Love Is Strange (A Paranormal Romance)

by Bruce Sterling

  “You’re not ambitious? You don’t have big career plans? Someone as attractive and bright as you? Someone with your many unusual talents?”

  “No.”

  “You can foretell the future, Farfalla. You don’t... what? Bet on racehorses?”

  “That never works. I feel the future. Sometimes, I smell it and I can even taste it. Sometimes, pieces of it rise up inside me, like ugly monsters, and grab me. I can know the future, but not all of it. Nobody knows all of the present. Nobody ever knew all of the past. We forget the past. We forget the most important things in the past. They are gone, they are ghosts now.”

  “All right. Thank you. Thank you for telling me that. Thank you for being so honest with me. I needed to know that. It’s the same with me, too... but in a different way. I’m in business, you know. It’s amazing how much of business is just fantasy! The business world is never ‘real.’ It’s all folktales and myths. ‘The invisible hand of the market.’ That is a ghost story. Straight out, that’s a ghost story.”

  “You don’t want to make a million dollars?”

  “I made twenty million dollars. It all went away, like the dew in the morning.”

  “You’re rich. You are from a rich family. You are happier than me. You are fortunate.”

  “Oh, people always say that about us rich guys... All that ‘rich’ means is that you are responsible for something. I know the very richest guy in the world. The very richest guy, ever, in all of human history. I’ve met his wife and his kids. I’ve been to his house parties. You know what he talks about? He talks about malaria.”

  “Malaria?”

  “Yeah. That’s one of your nice Italian words, ‘malaria.’ People die from that.” Gavin looked at her. “Rich people are mortal. We have a time to be born, and we have a time to die. I know some idiots who have a pretty good time, being rich. Those clowns are making sure that their grandkids will be poor.”

  “You don’t want your grandkids to be poor.”

  “I am a grandkid of rich people. My grandkids don’t even exist. And I work for them every day. I know a lot about their future. You want to hear all about it? What I know about my grandkid’s world? You, you, I can tell all this to, right?”

  Gavin’s eyes were narrowing and his face was growing red. “My country is an empire in decline. You’ve been over there, so I’m sure you know that. A tiny minority owns most of everything in America now, and we rich Americans are driving everyone else into poverty. We are wrecking our heritage, destroying our soil, air, and water, cheating each other, and ourselves... I’m a visionary. I live in a ruined castle. The plumbing broke in my castle. My castle stinks every day.”

  Gavin’s phone rang. He yanked it from his pocket and glared at the cracked screen. “That is my dad calling me,” he said. He set the Blackberry on the tabletop, as if it were a live spider. “That waiter’s sure taking his precious time with our drinks! You know where the bathroom is?”

  “There must be a bathroom inside the café,” Farfalla offered. Gavin stood up and stalked off.

  A bored waiter arrived with a bottle and two dusty glasses. He ceremoniously topped them up, not bothering to meet her eyes. Then, he vanished.

  Farfalla stared at her dusty, sparkling goblet. She had never felt sadder in her life.

  Gavin’s phone rang yet again, buzzing angrily on the cafe tabletop. It rang insistently, again, again, tearing at her nerves. Global people always had to answer phones. Farfalla picked up the phone.

  “It’s me,” said Eliza. There was a tremendous party racket in the background. “How are you doing?”

  “Molto bene,” Farfalla growled.

  “You’re speaking Italian, Gavin! You sound pretty happy!”

  “Così così,” said Farfalla.

  “Farfalla is with you, that’s why you sound so happy.”

  Farfalla said nothing. Her heart bled a little with every beat.

  “Gavin, everyone here is asking about you. I’m telling them you’re at this party. I just tell them that you are lost in this crowd. They believe me. There’s a huge mob packed in here. All these party moochers are like a zoo.”

  Farfalla continued to say nothing.

  “Gavin, don’t worry. Please. Just be happy, I have you covered. I knew you would be with her,” said Eliza. “I won’t tell anybody! Never, I promise! If Madeleine asks me, I’ll lie.”

  Farfalla set the phone on the table.

