead a simple life, have a simple income and be content.
To live here and not have to worry about deadlines, accounts, mergers,
promotions, crummy staff meetings where you have to flash fake smiles for your
co-workers and reel pitches for the bosses that never appreciate them…aargh!”
She rubbed on her temples in meditation, a headache was forming just thinking
about the rigorous antics of work life.
“Think about when you’re
stuck to the hip with four other guys like me, then what happens? It’s like, I
can’t make a move without telling any of them or running it by our management
team or our publicist.”
“It can’t be all that
bad. They seem like nice guys,” Stef complimented.
“They are, the best. But I
want my own life sometimes,” he emphasized, rubbing his chest.
“So you run away, disappear
to Venice?”
“Yep, the land of romance
and escapism, I learnt it from you. Anyway, the other day, I got this pitch for
a movie; an action role and I really like it. But for the life of me I don’t
think the others will, and if it clashes with our schedule.” He shook his head
regrettably. “You always have to think of the good ole' schedule now.” He
emphasized with his eyes, rolling out in a Southern drawl. “We’re meant to go back to the studio for the new
album soon, they want to do some writing with some professionals.”
“You don’t want to?”
Stef peered for an answer.
“I do, I feel like I have
to go with them. It’s the most natural thing to do, but I feel like if I
don’t follow my heart now I’ll live with that regret all my life, especially
if this one ends up being another flop.”
“Oh, we can’t have that
now, can we?” Stef assured.
“No, we can’t. Not at
all.”
The waiter passed by their
table as if to ask what else they wanted anything and possibly making sure they
knew they had exceeded the morning time limit. Stef grabbed him rudely by his apron.
“My friend and I want lunch, Roberto.”
“You know his name?” he
gasped.
“Yep."
Stef smiled proudly. “A month remember,” she mused, and then gave Roberto
their orders for lunch and told him to bring them a jug of ice water. It was getting
a bit hot and humid. She yanked at the sleeves of her sundress. It was cotton
yet she was heating up inside. She reached into her pockets to retrieve a
handkerchief and wiped her forehead, her arms and the beads of sweat that had
percolated in between her cleavage.
“What time is it?” she
asked him.
“It’s a little past 1
o’clock now,” he said glancing at his silver Tag Heuer watch.
Stef licked her
lips wetting them. “It
would be better if it wasn’t so hot.”
“Yeah, it would be. We
could take a walk or a boat ride on the river,” he offered. “It can be a bit
refreshing.”
“Yeah,
I know, maybe after lunch. I’m a little hungry myself.”
She wiped her forehead again.
She noticed that he was staring at her as she did so. Why is he staring? she
thought.
A sudden refreshing breeze
cut across her from the river, blowing at her hair, into her cleavage, cleansing
her with its freshness thus cooling her off, however temporarily. She felt
refreshed now, and the uncomfortable icky feeling sweat that had gathered under
her armpits had evaporated with the fleeting wind. She looked to the direction the wind had come. Where did it come? And just as quickly as it had come, it had disappeared.
She turned back to him, to
the young man she had been sitting with all afternoon. He is so young, she
thought. She couldn’t quite remember how old the papers said he was, but she
could remember he was reasonably young but mature. “How old are you again?”
she bravely asked.
He scrunched his nose for a
second, “I’m 21, 22 in a bit.”
“How
much of a bit?” Stef asked like an older sister.
He laughed mischievously,
“Okay, you caught me - in roughly five months,” he confessed.
“Oh, well it’s a bit. A
long bit, but still a bit, depending on how you look at it. I’m 27. That’s
pretty steep, isn’t it?”
“Not
really.” He pursed his lips to the side in contemplation. “I’ve been with older women before. Well, just a bit older.”
“Knowing your bits,
that’ll be like my age, right?”
“A little less than your
age. Four years older is the highest I’ve ever gone for. You can’t help it,
all the guys hang around with older women, a girl my age would just get lost in
the program.” He scratched his neck in thought.
