Italian for Beginners Read online

  The walk back to his apartment was short; we had taken a roundabout, scenic way to get to the restaurant. Francesco fumbled urgently with the lock to his door, then we fell inside together. Before he had even closed the door, he was all over me, kissing me passionately, pulling me close to his taut body.

  The next few minutes were a blur of murmured words of passion, shoes being kicked off and landing with loud thuds on the tile, items of clothing flying almost cartoonishly into every corner of the room as we undressed each other frantically. I think we both felt an urgency to the moment, a feeling of being given a second chance, a fear that if we didn’t take hold of it quickly, it would slip away.

  We didn’t even bother climbing up the ladder into the loft. I’m not sure we could have made it. Instead, Francesco pushed me backward onto the couch, landing gently on top of me without separating his lips from mine.

  “I want you,” he murmured in my ear, as if I couldn’t tell already.

  “I want you, too,” I murmured back between kisses, feeling the power behind the words, still hardly believing that I was here. Naked. In Rome. With him.

  And then, just like that, he was inside me. I gasped, taking him in, adjusting my body. My head was spinning, and I wasn’t sure whether it was from the chianti or from being with Francesco again. But it didn’t matter. It was amazing. For the first time in years, I felt loved by a man again. I closed my eyes, pulled him closer, and let myself slide into the moment as he whispered Italian endearments in my ear.

  Afterward, as we lay sweaty and panting on the couch, Francesco traced a finger slowly down my face and tilted my chin toward him. “That was good,” he said. “Very good.”

  I laughed. Talk about the understatement of the year. “Yeah,” I agreed. “It was.”

  We lay there for a while, catching our breath. His left arm was still around me, and I felt safe and protected as he pulled me closer. I closed my eyes and tried to imprint the moment on my mind. I never wanted to forget the way his body felt against mine, the way our breath rose and fell together, the way he was gently stroking my hair, almost absentmindedly, the fact that we didn’t have to speak to be together; we were beyond words.

  A few minutes later, he leaned over and kissed me again, tentatively at first and then more passionately. He pulled me on top of him, and after a moment, he asked in a husky voice, “Shall we go upstairs?”

  “Yeah,” I whispered. He scooped me off the couch, like a prince carrying his princess, and deposited me at the foot of the ladder to the loft. I climbed up quickly, momentarily feeling self-conscious that he was behind me, getting a full view of my cellulite-ridden thighs. But he didn’t seem to care. Seconds later, he was on top of me again, in his bed, kissing me everywhere.

  I woke the next morning feeling strangely disconcerted. In fact, it took me a second to register exactly where I was. It all came back in a flood of moments, though.

  Francesco touching me.

  Francesco’s lips on mine.

  Francesco ripping my clothes off like he couldn’t wait to be with me.

  Francesco holding me as we fell asleep.

  I turned my head and smiled. His familiar form was beside me. He was deeply asleep, curled away from me on his side. I watched his smooth, tanned back rise and fall for a moment, his muscles stretched taut. I shook my head in astonishment. How could everything feel so perfect? It was like the past thirteen years had never happened. I was twenty-one again, waking up in bed next to the man I was madly in love with.

  As I lay there watching Francesco sleep, I thought it just might be possible to get back to that place, to love him with the same intensity I once had, to let go of common sense and fall recklessly in love. If we were still so connected after so much time, it seemed almost as if we were meant to be together.

  For no reason at all, an uninvited image of Michael Evangelisti popped into my head. I scrunched my eyes tightly closed and banished it. What was wrong with me? I was with a man who loved me for me—and, more important, who was single. Why was the married restaurant owner even a sliver of a thought in my mind?

  I swung my legs over the side of the bed and climbed down from the loft. After pouring myself a glass of water in the tiny kitchen, I found an extra towel on a shelf in the bathroom and turned on the shower.

  As I lathered up with the olive oil soap Francesco kept there—the same kind of soap he’d been using the last time I saw him, which meant that the scent propelled me back in time—I looked down at myself and frowned.

  With the morning light pouring in from the window above the shower stall, my body’s imperfections were all illuminated, as if a spotlight were shining down, pointing out all the things that were wrong.

  My own shower at home in New York was dimly lit, which was exactly how I liked it, because here in the bright light of day, I could see every flaw. Too much fat around the waist. Breasts that weren’t quite big enough. Arms that were starting to get jiggly. Dimpling in my thighs.

  God, when did I get so old? I wondered what Francesco had thought of me last night. The body I lived in now was different from the one I’d inhabited when he’d seen me last. Could he possibly still love this older, aged version of the girl I used to be?

  Of course he can love you, I chided myself. Don’t be silly.

  After all, hadn’t last night—and the ease with which we fell so comfortably together once again—proven that? Hadn’t he looked at me with that intoxicating mix of love and lust in his eyes?

  I looked down at my imperfect body once more and didn’t hate it quite as much as I had a moment ago. It was me, and if Francesco was capable of seeing past the imperfections, then I was, too.