  Gavin returned. He had splashed water on his face, combed his hair, and recovered his composure. He plucked up his prosecco glass. “Well,” he said, “the night is young!”

  Farfalla began to weep.

  “Oh, for heaven’s sake, what on earth can it be now?” he demanded. “Come on! A broken heel is not a broken heart!”

  “I can’t believe I’m so miserable,” she sniffled. “I can’t believe I’m so scared.”

  Gavin twirled the wineglass. His face was clouded. “What future prospect seems to trouble the pretty signorina?”

  “Why are we are so stupid? We should have gone to that party! We should be drunk now! Take me to your hotel room! Do anything you want to me, I don’t even care! We should steal our one sweet little night, then run away from each other! What is wrong with that? A million people do that!”

  “Oh, I agree with you,” he said. “That can be beautiful. But only while it lasts.”

  She looked into his face. It was like looking at a wall of bricks.

  “I knew,” he said, “that your pretty scenario wasn’t going to happen for the two of us.”

  “You knew?”

  “Oh, yes. I knew it as soon as you said that we were climbing up this mountain. And look, here we are. It’s just like you said. We’re on a mountaintop. Amazing horizons all around us. This is the top of the world. It’s just like you promised me. This is where we belong. Because we’re visionaries.”

  “I meant my promise to you. I want you to be happy. I’ll do anything for you.”

  “You foretold that I could ‘have whatever I wanted from you.’ Now, your words are coming true.”

  “Why are you doing this to us?”

  “’Whatever I want’ is the truth. I want the truth. I want some moral sincerity, some integrity, and some free will. That is ‘whatever I want.’ I want it so badly. Because I don’t have any. Maybe you can give me some of that... Because of who you are, you’re a seer, a prophetess... You’re a goddess.”

  “I’m not a goddess.”

  “All right, you’re as human as I am, but you’re like a woman touched by a goddess. You’re like the favorite of a goddess, blessed by a goddess. You’re radiant with divine grace, you’re like a beautiful, supernatural priestess.”

  Farfalla knitted her brows. “Why do men always talk that kind of rubbish to women? We never ask for that! I’m not your ‘goddess,’ I’m not even your girlfriend, you haven’t even kissed me... This is terrible.”

  “Well, yeah. You’re right again. We don’t have a lot of options here. You and I are in a lot of trouble.”

  “You’re angry with me.”

  “I’m angry with this situation. Look, I could marry you. I adore you. I don’t think I even lived until I met you. And don’t look at me with scared eyes when I say a thing like that! I am serious about you — I am completely, deadly serious about you. No one else in my life has ever made me feel this way. Just think about what that implies! For the future, of course.”

  “Would you really marry me?”

  “If we were free to do it? If we could make it work out? Of course! I would marry you in a heartbeat! We would have six kids!”

  “People in Capri get married. People have weddings in Capri.”

  “We wouldn’t get married here in Capri, for heaven’s sake! We would get married back at home in Seattle. In a Swedish Methodist ceremony, like my parents, and my grandparents. That’s how we Tremaines do these things.”

  Farfalla loosened her aching foot in her damaged shoe. She should have known
to expect the unexpected when it came to the One. Somehow, just “giving up and doing whatever he wanted” wasn’t even the easy way out. Even abject erotic surrender couldn’t help her.

  Should she play ‘hard-to-get’ with him? But, she was hard-to-get. There was supposed to be only One in the world who could touch her heart. Here he was, what was wrong with him? “I’m not a ‘Tremaine.’”

  “Well, that’s why I would marry you. You would be ‘Farfalla Tremaine.’” The prospect of this made Gavin grin. “That sounds so fantastic! Your new name has some kinda rhythm, doesn’t it? Far-FALL-a Tre-MAINE. It sounds like a good old-fashioned bossa nova.”

  “But I don’t like Seattle! The sun never comes out there. It’s cold there, and everything smells like fish...”

  “You’re still telling me the truth. That’s great. Let’s just lay all our future factors here, all right? Because I have been thinking hard about us. It’s hard to do, it hurts our feelings... so, let’s pretend that we have a marriage counselor. Someone to give us good advice about our future. He starts telling us what you and I have at stake here.”