Pretty
lady, I knew she was older, he thought. But it makes her more attractive though,
the fact that she knows more about life than I do, and is so intuitive about
everything. I can deal with that, he assured himself.
“What’s the most
fascinating thing you find in a woman?” Stef asked, since they were on the
gender preference topic.
He thought for a second. “A
lot. Her smile for one has to say a lot to me. She has to be someone that can
send a million messages with just one smile.”
“She has to be
beautiful…” Stef hinted.
“Not necessarily. Good to
look at, but not beautiful. If I want beautiful, I date a model. And personally,
I have. The relationship can’t go past sex, boring sex but good sex either
way.”
Stef was put aback with his
frankness. “Wow!” she kept on exclaiming.
“I’m a superstar,” he
boasted. “Women come a dime a dozen to people like us.”
“But you have to pick and
choose the good ones from the crap or as you say ‘good boring sexy’ ones?”
“Yeah, and it’s such a
tough job,” he joked. “But someone has to do it.”
“How do you handle
groupies?”
“We have bodyguards and
dancers and stuff who keep them occupied.” He boasted unknowingly.
“What if you like one?”
“Rarely happens,” he
brushed off. “Most times, we do them the courtesy of going out to dinner or
something, just so they can go back home happy that they ‘mingled’ with us,
but apart from that they are just the same ole ‘boring sexy women’ to all of
us,” he explained, clearly and concisely driving his point home. The women had
played an important role in their careers, and no matter how they tried to deny
it the women were the only ones who really cared for their music, as fans and as
admirers so they always
did their best to be nice and courteous to them.
“I’m sorry, did I upset
you with my statement?” he asked Stef when he noticed her face downcast.
“No, I’m not upset.”
The waiter dropped off their jug of water with some ice cubes and two glasses.
She instantly poured herself a glass, and gulped down its contents thirstily. She let out
a refreshed sigh when she was done. “That was what was wrong with me. When I’m thirsty I turn
to a grouchy confused woman.” She turned back to face him after she had
drowned out her second
glass of water. “Okay, how do you handle the ‘boxer/briefs’ question?”
He laughed. “Ahh, that
all-important question. Funny, no matter how many times we answer that question
so many people still want to know the answer as if it would possibly have changed within the
time frame between interview. ‘One caller asks: Boxers or Briefs?’” he mimicked an
interviewer’s voice.
Stef was amused. She never
realized this side of the artists life, the cynic irritable side. She knew that the question was annoying to
her but they often reacted like it was second nature so she assumed they might
have been enjoying the attention, the morbid attention. She thought wrong. “What is it then, boxers or briefs?” she
teased, like she was opening an already itching wound.
He gave
her an angry face again,
that angry sex face that Stef saw he was accustomed to pull whenever he heard a
question or intended to make a remark that might not be so pleasing to the
average young lady. “It’s briefs, but at times it’s neither. You know, I
just let the dingy dangle freely without a hook.” he joked.
Stef was in stitches, “I
bet. The dingy, I haven’t heard it referred to as that before.”
Roberto and another female
waitress, who kept her stare on Stef’s companion, served lunch quietly. After serving
the lunch, she nudged Roberto playfully then he leaned over and asked him for an
autograph.
“It’s for my niece,
she’s 11,” Roberto excused grinning.
He obliged them taking the paper with his left hand and scribbling something close to a signature. When he was done he was handed another piece of paper. The female waitress whispered shyly, “It’s for me.” She said unashamed.
He obliged her, this time
with a smile, surprised that they were fans. When he was done, they thanked him profusely before they let him settle down to
lunch with Stef. He apologized to Stef and she nodded in assurance, it didn’t
bother her, it rather intrigued her to see him at work.
He admired the
appetizing spread of food. “I hope this tastes as good as you described!”
“Unless
what, Nicholas Carter?” she spat out, playfully.
He
knew his name after all! He moved back, startled
that she knew his name, his full name. He let his mouth fly open in astonishment.
