by Anna Chillon
Dad confessed that this weekend had been the first experiment; for the following trips they would have to stay in Tuscany several nights, starting already from the following one, from next Friday. Vincent can’t have been very happy, but he pretended that it wasn’t a problem for him, even though he already had his own troubles to think about.
That week, during the evening when he came to visit us as usual, I waited till Mum was sitting in front of the TV and pretended to go up to my room, but instead I put my ear to the office door. I was still worried he might tell Dad something about my escapade.
His voice, muffled by the door, sounded irritated. “Can you believe it? That asshole ransacked my studio; like it was my fault his girlfriend’s a whore!”
“He just needed to let off steam with someone, you'll see that he’ll get over it soon enough and leave you alone.” Aron tried to placate him.
“I hope you're right, for fuck’s sake. He said he wants to send inland revenue! You know I don’t want them nosing around my office.”
“Because you're a fool. I love you, but you’re still an idiot. If you’d listened to me you wouldn’t have these problems. Seascapes I told you... what the hell’s wrong with seascapes?” I heard the rip of a page being torn. I could imagine Dad playing with the brass letter opener made shiny through use. Sometimes he filled the bin with pieces of newspaper of all shapes until there was nothing left to tear off: it sounded as if this would be one of those evenings.
“Seascapes don’t make any money. That’s what's wrong with them.” Vincent's heavy steps approached the door. “I need another beer.”
I threw myself up the stairs, taking two steps at a time. At the top I stopped to watch him open the door vehemently and head towards the kitchen. I thought he hadn’t seen me, but he stopped and turned around, throwing his eyes up the stairs to me, still motionless.
“Go to bed, Giada.”
Perhaps he thought he’d become my second father, only I wasn’t his daughter and I was no longer a child. Apparently I wasn’t even his biggest problem.
I put the iPod's headphones in my ears, hanging from my tracksuit pocket and tapping them with my forefinger I shook my head. “I'm sorry, I can’t hear you!” I turned my back to him and shut myself in my room.
The next day, Zoe told me that she’d accepted Tim's invitation to go out with him.
“You said he wasn’t good looking enough,” I objected as we went to class.
“I know, but then I saw him by chance after class, and he gave me a lift home. Do you know what car he’s got?”
“No.”
She stopped walking before reaching our classroom. She looked dreamy. “A new BMW, metallic blue with leather interior.”
I whistled. “I didn’t think grass was such a good business.”
“It was a gift from his father because probably next year Tim will play in the premier league. He could be a footballer, isn’t that cool?”
I gave her a good look even though I knew her so well that I didn’t need to; her brown curls cascaded softly across her shoulders, she always had her nails painted two colours and filled a size 14 like the cream in a profiterole. Given her constitution, she would probably put on weight over the years if she wasn’t careful, but for the moment she was really cute.
“So you've changed your mind because you want to be with a footballer? Zoe, you're a chick with a brain, you can have all the nice guys you want... oh my God, I sound just like my mother.” I shoved her shoulder. “Why are you making me say things like that?”
ignoring my joke, she lowered her gaze to the ground. “He could go away and I would never get the opportunity to know him better. And he’s not so bad, at times he's almost cute.”
“Maybe he doesn’t have a beautiful face, but he has a pretty good body,” I admitted.
“His ass is amazing, not pretty good. But it’s the way he smiles and jokes around that gets me.”
“Aha, then it's serious. I think you have to go out with him, at least to see whether you really like him or not.”
She seemed to really care about Tim and that seemed like a good reason to give him a chance while she still had the opportunity. I myself would have left after the summer, I would never see Simon and many other people that I was used to having in my life. At that moment I decided that there was no way I would move to Tuscany as a virgin. I wanted my first time to be in Rome, the eternal city with something eternally mine to remember. When it happened, I would buy something beautiful and expensive in Rome, and I’d attach the card to my bulletin board and only I would know what it meant.
Simon called me the same day. Despite everything, he was still interested, maybe even more than before. This time my parents would leave a day earlier, so we hatched a very simple plan: Friday night I would behave like a good girl so as not to arouse Vincent's suspicions. Saturday Zoe would come and pretend to spend the evening with me and, straight after the first check, Tim would come to pick her up for their first date. Simon would join me immediately afterwards.
It could work.
But the question was; did I really want it to?
***
Friday, home alone again, I woke up with the fear that I might be about to ruin something that I couldn’t ever get back. I wanted my first time to be with someone special: Simon was, wasn’t he? He was the best looking and nicest guy I knew. There was no reason or time to change my mind.
I had two exams at school; it was a busy morning. When I got home I just wanted to relax and de-stress. As soon as I got in I threw my bag on the floor. My first reaction was to pick it up and put it away, but a streak of rebellion told me it was OK where it was, upside down in the middle of the room. Nobody was there to complain.
I untied the jacket from around my waist and simply let it fall at my feet. I stepped over it and started to take off my top and threw it aside without even looking to see where it fell. Then it was the T-shirt’s turn, then trousers and everything else; I carried on leaving a trail of clothes up the stairs until finally stripping off my bra and pants, by which time I’d already reached the shower.
