THEN: Everything slows down
I feel myself being guided into the chair next to the desk. It’s as if the world is in slow motion. As the blood returns to the far corners of my body, bringing a tingling sensation with it, I watch him put his glasses back on and carefully examine the tiny latches on the front of my corset. I smile.
“You are beautiful with your glasses,” I whisper. He smiles as he unlatches the first buckle on the corset . . . and then the second and third. My breasts now half popping out, I try to finish the job, but he stops me, moving my hands back to the chair. He kisses me sweetly.
“Leave it on.” He traces a finger down my neck, over my chest, to my now exposed nipple. Tracing small circles around it, he leans in, caressing it gently with his lips, then more firmly. His other hand gropes my other breast. His breath is hot on my skin. His teeth find my nipple. I can feel his body against my leg, his hard cock pressing into my thigh, his jeans still on. My eyes fall on the sword, on the floor.
“Stop,” I say. He stops. “Stand up.” He does, looking confused. Leaning down, I pick up the sword (it’s bent) and point it at him. “Take off your clothes.” He smiles and pulls his shirt off quickly, tossing it onto a chair. “Slowly,” I command. He slowly unclasps his leather wristbands, tossing them too. Watching me watch him, he now unbuckles his belt, slides his jeans to the floor. His cock is practically bursting out of his tight black jockey shorts. He bends, removing them. His gorgeous body is perfect in the pale light of the room. He just stands, waiting. Transfixed, I stare—at his stomach, his strong shoulders, his magnificent erection.
“Yes, Amazon princess?” He waits. Oh right. I’m directing. I point the bent sword towards the bed.
“Sit,” I say. He does. Remembering my prize of the night, I suddenly toss the bent sword down and take the golden lasso into my hands.
“What are you going to do with that?” he asks nervously.
“Not ask you questions,” I smile. Sliding my fingers along the cord, I stretch it out. My hair tickles his back and my breasts graze his face as I lean over him, wrapping it once, twice, three times around his bare chest and arms. “Put your hands behind you.” I wrap the cord once around his hands, and then deposit the rest in his open palm. “Don’t worry, I’m not a knot-tying type of girl.” I smile, pleased at my clever double entendre.
I kneel in front of him and slowly slide my lips around the head of his cock, tickling the tip of it with my tongue. Pushing his knees apart the same way he’d spread my legs, I slip my lips down over his erection. The largeness fills my mouth. I slide up and down slowly, sucking and teasing him, stroking him and massaging him with my tongue. He groans softly. Reaching around the outside of his legs, I hook my hands onto his thighs to find leverage. Now moving faster, my lips close around him and I suck harder. His groans grow more intense. And then, I stop and stand.
“Condom?” I ask.
“My case, there,” Frantonio says, out of breath. He tries to point but he’s tied up. I fumble through his suitcase and quickly grab a condom, ripping it open. With both hands I slide the condom slowly, slowly, ever so slowly down onto him. He looks me in the eye. “You’re torturing me. Chèrie please, just fuck me,” he says. I smile. Putting one knee on the bed, I swing my other leg over him, straddling him. Holding onto his shoulders, I hover over him.
“Say it in French,” I tease.
“Baise-moi, s’il te plaît” he says.
“Now Italian,” I say.
“Fottimi, per favore,” he begs.
“You’re right. French is sexiest,” I agree. With that, I slide my figa down onto his waiting, throbbing cock.
“O dio,” he whispers in ecstasy as I grip his bare shoulders and ride him up and down. He leans his head back, breathing hard. I feel his hands on my bare ass. He’s dropped the lasso. I let him. Who am I kidding? I’m no dominatrix. He pulls me up and down on his cock, grasps me by the hips and ass. In one fluid move, he flips me onto my back. The feather duvet sinks under me as he presses his naked, sweaty body against mine. He thrusts himself deep inside. The muscles of my figa tighten again and then I’m coming a second time. I cry out with pain and pleasure as he pushes into me over and over again. Then, as my whole body shakes and tightens, with a final massive push he comes too. My toes and fingers curl against the soft, clean cotton of the cool sheets as he collapses onto me. His heart beats through the leather of my half-on corset. I smell his hair against my cheek. I breathe in deeply and drift into bliss.