His near-shock at her
outburst amused Stef. “I attended your concert earlier this year. The Black
and Blue World Tour, it was called; personally the black leather duds did it for
me, the smoke screens effect, pretty cool too. I couldn’t stop screaming,” she
snickered. He dropped his napkin in more shock, stared at the mischievous grin on
Stef’s face. “I’m sorry, I should have told you, but I guessed you wanted
anonymity. That’s what you wanted isn’t it, by coming here? God knows,
that’s what I did.” He didn’t respond. He didn’t even flinch, he cradled
his face with his right hand, elbow on the table absorbing this newness in Stef. “I’m
sorry I should have told you. But you should have known I would know, at least a
little bit. I’m in Media, remember?” She apologized again, peering at his
faded blue eyes.
He
sighed. “I’m not surprised you
know who I am, like I said, we are superstars, it’s just the concert bit that
got me. You screamed?” he enquired.
“Yep, persistently. I
couldn’t stop. I even got to cry some time in it too. It was the most amazing
thing I had ever seen, amazing display of testosterone - good testosterone, not
the boring kind, and all from five men. It’s like I got the dose five times
multiplied.” She giggled, giddy like a schoolgirl, as the events of that night
played in her mind.
He brushed it off. “Anyway,
I’m glad you had fun. That’s one satisfied fan I have to cross off my
list…” He bent over to his food.
“List, which list?”
“List of unsatisfied
ones,” he replied instantly. He picked up his fork and made for the chicken on
his plate.
“The fans are not
dissatisfied, honey.” She reached for his face across the small table, started to rub it with her palms, running her thumb and forefinger along the
creased lines formed on his forehead. “It’s just that sometimes you have to fall to
get back up again. It happens to the best of musicians and it’s your ability
to rise above it that establishes your longevity and earns you respect in the
business. Look at
Carlos Santana, or worse off, Steely Dan.” Stef’s business mind was talking,
giving him advice on how to handle defeat in the game of entertainment.
He
smiled sweetly in acceptance, reached for Stef’s hand on his face, taking it in
his, he kissed the inside of her palm fondly.
“They should have made you
Chief Media Executive,” he remarked.
Stef blushed. His kisses on
her palm were still tingling her, she strained to speak straight. “Yes, I know, and I should have lobbied for your
account, at least I would have met you sooner.”
“When are you leaving?”
he asked, soberly, his mind considering spending his entire vacation time with
this young lady.
“In three days. But I have
to be in Milan tomorrow. I need to get some shoes there and then it’s off home
to go look for another job I love to hate.”
He let go of Stef’s hand
and placed it carefully on his side of the table. “We have today...” he
remarked contrite.
“Yes, we do,” Stef replied, choked with emotion. She went back to the food on her plate, struggling to concentrate on food with the revitalized nerves alert inside her. Just the mere feel of his mouth on her hand had worked her up so badly, that her nipples tore at her the seams of her dress. Food didn't seem so appetizing after all.
“You said you cried, when?
At what point during the concert did you cry?”
She squinted her eyes and
thought hard to remember the exact moment she did cry. She knew she cried but
she couldn’t remember when exactly. “Okay.” Her eyes opened up when she
remembered, “That song, ‘More Than That’ - there is this part that goes
‘I heard him promise you forever/but forever’s come and gone’ and then it
goes on to say ‘I would say the words, then take them back/don’t give
loneliness a chance/ baby listen to me when I say/ I would love you more than that.’” Stef said, half
singing, and half drifting into a deep intoxicating trance. “It was the most
beautiful thing a man could ever say to me or you or whoever,” she
fumbled.
Nick nodded. He remembered
when they had written those words and their manager said they were a bit too
mushy, too fragile but when they had played them to a control group of women, every single
one of them had a tear in her eye. “You’ve been in a bad relationship,
haven’t you?”