  I finished my shower, toweled off, and washed my face at the sink. Feeling suddenly self-conscious and wanting to look my best for Francesco when he woke up, I dipped into my makeup bag and quickly applied my usual concealer, tinted moisturizer, gel blush, and mascara, until I looked halfway human. I smiled at myself in the mirror and, with the towel still wrapped around me, opened the bathroom door.

  Francesco was already up, sitting in the center of the couch, holding an espresso cup in his hand. He looked devilishly sexy with his dark hair mussed from sleep, his white T-shirt stretched tight against his contours, his dark gray boxer briefs gaping slightly, ever so enticingly. I smiled at him. I almost wanted to throw myself at him again, but first, I needed some caffeine. I still felt like I was moving in slow motion.

  I could smell the coffee and wondered if he’d made me a cup, too. There were few things I liked more than strong Italian espresso, and Francesco always brewed it perfectly.

  “Good morning,” I said. “Last night was wonderful.”

  I said it in my best sexy purr, but to be honest, I thought I sounded kind of silly. Oh, well, I supposed there was no need for further seduction, right? Francesco was obviously interested.

  He gave me a half smile. “Good morning.” He gestured to the empty space next to him on the couch. “Can you sit down? I need to talk to you.”

  For the first time, I noticed that he didn’t look quite right. A strange feeling washed over me, and the smile fell from my face. “Okay,” I said tentatively.

  I crossed the room and sat down on the couch next to him. In the small white cotton towel around me, suddenly I felt overexposed. My pasty skin looked even whiter against the pale towel, and the couch didn’t do me any favors by splaying my thighs wide against the worn leather.

  Francesco opened his mouth and then closed it again. He looked nervous. My stomach swam uneasily.

  “We have a problem,” Francesco began slowly. He wasn’t looking at me; he was looking away from me, as if meeting my eyes was too hard.

  “A problem?”

  “Sì.” He still wasn’t meeting my eyes. “I seem to have made a mistake.”

  “A mistake?” I stared at him, my heart pounding.

  Francesco nodded, met my eyes briefly, and looked away again. “I, well, it seems I mixed up your e-ma
il address with someone else’s.”

  I stared at him. A lump formed in the pit of my stomach as he went on.

  “This is awkward,” he said. “But the truth is, I thought when I got your e-mail that it was from an American girl named Caty that I met two months ago in Roma. Your e-mail addresses are very similar, you see, and since I hadn’t seen you in years, I thought it was her writing to me. She’s a junior at UCLA. Very smart girl, you know.”

  I gaped at him. “A college junior?” was all I could muster. I wanted to ask him if maybe at the age of forty-two, he wasn’t a little too old for a college kid. For goodness’ sake, he could be her dad! But that didn’t seem to be the most pressing issue at the moment.

  “Well, yes,” Francesco said a bit defensively. His face lit up. “But she seems very mature. Very passionate. And love shouldn’t be restrained by age, no?”

  I threw up a little bit in my mouth. “Love?” I managed to choke out.

  “Anyhow,” Francesco continued, glancing at me nervously. “I am sorry. I know this is, ah, a very awkward thing to say. But it was not you who I intended to share my bed. And, well, you are not quite the woman you were when I met you, I think you’d agree.”

  He raised an eye meaningfully and glanced down at my body, my dimpled thighs, my wobbly arms, my general lumpiness.

  Suddenly, I was humiliated and furious all at once. I felt like he had slapped me across the face, hard, snapping me instantly out of the dreamlike state I’d been in since arriving in Rome.

  “Wait a minute,” I said, feeling my temper flare. “You’re telling me that I’m the wrong girl and you screwed up and oh, wait, I’m not pretty enough or young enough for you, but you still figured you’d sleep with me last night before telling me?”

  Francesco didn’t look nearly as embarrassed as he should have. “Well, ah, yes,” he said. “But do not worry. It was my mistake. Entirely. So you may stay here, if you wish, until you are able to book a flight home. I will sleep on the couch. I am a gentleman, Cat. You know that.”

  I stared at him. I wasn’t sure whether to die of shame right on the spot or whether to punch him.

  Instead, I stood up, clutching my towel protectively around me, and walked quickly to the bathroom. I grabbed my suitcase, dragged it awkwardly inside, and slammed the door behind me. I would have locked the door, too, if it hadn’t been one of those stupid, antiquated Italian doors with no lock.

  I couldn’t have felt lower. I was an idiot.

  “I will not cry,” I said firmly to my reflection in the mirror. I blinked quickly, hating myself a little more for being stupid enough to have not seen this situation for what it was, for being foolish enough to believe that there was anything redeeming about this arrogant, shallow man outside the bathroom door.

  Breathing hard, I rooted through my suitcase and grabbed the first two clothing items I could find—a pale pink A-line skirt I had planned to wear on a dinner date with Francesco and a green-and-blue-striped collared shirt. I tugged them on angrily, not even caring that they didn’t match at all. All I wanted, suddenly, was to get out of there as quickly as possible.