Frantonio’s Suite, Belmond Hotel Cipriani, Venice: Saturday, Dawn
The clean scent of lemon blossoms is carried in from the garden by a breeze off the canal, and it almost but not quite masks the soggy, moldy, dank smell of Venice. This smell is strangely starting to grow on me. There is something surprisingly satisfying about it. All the fine and foul folded into one. You can smell the years. Venice smells like a dusty attic or damp basement looks. Overburdened with boxed up memories and forgotten lives, these places give you a solid sense of being. You can see, smell, and feel the past, present, and future. And by sensing it, you are part of it. Time feels tangible. Like the ridges on a tree stump, you can feel the years.
As I lie here, blinking slowly in the unfocused light of dawn, breathing in the comforting smell of sixteen hundred Venetian mornings mashed into one, I realize for the first time that a person is also this. A person is a compilation of millions of moments, thoughts, and experiences. Of actions and reactions. Of choices, dreams, adventures, encounters, and emotions. You are a living, breathing, tangible record of your life. A Collection of Being. If you are a child, this is a very short collection of stories. And if you are like me, in your twenties, your collection of stories may require a shelf or two. But if you are like Regina, Bob, Sheela, Uncle Gandhi, my mother, or even Ruby of the Vegan Goat Farts at Miami International Airport, your collection is a vast library.
Why has it taken me so many years to see this? To respect it? Because these same people ask loud questions during movies, walk slowly in front of you despite highly engineered orthopedic shoes, tell the same stories over and over, and use cell phones like ham radios. But, are not the years they wear like permanent scout badges—and these badges actually tantalizing hints of what still lies ahead for me? They are promises of the collecting I still have left to do. This is both daunting and thrilling. Or at the very least, surprisingly satisfying.
I feel a warm hand move over my waist, slide up my belly and between my breasts. Speaking of satisfying . . . I close my eyes again and smile. Frantonio’s chest rises and falls against my back, and I think for a moment that he’s still asleep. Then his thumb and forefinger begin to tickle my nipple. His lips on the back of my neck are soft, but his whiskers rake my skin and I begin to squirm.
“It’s barely light out,” I complain. But he can hear me smiling.
“Perfetto,” he whispers, deep and sexy. “Time to nap after.” He rolls me over. This will be our third time. If Piero #4 was sexercise, Frantonio is more of a sexathon.
Frantonio’s Suite, Belmond Hotel Cipriani, Venice: Saturday, 9:12 a.m.
A knock at the door wakes us. I open my eyes and immediately realize it’s much later. Bright sun floods the balcony, spilling into the room and onto the bed. By the third knock, Frantonio is out of the bed, wrapped in a fluffy, white hotel robe and swearing as he answers the door.
“This better be important,” he says harshly.
“I’m sorry. Your mobile is off and Mr. Barton needs to move his appointment up to ten because he’s taking an earlier flight home.” I recognize Uncle Gandhi’s soft, melodious voice as I burrow deeper into the sheets, hoping he can’t see me.
“Who the fuck is Barton?” Frantonio’s sharp tone startles me. A far cry from the sexy whispers of his sunrise seduction.
“The curator from Soho.”
“Dammit.”
“I’ll have the car brought around while you’re gone and load everything up for the drive home.”<
br />
“Good. Then you can look for a new job,” Frantonio says bluntly. My eyes widen. What?
“Per favore, nipote. What happened last night was a simple mistake.”
“What happened last night was unforgivable and a public relations nightmare. It could have cost my reputation. If you can’t see that, you’re either a moron or too old for this job. Which is it?” Fantonio asks. Uncle Gandhi, perhaps knowing someone else is in the room, retreats deeper into the hall and to his native tongue.
“Per favore non parlare così,” he says quietly. “Tutti fanno degli errori.” I think the conversation is over when I hear the door close, but quickly realize Frantonio has stepped into the hall to berate his uncle. I hear his shouts in angry Italian, through the door. I sit up, feeling awkward, wondering what to do with myself. I cringe as his voice gets louder.