“Been in?” Stef
exclaimed, “I live in bad relationships. I live with a man I don’t love, I
just don’t. I did, but one day it just stopped. It started from a little wrong
that never got excused, and then it developed into something neither of us could
account for. Then you start by not saying ‘I love you’ for one day and from
then, you just stop saying it. The words don’t mean anything to either of you
anymore. We just slowly drifted apart. And yes, I disappeared on him too.”
They said the last sentence
together. Nick smiled at Stef, suddenly he felt the need to hold her in his arms
and comfort her, squeeze her so tight so that she could forget the misdeeds of
the other men in her past. He felt the need to connect with her on a higher
level, speak to her those words that no one could take back. He had no idea this enthralling, ever-confident woman could be feeling so
much hurt inside her and could succeed in concealing it with brilliance.
I like her, I like her a lot,
he thought. She is in touch with her emotions and it, in effect, touches me
to see her in so much pain. I wish I could help her, be her, and be in her
thoughts to wipe away the pain.
“I want us to spend the day
together. I wish you didn’t have to go. If you could stay one more day for my
sake, would you?” Nick pleaded, his voice choked with emotion and regret that
he hadn’t shown up at this café days ago when the hotel staff had pointed it
out to him.
“Let’s see how today goes
first, okay. Let’s start by being...silent. Yes, silence, would be nice,”
Stef assured rubbing on the hand that had been placed on top of hers.
Nick agreed albeit reluctantly finding it hard to tear his blinding blues from Stef's hurting browns. She consoled him with a small shift from her lips, reassuring him that sometimes speech would get in the way of a perfect calm. Silence could crossover the gap, speaking a magnitude of emotions words would only help to misconstrue. With a closed stare, constant absorption of the pain her confession had instilled in him, Stef convinced Nick to stay still while they ate in each other's company. Their hearts dancing in each others heartbeats.
They bent down to eat their food in silence, no one saying a word or looking up at the other, connecting with each other's imaginations.
On the river beside them,
couples sailed by on their gondolas, cuddling, necking, groping, stealing a
kiss, being serenaded by their
gondolier, whilst some were busy proposing to their partners. Stef took in the
environment with every breath inside her, sighing at its splendid composure.
The café blasted Frank
Sinatra’s music from their speakers. They did that every afternoon when the
couples came in for lunch. It had never occurred to her how romantic it must be
for the couples to hear Frank and his endless profession of
love and deep affection whilst they ate lunch, by the sea.
Today, for the first time,
she was brought into the glow of that splendor just by sitting with this young
man. A fine young man he certainly was, young and mature and heartfelt in every
way. He was the kind that could love and share his private moments with a lady
just the way she wanted him to. Stef felt the romance of Italy rush through her
and it was a good, tingling sensational feeling, one that she hoped she could
tackle it with her hand, trapping it somehow to take back home to America. It
would keep her warm on those cold nights alone avoiding the abhorring company of
her lover, those Friday nights she longed to hear the words as she ate dinner
alone, those moments she sank into a hot tub wishing someone could massage her
body inside the bubbles.
She looked up at him and
smiled, likewise he returned hers with his all so innocent one. My Honey
Molasses, she thought. She smirked, that was a good name for him, Honey
Molasses. Because he had a smile that was just as sweet as honey.
They
were through with lunch and the bill by 5 o’clock, no one speaking still so she walked him
over to the river
but he insisted that he wasn’t ready to leave her.
“Thought I was joking,
didn’t you?” Nick said.
“No, I want to hear you say
it again.” Stef snickered.
“Hear what? That I want to
spend the day with you. Okay, I’ll ask…” he leaned forward and made to
kneel down when he did a quick look around, he whispered, “I don’t know your
name?”
Stef let out a hysterical
laugh. It's true, she hadn't told him her name. “It’s Stef. Stephanie, but Stef to my friends.”
He nodded with a
smile, feeling slightly stupid. He
knelt down on the concrete paved ground of the Venice streets and held onto
Stef’s hands tenderly, “Stef, would you stay for just one day?” He clutched
them onto
his chest, pleading.