  Gavin drew a deep breath. His eyes grew distant with calculation. “We’re not from the same country. We’re not of the same ethnicity. We don’t have the same religion. We’re from different economic classes. We surely don’t have the same temperament. I have a steady girlfriend now, and you have a boyfriend, too. Where would we live? I’m completely attached to Seattle. I’m not going to run off with you to Italy — my family would be ruined if I left Seattle! How would we make a go of our future life? I give us credit for being two good people. We need to find the right thing to do.”

  “The love songs say that love will find a way.”

  “Our love needs to find a whole global map. Not for one weekend in Capri, but until we die. Imagine, it was not you and me here, okay? Imagine, it was some Italian guy and some American tourist girl. Imagine that situation! What would you tell them to do?”

  “You want me to play make-believe with you now, here on the top of the world, just like that?”

  “This is not make-believe. We call this ‘scenario work.’ I’m serious.”

  “Oh, well, perfect. I love to play make-believe. You’re the American girl, and I’m like me, but I’m an Italian man? Oh! Perfect! I know what would happen. I would ask if you had any condoms.”

  “And I would say that I didn’t. American girls have common sense.”

  Farfalla closed her eyes and opened them again. She really couldn’t get any more brazen than the amazing thing she had just said to him. She could feel a hot blush welling up.

  This was so pathetic. She had never been some kind of party girl who jumped into bed with men. She had no idea how to be such a person. She led a life that was modest, bitter, guarded, and threatened. She looked into his face. “You are so angry with me.”

  “No, no, no! That’s not called ‘being angry,’ that’s called ‘being realistic!’ Weren’t you listening to any of those important things I just said to you? That was a long list of serious relationship problems! Are we joking about our future? It’s our future, it’s not a joke! Marriage is a lifelong commitment! Marriage is a holy sacrament!”

  “Gavin... What is a ‘Swedish Methodist?’”

  “TheTremaines have always been Swedish Methodists! That’s our family tradition. I’m theologically ecumenical... but yes, I do go to Covenant services. I find that it helps me. My faith helps me within my church community, and within my private life as well. Sometimes, I pray for guidance.”

  “My parents are Communists.”

  “You’re kidding me.”

  “Don’t worry, don’t worry! I hate the Communists. I’m an Italian Futurista. So, I always vote for the Neo-Fascists.”

  Gavin gazed at the darkening, star-studded sky. He sipped from his wineglass. Then, he sighed. “This must be happening to us for some good reason. Somehow, we were fated to meet here on this island. There is some vital, valuable lesson for us here... We are two young people. We have our whole futures ahead of us... Well, sometimes, wonderful things pass between a man and woman, beautiful things... that they have to renounce.”

  “’Renounce’?” she said at last. “What does that mean?”

  “It means that suffering can bring spiritual growth to people. When I was a kid, they taught me the Convenant Prayer. I learned that prayer by heart. Listen to what this prayer says. It speaks to people who suffer, like us.”

  Gavin drew a deep breath. ‘Put me to what you will, rank me with whom you will; put me to doing, put me to suffering; let me be employed for you or laid aside for you, exalted for you or brought low for you; let me be full, let me be empty, let me have all things, let me have nothing; I freely and wholeheartedly yield all things to your pleasure and disposal.’

  Farfalla wiped at her eyes. “Oh! What beautiful wedding vows! I didn’t know they were so lovely.”

  “You’re not supposed to say that to your girlfriend! You’re supposed to say that to God!”

  “Oh! I’m sorry.”

  A long silence passed between them. Swallows winged their way over the mountaintop.

  “Look,” he said, at last, “don’t feel bad. I’m not offended. I mean, it’s sacred to me, but how were you to know that? Actually, when you said that to me? That was funny. I mean, that was totally funny. I just read a book by Mark Twain that was full of blasphemous stuff like that. I respect Mark Twain. Mark Twain was the funniest depressive guy in America.”

  “You’re not mad at me anymore?”