I waited for the water to get really hot while I undid my plaits and dived under the water until the steam filled the air like London in February.
“Giada? Are you there?” I thought I heard from downstairs.
“Giada?” Again.
I’d been home less than half an hour and Vincent had already arrived to check up on me.
I stuck my head through the shower curtain. “I’m up here! I’m in the shower with Simon, as soon as he comes I’ll join you!” I shouted.
I thought he knew how to tell when I was joking.
Less than thirty seconds later a blast of cold air reached me as the curtain opened. Vincent had no problem coming into the bathroom, bloody hell, and almost got into the shower he was so furious. “Ahh! what the hell are you doing?” I turned to the side brandishing the shower gel, as if an insignificant bottle would protect my nudity. How stupid.
“You’re alone”
We looked into each other’s eyes, both dumbfounded until I looked away and put my arm across my breasts. “Do you think that if there was a guy in here I’d tell you?” The water carried on hot and steamy, but the real heat was in my cheeks. “And these?” He was holding all my clothes including my pants. I wanted to melt away, and he still hadn’t taken his eyes off me and didn’t look as if he had the intention of doing so.
“Would you mind turning around?” I replied angrily raising my eyebrows.
That was the moment that he dared to give me a good look over. “You haven’t got anything that I haven’t seen anywhere else kid.”
He shouldn’t have said that. He knew that I hated that word, and he’s used it on purpose. In those circumstances it seemed even more offensive.
“Even though you treat me like a baby I’m not a little kid!” I turned the shower head so it sprayed him. He reacted suddenly, very differently from the grumbling escape that I’d imag
ined. He dropped my clothes on the floor and moved forward to turn the shower head round, took hold of my neck and pushed me under the water, then turned the handle. An ice cold jet took my breath away. “Shit!” I opened my mouth reeling against the wall. “You win! You win!” I shouted clamoring in his grip.
The jet stopped, but he still hadn’t let go of my neck.
Covered in goose bumps, shoulders hunched and teeth chattering I lifted the hair out of my face, saw that he was tensing his jaw, with a conflicted expression on his face. The shower gel slipped out of my hands and fell, hurting my foot. The contents went slipping down the drain together with my desire to joke around.
Frightened by his severe glare, I waited till he calmed down meekly sticking to the tiles that he was pressing me against. An episode of many years earlier came to mind for no apparent reason.
I was young and it was summer. My Dad had bought a blow up paddling pool to put in the garden and I’d been banned from going near it without Mum.
It wasn’t like me to stay away: within less than two days I’d already slipped in head first. The water straight away filled my throat, I can still remember the burning in my lungs and the panic. Then I felt a hand pluck me out, by my neck and arm, and I was lifted up.
Vincent had saved me. Soaking wet I had snuggled into his arms coughing and crying.
In that moment too, in the shower I would’ve liked him to hold me and let me cry. But I resisted the urge because I needed to show him that I wasn’t a little girl that breaks into tears at a prank. A prank that had sent shivers all over my body, inside and out, due to the cold and the embarrassment of having his eyes on me.
“Vincent...” I muttered in plea.
As if awakening from a day dream he let me go.
“I’ll wait for you downstairs.” He stepped back, took a towel and left.
I slid down the tiles, kneeling in the shower tray I waited for my legs to stop shaking, thinking that it was stupid to be so affected by it. I dried two tears that had escaped.
Twenty minutes later I joined him in the lounge with very little will to confront him again. The discomfort was clearly only mine; Vincent was eating crisps and sitting on the sink that was set into the worktop.
“About time. How long does it take you to dry your hair?” He’d got his normal sarcastic tone back, as if nothing had ever happened. He didn’t look at me strangely, or have written on his forehead ‘I’ve seen you naked, hide.’
“I’ve got a photographic job for the opening of a beauty salon in twenty minutes, I’m late and thanks to you I’m soaked.”
His white shirt had become semi transparent and his normally spiky hair up was flattened by the water. I warily moved closer to him and dove my hand into the packet of crisps. “That’s why you’re so cross. Sorry, I didn’t know, otherwise I wouldn’t have got you wet.” I wasn’t a hundred percent sure.
He jumped down from the worktop. “Luckily you’ve never seen me cross. But you definitely deserve a punishment, something like a weekend grounded in the house. We know though how dangerous that could be in your case, so tell me where you want me to take you and your friend tomorrow, then I’ll go.” He left the crisp packet in my hands and closing his eyes a little and looking at me from beneath his eye lashes, sucked a finger.
I liked how he did it.
That thought worried me, almost electrified me, I wanted Vincent’s mouth on my fingers. The absurdity of the circumstance bought me to imagine that maybe if I’d have asked him, he would’ve taken my fingers into his mouth in an even more pornographic way.
Oh my god, there was something terribly wrong with me. That was an immoral thought, in conflict with everything we were to each other, practically two relatives a generation apart. It was one of those bad fantasies that you have about unthinkable people, like a teacher, the doctor or even the vicar.
“So? What have you got in mind?” He asked unaware of my thoughts, he turned to wash his hands.