Stef agreed
instantly, blushing from corner to sidewalk. This
was the most romantic gesture she had had cause to witness, and hence be a part
of. “Certainly, Nicholas I would. I would.” She pulled him up to his feet
and he bent down and brushed Stef’s lips with a brief kiss, soft enough to
stimulate Stef's nerves. “C’mon, I
wanna take you somewhere.” She dragged him off excitedly.
She took him to a local bar
where they had margaritas and tequilas ‘til they couldn’t have anymore. They
left at 8.30, avoiding the nuisance route and walked back up the river creek towards the café they had spent
the day in.
On the way, Nick stopped abruptly at the side of the road and started to belt out a tune he had been humming inside him all through the walk. He sang the song, her song, ‘More Than That’, the infamous song that had brought Stef to tears at their concert.
Baby you deserve much better/ what's the use in holding on.../cos I would love you more than that/I won't say the words then take them back/Don't give loneliness a chance/baby listen to me when I say...I would love you more than that.
She
clutched her face as he sang, afraid that they would burst from the gushing.
This time there was no holding back the tears fell free from her eyes. “This is not fair, Nick, it’s
so not fair Nick,” she repeated, begging him to stop but he continued aiming at
wooing Stef with the song's promising love vows. The few passers-by that heard
him, stopped to drop coins on the ground in appreciation of his serenade. He sang the
song twice, swooning Stef each time. When he was done he dragged her to the
creek for a midnight boat ride.
“This was your idea in the
first place,” he said, as he paid for the ride, ignoring Stef’s objections.
He sat in the boat with his
arm across Stef’s shoulder making her warm and safe. She leaned closer inside
his embrace, putting her back to his comforting chest, while his face was to her hair. She could feel
his heart thumping through her back and she wished he would just kiss her, on
the cheek, on her neck, anywhere, just to seal the
moment, make it more enchanting than it had been all evening, quench the fire
burning on her lips. Sadly, it didn’t
happen.
“What are you gonna do when
you get back?” Stef asked, referring to his dilemma with his group.
“That, oh, I’ll call them
tomorrow and tell them where I am and that I am okay. Not like they cared,” he
lamented.
“Yeah, yeah, I’m sure
they did, maybe they just wanted you to act out your boyish adventures first.”
“Probably,” he tossed the
explanation in his head. “What about you…and him?” he hesitated.
“Him, he should be fine. He
might have left by now, if I’m lucky. Then again, he might not have. But
I’ll be okay,” Stef reassured.
“Now I know why you come to
this place,” Nick said in awe as he admired the dancing lights on the waves of the water
as with the glimmering shimmer of the moon reflecting on Stef’s brown hair.
“It’s beautiful here, I have to admit. It’s like the people don’t have a
care in the world, so carefree and so giving of warmth. For the first time in my
life I’ve felt free to do anything I wanted, I could walk around naked and no
one would look twice. The first time I’ve ventured out without a bodyguard in
years. It’s an amazing place. I’d like to spend a month if I could.”
“A month is good, not too
short, not too long, just right.” She pulled into his embrace and sank into
his arms, placing her head on his beating chest.
He caressed her hair,
stroking it gently, then
kissed it softly. He was too enthralled to notice any odor from it; to him it
had the peculiar scent of Jasmine. Jasmine.
In the far distance they
could hear Frank Sinatra’s song blaring from the shore.
“I’ve got you under my
skin/ I’ve got you deep in the part of me/ I’ve got you and I won’t give
in/I’ve got under my skin” Frank crooned.
Stef nodded, that was her
favorite Frank Sinatra song. Though, she never understood what it was to have
someone so lodged deep into you as to become a part of you, she considered it
rather intense that someone could have it to want to sing about it.
The ride
along the river
took about an hour as they told the gondolier to take it slow, going round as
many times as they directed him to. He obliged. He had no objections as long as
he was being paid for his time.
They left the river at a
little past midnight and Nick walked her to her hotel room, once again in
silence, pinching her hands tightly as they walked. At the door, he took
hold of Stef’s hands to his chest, squeezing them in fear that he might have to let go
now that they were home.