  “Honey, how could I be mad at you? I was never mad. You’re too pretty for me to stay mad. That look on your sweet face just slays me. I could die from how pretty you are. Look, we’re just two foreigners. Okay? It’s natural that some things between us are confusing. Now, if you can’t understand what I say to you, right away, don’t think that I must be mad at you, it’s just… It’s just very important, that’s all! We can’t just kiss and part! That is wrong! It’s decadent and cruel! It’s unworthy of two people like us — insightful people, forward-thinking people. We shouldn’t do bad, deceitful things that can hurt us, and hurt the people around us.”

  Farfalla silently poured herself more prosecco.

  “Even if,” Gavin said heavily, “even if we are both pretty sure that we could get away with it. And that it would be super-hot.”

  “It’s like Roman Holiday, with Audrey Hepburn,” Farfalla said. “You talk just like that old movie.”

  “Yeah, I know that movie, Roman Holiday. Italians love that movie. That movie’s got their cultural values.”

  “I saw that movie. The man loves the woman. He can’t have the woman. She is a beautiful princess with a beautiful haircut. He’s a dirty American reporter, who doesn’t even have a kitchen in his apartment.”

  “Well, maybe I wouldn’t have framed it quite that way, but...” Gavin slowly spread his hands. What nice, strong hands he had. She was dying over his hands. “If you examine that film as a Futurist scenario, well, they were making an intelligent decision. Because that movie is called ‘Roman Holiday.’ It’s not called ‘Reporter Elopes With a Princess.’”

  “Princess Elopes with a Reporter.”

  “That was your Italian chick-flick version. That film was scripted by an American guy. Dalton Trumbo. He was a McCarthy-era American Communist. It should have been called ‘Communist Subversive Makes Audrey Hepburn a Star.’”

  “All right,” said Farfalla, shoving her wine-glass aside. “You always know so much more than me! I loved that sweet romantic movie, it’s my favorite American movie. I will hate it forever now, but it was my favorite. I give up. You win! Just tell me that you love me. Tell me that you are my One, my one true love. So that I can believe it until I die. No matter where I go. No matter that my poor life is full of sad royal duties and ugly 50’s hats. Just say it to me and I will go away, forever, like in your stupid Communist movie. Then, you can go back to your Madeleine.”

  “I am
going back to my Madeleine. I have a flight out from Naples, and I’m leaving Capri at 7 a.m. tomorrow. That part is totally settled.”

  “I am going back home, too. I won’t be lonely without you. I’m going back to my Pancrazio.”

  “Your boyfriend’s name is ‘Pancrazio’? That’s an unusual name.”

  “He’s an unusual man.”

  “’Pancrazio’... Wait a second. Your boyfriend isn’t ‘Pancho Pola,’ is he? ‘Dr. Pancrazio Pola,’ the guy who runs that awesome chip lab in Ivrea?”

  “You know him?”

  “Of course, I know Pancho Pola! He’s world-famous! He’s one of my business partners. You are Pancho Pola’s girlfriend? Good God, no wonder you know so much about electronics.”

  “Pancrazio always works very hard.”

  “How come you never show up when I’m taking Pancho out to all those posh dinners in Milan? Pancho never said one word to me about you! If I knew, if I even thought that you were Pancho Pola’s girlfriend... Oh, my God, really. I would never. There is just no way.”

  She said nothing.

  “I really don’t know what else to say here! We’re not sitting on the top of some mountain. We’re right on the lip of an Italian volcano!”

  Farfalla retrieved her prosecco glass and took a measured sip.

  “Your boyfriend is a genius! Did you know that? He’s a world-famous inventor! That guy is probably the most gifted circuit-designer in Europe. He is the hardware-head of all hardware-heads! Pancho is an ultimate, stone geek!”

  Farfalla said nothing.

  “And you really live with him? You must have the patience of a saint.”

  “Don’t say any more,” Farfalla muttered. “I am getting angry.”

  “Look, I am not angry, all right? Every time you said I was angry, I was not angry. I know that Pancho has his geeky quirks, but... that guy is a personal friend of mine. I’ve known him for years. It’s just that... wow.”