Remembering his uncle’s caring words to me last night, I can’t understand how Frantonio can treat him this way, even if he screwed up the wine auction. Didn’t it all work out in the end? Suddenly my phone vibrates next to the bed. I pick it up. One new message . . . from Frantonio? I stare. This isn’t possible. I look around the room and see his phone, lying next to his leather jacket on the floor. Bewildered, I click open the message on my phone:
I cannot forget but I forgive you, I do
Like a stone in your shoe my heart beats for you.
More song lyrics? My head swims. What’s happening? The truth hits me hard. This is not Frantonio. All the song lyrics, this whole time, they were sent by someone else. But who? I puzzle it out. The first message I got was a French number. I assumed it was Frantonio and that Yin had given my number to him. But she’d never actually confirmed this. My mind races through the conversations I had with him in my room at Regina’s and in her library. I’d always been the one referencing the song lyrics, not him. But just last night, hadn’t he quoted the Bryan Adams song back to me? Or was he just saying, “please forgive me?” I’m an idiot. I had assumed it was Frantonio because I wanted it to be him. I had seen what I wanted to see. The flirty, romantic, and mysterious exchanges I’d been having this entire trip had been with someone else entirely.
Chapter 36
How Not to Take the Wrong Ride
Frantonio’s Suite, Belmond Hotel Cipriani, Venice: Saturday, 9:20 a.m.
“Je suis désolé, my dear,” Frantonio says as he walks back in. I quickly stuff my phone under the sheet. “That was a rude awakening after such a lovely night.” He leans over the bed and kisses me. “I hate to run but I’m late for a meeting about a show I’m doing in New York.” He heads into the bathroom, turns on the shower. “Please say you’ll come to Firenze with me and let me show you my city.”
“Florence?” My hand tightens around my phone under the sheets. I feel unsure of everything. All the romantic, late night exchanges I thought I’d been having with this man had been with an entirely different person. And the man yelling profanity at his elderly uncle moments ago on the other side of that door also seemed like an entirely different man from the one I’d just made love to three times. My dawn musings on age and experience now sit in my stomach like a lead milkshake. Suddenly I want to be in my own room, alone. I need to think. Frantonio’s robe drops to the bathroom floor and I’m once again staring at his gorgeous naked body.
“Oui chèrie. Florence is where I live. Where my studio is,” he winks as he walks back over to me. “Maybe you’ll let me shoot you in my studio?” He gently pushes me back onto the bed, his muscular chest leaning over me, the graceful curve of his neck lit by the sun. “Just the two of us?” He smiles. “No fountain or Roman carabinieri?” He leans in and kisses me deeply. My lower half wakes up. The steam from the now hot shower drifts into the room. He stands. “See, only one kiss and you torture me.” Standing there naked, back lit, with steam billowing behind him, Frantonio looks like Michelangelo’s David in a porn film. “My little red car is downstairs, chèrie. Maybe you’ll accept my offer of a ride this time?”
Belmond Hotel Cipriani, Venice: Saturday, 11:15 a.m.
I have packed up in my own hotel room, left my costume at the front desk for Sheela’s courier, and returned to Frantonio’s hotel swiftly. I’m no longer part fish, I’m all shark. I must keep swimming. If I stop, I’ll start to wonder if Yang was right, if the French-Italian photographer of my dreams who fucked my brains out last night and now wants to drive me through Tuscany in his vintage convertible is actually an egotistical ass. And I will sink.
Wheeling my roller board bag toward the front steps, I see Frantonio’s car in the valet area and Uncle Gandhi . . . unloading bags? I wheel over and greet him with a smile, hoping he’s recovered from Frantonio’s earlier outburst.
“Good morning!” I say.
“Buongiorno, Wonder Woman. You are in your human disguise, I see.”
“But always ready,” I smile. “Why are you unloading?”