I concentrated on the packet. “I don’t want to go out this evening or tomorrow. Zoe’s going out with a friend, because she’s allowed.”
Don’t worry, you can come and check up on me as many times as you like, I won’t go anywhere and thanks to you no boys want to come anywhere near my house. Are you happy? You’re making me into a frustrated eighteen year old.” He turned to face the door looking at the clock. “I found the front door open earlier. Lock yourself in when you’re alone in the house and behave yourself, otherwise...” He mimed the crack of a whip with his wrist.” And with that he left.
He seemed a bit drunk.
I sat on the sink which was still warm, looked at my hand and put my finger in my mouth, wrapping my tongue around it, licking off the salt.
And I bit it hard.
***
At seven that evening Vincent came back.
He was dressed in a dark suit again, grey this time, ready to go out carrying a box that he put in the kitchen.
“Moving house?” I asked from the sofa in the lounge, where I was reading a young adult novel, after showering for the second time that day. Hot-cold, cold-hot, moving under the jet, it was more of a torment than a shower.
“Do you want to eat frozen pizza and chips every weekend for two months?”
“I know how to cook pasta for your information.”
“But you don’t.” He took out king prawns, a jar of tomatoes, parsley and other supplies.
The sight of the fresh bread drew me towards the kitchen. I wondered how he was going to cook dressed like that and who he’d dressed up for. “Haven’t you got a dinner?”
“Just after dinner drinks, so before I go you’re going to taste one of my best recipes, trofie pasta with king prawns.”
I watched him hang his jacket on the chair and roll up his sleeves. He was going to cook for me, I felt so touched.
“Why?” I asked.
“What’s the point of eating alone five hundred meters apart?” Anyway then you can flatter me about how good I am.”
He didn’t have to prepare me dinner or spend time with me; I almost felt guilty as if I was cheating on Simon.
A fish dinner cooked by an elegantly dressed man required a suitable attire. I ran upstairs and changed into a vintage skirt, not too short, and a top with buttons up the back and a boat collar that fell on my shoulder blades. I brushed my hair with my head upside down to give it volume and went back down, greeted by a delicious smell.
He, with a towel over one shoulder looked at me; I didn’t realize a man in the kitchen could look so sexy. I was having inappropriate thoughts again. The situation was very strange, surreal, as if I had found myself acting a role in a film that didn’t belong to me. Probably Vincent realized; after giving me a good look from head to toe, he pulled the towel off his shoulder squeezing it in his hands while he spun around.
In silence, I laid the table in the lounge with the special crockery. Before I put the plates on the table, Vincent opened a Budweiser for me and a Tennent’s for himself.
We crossed the bottle necks toasting “to freedom.”
For the first time, since the year before when I plunged into the sea from a six meter height, I felt free again. In that precise moment of my life I didn’t want to be anywhere else and I felt the same excitement that I felt diving into the void.
I tasted the meal that was placed under my nose. “Shit! It’s delicious!”
A proud smile emerged from his lips. “So don’t say ‘shit’ it doesn’t give the impression of being good!”
“No really, you’d be a good catch.” He didn’t take the bait so I elaborated. “How come you’ve never married?”
“I’ve been committed to other things.”
“Don’t you want kids?”
He cleaned his mouth with the napkin, refolded it and placed it on his knee. “Do you mean one of those nosy parkers that listens behind doors while you’re trying to talk to a friend?”
Instead of answering my question he attacked me. He
was an expert at avoiding questions and I fell for it; I had very little chance of being taken seriously or at least of holding a normal conversation with him. “I didn’t eavesdrop your conversation.”
“Don’t you know, the guilty party is always the first to deny the evidence.”
“OK, I heard some of it, but only because I was worried you were going to tell Dad about Simon.”
“I told you I wouldn’t have done.”
“Yes, and thanks for keeping your word. I didn’t want to listen to more than I needed to but...”
“But?”
“I heard that you’ve got problems at the studio? I didn’t understand much: what’s happened?”
He shrugged. “Nothing of interest to you.”
“What do you mean nothing? You seemed really worried.”
He threw his napkin on the table in annoyance. “I was hoping to enjoy dinner in peace, so thanks for reminding me that I could lose the studio. Thanks very much Giada.” He got up turning his back to me and put his hands on his hips.
“Sorry” I whispered, mortified. I put the fork down looking at the food with sadness. “Today it seems I can’t anything right.”
I didn’t want to ruin the evening, I didn’t realize it was such a serious problem. Pretend I didn’t ask you anything, please.”
I saw his shoulders shaking. If he was crying I swear I would’ve pierced my tongue with a kebab skewer; I’d never seen him so beaten down to give into tears and just the thought of it sent me into a panic.
Then I heard him laughing.
He was entertaining himself taking the piss out of me! And there I was, ready to pierce my tongue so that he’d forgive me.
He moved the chair back making the legs screech across the floor. “Oh but what... what a bastard!” I used a familiarity with him that I never would have used with another man his age.
“Don’t ever call me that again young lady!” He sat down putting the napkin back on his lap. “You were asking for it: You’re so naive and your injured puppy tone is so pleasing. Moreover, it’s right that you should be sorry.