“This is the part I
hate,” he said, nervously awaiting the verdict.
“What part, the end of the
date?” He nodded, shyly in response. “Reminds me of those blind date episodes where the
couple has to give some sort of assessment of how the date went. Ridiculous.”
Stef joked, causing Nick to break into short bouts of laughter. She looked up at
the hotel; her room was on the fifth floor, facing the main road. She stared harder
to make out her room from the others in the dark but she couldn't be certain
which one it was, they all looked alike from below. They had the same windows,
“This is the part where you
tell me to come up,” Nick hinted, careful to be as polite as possible.
“Really…is that what your
models tell you? The ‘good boring’ ones?”
“I never ask them to, they
offer,” he replied, his voice denoting a hint of pride and sarcasm.
“I see…” Stef nodded.
“I would ask you. It’s just that I am not too sure if I am up for ‘good
boring’ sex tonight.”
Nick thought hard at Stef’s sarcastic statement. He knew that forced sex, or volunteer sex, would just ruin a perfectly enchanting afternoon that had been made wonderful by forces above their comprehension but that deep down inside both of them it would be expressing what they had fought all day to do--feel passion, feel free, fly with their emotions, throw caution to the wind. Or perhaps that time was too soon, like she had hinted by the deck, silence was now their hearts communicae, so why spoil it with sex of whatever kind.
“Good is fine with me. Good comforting company would do
for me this evening,” he replied. This was exactly what he wanted too.
“Besides, I am a little beat up tonight,” Nick added, adjusting the lapels of his
shirt.
Stef was a little disappointed that he hadn’t objected to that; that he didn't insist on having any type of sex--boring or otherwise with her. It wouldn't be that bad. She imagined it would only be expressing what she read from his eyes--he wanting her as much as she wanted him. However, she couldn’t complain. He might have his reasons, she thought, and it was always good to deal with a gentleman that announces his departure than one who rudely ignores it.
“Okay, fine with me.” Stef took a hold
of his hand, leading him upstairs to her room. The doorman didn’t look twice
at her visitor.
Bringing home male company was nothing new around here, in his mind he had wondered
why it had taken Stef this long to bring home a date.
Nick crashed onto Stef’s
bed tiredly throwing himself onto it with a heavy flop. He was courteous enough
to make a brief stop for the bathroom to wash up just before he curled up in his
clothes, drifting off to sleep on her bed. Stef watched him as he slept, admiring the
baby that he was, snoring away his worries. She sat on the window ledge, cradled
like an unborn child facing him, staring at Nick, wondering why it was that their paths had
conveniently collided that morning.
Absurd thoughts raced through
her mind as she watched him: He is…so not me. He is carefree, energetic like a June bug,
intoxicating like a drug, and amusing like a mechanical toy. But in all this, he is
still not me, and I am so not him. I could hurt him, or worse, he could hurt me.
James has already hurt me and I don’t think I need to get over my hurt by
picking up Nick, even though every limb inside me wants him. I want him enough
to let him go.
In
the morning, Stef packed her bags and crept out of the room before he could
awake. There was too much that needed to be done at home, she thought.
She didn’t see Nick again.
2
mon
Stef was running late for the
staff meeting at her new job. “Damn these staff meetings, more bad news and
more accounts that need pitching,” she cursed under her breath fighting to
make it their on some sort of time.
She straightened up her skirt
that had rumpled from the hasty cab ride, shoved the hair out of her face and
proceeded climbing the multiple steps in front of her building.
She adjusted the high heels she had bought in Milan the day after
she left Nick in Venice; they were black strap sandals that were just as
beautiful as they were uncomfortable. .
She had taken a job with a
small advertising company in a town several miles from her house. It had needed her
to move house, so she had used that as an excuse to break up with her boyfriend,
James. He hadn’t left the house when she returned from Italy; he was possibly
waiting for them to reunite and forget all that had happened between them.