“These are just my bags. I’ll take the train,” he smiles. I stare at the car and realize there are only two seats. Frantonio has chucked his elderly uncle out of the car, for me. My inner shark stops swimming and I sink rapidly. I am again part fish. Floundering.
“I can’t take your seat.”
“Don’t worry, dear. I’d probably be on the train anyway. He’s fired me again and he’s in one of his moods.”
“Fired you for what reason?”
“I told him last night was my fault. I just couldn’t let that bartender and waitress lose their jobs.” Uncle Gandhi can see my distress. “Don’t worry. He fires me once a year at least.”
“And then rehires you when he feels guilty?”
“He can’t find anyone else to do the job,” Uncle Gandhi laughs. I’m glad he’s got such a good attitude about it. I’m struggling. He takes my bag and wedges it into the tiny trunk, putting a few more items into the car, like the eight-hundred-euro bottle of wine we never drank last night. “He’ll be here soon. They have a lovely bar in the lobby, please have a coffee, relax.” I force a smile and walk inside, but my head is spinning.
At the bar, I’ve put three sugars into my now lukewarm café latte without realizing it. My phone buzzes and I look down. This message is from Mike. Just seeing his name on the screen makes me smile. I miss my friends.
MIKE: Florida Woman Wows Crowd with Wonder Wit?
ME: Florida woman realizes she’s fucked a dick.
MIKE: Hello? Straight girls fuck dicks.
ME: Okay I fucked an asshole.
MIKE: That’s my job lol. We’ll talk about it in Rome. See you tonight?
ME: He wants to take me to Florence.
MIKE: What? Fuck that asshole!
ME: Already did. Pay attention.
MIKE: Come to Rome! Michael got me a room at the De Russie for my birthday!
Shit! Mike’s birthday, I forgot. A familiar voice turns my head. There, at the front desk, Regina is checking out.
“Ciao, Wonder Woman,” she smiles. “I didn’t get to say good night, or tell you what a fantastic job you did saving our host,” she chuckles.
“Thank you,” I blush. A driver in uniform walks up and takes her bags.
“No, thank you. I’ve spent my life seeing women taken advantage of in this country . . . well in every country I’ve lived in. It’s hard not to just feel overwhelmed, like your own small actions never make a difference. But you reminded me we can make a difference if we keep trying. Things are changing so slowly.”
“That means so much coming from you.”
“How did things go after I left? Did you get what you wanted? Did you hear the end of Frantonio’s song?” she asks with a smile. “Yes,” I say.
“And did the song end as you expected and dreamed?” she asks.
“Sì, and no,” I admit.
“It seldom does, my dear.” She laughs and snaps her designer purse closed. “Allora, I go. I’m already late leaving. Tomorrow I fly to London for a meeting with a film director so we’re driving to Roma today. Would you like a
ride?”
“Frantonio has invited me to his villa in Tuscany.”
“Well, that sounds like a lot more fun. Perhaps there is a verse left in his song that you haven’t heard yet.” She gives me a kiss on both cheeks. “Buon viaggio e buona avventura, cara.” As she walks through the elegant hall, heads turn. A verse I haven’t heard yet. I wonder to myself: is there?
“Regina! Wait . . .” I call. She turns.
Outside, I see Frantonio’s car parked at the edge of the valet, overlooking the lower garden and pool. Maybe I can slip off without having to see him. I’ll call him. Or send a text. It’s a total guy move, and not very nice, but somehow I think he’ll get over it before lunchtime.
“Give me one minute,” I ask. I hurry outside to reclaim my bag. But the trunk is locked. Damn! Uncle Gandhi is nowhere in sight. No valet either. Where is everyone? I look over and see Regina’s driver loading up her luggage in a black town car. Shit. I don’t want her to leave without me.
IF YOU: ever find yourself in this situation, DEFINITELY DO NOT:
1. Try to pop the trunk lock with a paper clip from your purse.
2. Bounce on the trunk with your butt trying to spring it open.
3. Try to fold back the convertible canopy, which is also locked.
4. Stick your arm deep through the open vent window to reach that lever you think will open the canopy.
A Not So Lonely Planet Page 24