Things like that never mended the past, they only made it worse to pick up and
face the future.
“Miss Bennett,” said her
boss, catching her sneaking into the boardroom's back door, “I do wish you
wouldn’t come late for these things.”
Stef
mumbled an apology, her face red with embarrassment.
“It’s okay, I know the
change to our side of town is pretty hard on you. Anyway, I just wanted to say
‘Congratulations on the new account’ - good job young lady. I knew I
wouldn’t regret bringing you on our team,” he cheered, patting Stef’s back
in celebration. She questioned him with his eyes. “It’s okay, I know you
don’t have to pretend that you don’t know anything about it. Anyway, the
file is on your table so if you want to bring it down to brief the rest of your
team that are in boardroom waiting for you, that’ll be nice.”
“S.. Sure, Sir,” Stef
mumbled, still confused. “Sure, why not.” She ran into her office to find out what Mr.
Kirkpatrick was indeed referring to.
She walked straight to her
desk, leaving the door open, she rummaged through the mess on her table for a
file, any file, that looked out of place from the rest, that would possibly give
her a clue to this confusion.
“Is this seat taken?”
she heard a
young man’s voice ask behind her. Stef spun around, almost snapping her neck, and behold it was
Nick, overlooking her in her office handsome and arrogant in a dark green suit. Her fear instantly
transformed to a smile, a sigh and an elevated rush of happiness.
“It depends on who wants to
sit down?” she joked, as he walked towards her in slow gentlemanly steps. “I never thought I’d see
you again,” she explained, gasping from his nearness.
“Why, nah, I don’t run
that easily.” He gestured waving his fingers in front of Stef’s face.
“Women have found it hard to disappear from me.”
“The account, it’s you,
isn’t it?”
“It’s us, all of us. The
band wants you to handle them. I suggested a little lady I knew and they
accepted, for once they listened to me and took my advice. They couldn’t have
me running off to Europe anymore. And yes, they did look for me; they looked
everywhere. So it’s no longer Nicky the baby, it’s Nicky the rascal with the
good ideas.
And..” He placed his hands around Stef’s waist, grabbing her forcefully, pulling her
close to him. “And I took the movie role too. They, well, you guys are gonna
see how to work around my schedule.”
Stef smiled, bemused and
proud that Nick had been able to stand up for him self in the group. “Gosh! It
feels so good to see you. It was like I had lost all sense of direction when you
left. I started to smell you even when you weren’t there,” he gasped,
rubbing his soft nose on Stef’s.
Stef giggled,
tickled by the rough ridges on his nose “Oh, and what
did I smell like?”
“Jasmine. You smelled like
pure Jasmine.” Nick flashed her a smile. She did smell like Jasmine, her hair,
her neck and her arms. He inhaled her with a mild sniff, sighing into the air as
he exhaled. “What about him?”
“Him who?” Stef
replied, kissing
the tip of his nose. “‘Him’ doesn’t exist anymore, unless you’re
talking about Mr. Kirkpatrick my boss.” She teased.
He smiled, amused and content.
I’m with her now and it feels good. I feel happy and I am glad, her heart has
met its friend and it would no longer cry in pain or want. I’m with her and
I’m glad. Nick thought, almost aloud.
“So what happens to people
like us when they get together in a relationship?” Stef asked.
“We’ll
just have to wait and see, Nick. Maybe we will last, maybe we won’t, maybe we’d end up moving out to
Italy, getting a place by the river, or maybe we would open up a café and name
it after us, I’d sing and you’d cook. Or is it vice versa. Or maybe…”
Stef cut in, “Or maybe we can just be silent.”
"I'd like that too." He sighed, remembering what blissful silence felt like with Stef. Heaven, smooth passage of time in heaven.
She reached for his mouth and kissed him, long,
hard
and sensual, feeling the romance of Italy massage in her once again as she
settled those tingles he aroused several months ago.
The first vacation they had
they got to spend it in Italy, a silent month by the
river.
THE
END.