  I zipped my suitcase back up, left the wet towel in a heap in the corner, and looked balefully at myself in the mirror. I was a mess. Nonmatching clothes. Sopping wet hair. Red-rimmed eyes. Great.

  Steeling myself, I yanked open the bathroom door and dragged my suitcase out behind me. Just as I’d predicted, Francesco was sitting calmly in the middle of the couch, one leg crossed over the other, holding his tiny cup of espresso in one hand and his folded magazine in the other. I rolled my eyes, and he looked up, almost pleasantly. A hint of amusement crossed his face as he looked me up and down.

  “Nice clothing,” he said with a smirk.

  “Shut up,” I snapped.

  He looked surprised. He furrowed his brow and shrugged. “So. Do you need to call the airline?”

  “I’m fine.” I began dragging my suitcase toward the door, hating how unwieldy it was. Would I have to carry it down all four flights by myself just to maintain my pride? Great, I’d have a strained back and pulled shoulder muscles to keep my wounded ego company.

  Francesco didn’t move from the couch, didn’t offer to get up and help.

  “But where will you go?” he asked casually.

  “None of your business.”

  I dragged the suitcase across the rest of the room.

  “Well!” I huffed as I reached the door. I yanked it open dramatically and shoved my suitcase into the hall, where it promptly tipped over on its side with a dramatic crash. A dog began barking frantically in the apartment next door. “I hope you and your little college student are very happy together,” I added haughtily.

  “Thank you, Cat,” he said calmly. Francesco had never really grasped sarcasm, which was one of the things I didn’t like about him. Funny how I’d managed to forget all the negative things about him. But suddenly, they were all flooding back. He paused and raised his espresso cup in a sort of wave. “What is it they say in your American TV shows?” He paused and tapped the folded magazine against his knee, a far-off look in his eyes as he tried to conjure words. “Ah, yes. It’s not you. It’s me. Is that right? Sì, I think so. It’s not you. It’s me.”

  He smiled pleasantly, as if we had just run into each other on the street instead of rolling around naked in bed all night. Then, to make the slap in the face complete, he winked at me—he actually winked— and went back to reading the magazine in his hand.

  I knew I should walk out then, with my pride intact, but his aura of calm was infuriating. I stood there for a moment, feeling the heat rise to my cheeks and the veins in my neck and forehead bulge. “Go to hell, Francesco,” I finally said in a low, calm voice that sounded a lot more confident than I felt.

  Then, with every shred of my remaining pride, which wasn’t much, I held my head high, sniffed at him, and strode confidently into the hallway, slamming the door decisively behind me.

  While the dog next door barked madly, I hefted my duffel bag and purse over my shoulder and began dragging my giant suitcase down the stairs, step by step, thud by thud, my back aching with the effort. I was on the verge of tears again, but I vowed I wouldn’t cry. No way. Not here. Not because of Francesco. He wasn’t worth my tears.

  It wasn’t until I was out on the street in front of Francesco’s building, my stair-dented suitcase by my side and sweat dripping down my face, that I realized that I had absolutely no idea where to go.

  Chapter Eight

  The smart thing to do would have been to hail a cab, head to the airport, and book the first flight back to New York. After all, I’d just walked away from the only person I knew in Rome.

  But as I stood there on the cobbled street, looking up at the flower boxes on windowsills, the flimsy curtains flapping in the breeze, the domes of ancient buildings rising around us in the distance, I knew I couldn’t go back. Not yet.

  Much as I knew my friends and family back home loved me, I also knew they looked at me as a boring failure. And who could blame them?

  Coming to Rome was finally something different, brave, and out of character for me. I always lived my life on the safe side, and for once, I had stepped out of the box.

  To admit that I’d failed miserably, that once again my life hadn’t worked out, was more than I could take. I couldn’t stand the thought of crawling back to New York with my proverbial tail between my legs, admitting to everyone that my imaginary love affair with Francesco had probably never existed in the first place.

  “So I’ll stay,” I said aloud. A squat, middle-aged woman strolling by with a little dog looked at me in alarm and quickened her pace, no doubt assuming I was a crazy person. Not that I blamed her. “I’ll stay,” I repeated to myself, almost in disbelief.

  I took a deep breath, soaking in the smells around me: baking bread from a nearby bakery; a hint of lavender perfume hanging in the air from the giggling pair of twenty-something girls who had just passed by; the slightly
salty, slightly muddy smell of the Tiber River drifting in from a block away. This was the Rome I remembered. And, I reminded myself, I had loved it here even in the weeks before I met Francesco. He hadn’t been single-handedly responsible for making Rome feel like home to me. It was the city itself, its faint, dusty smells, its rich, flavorful food and wine, its steeping in ancient history, that wrapped its arms around me and made me feel like I belonged.

  “I’ll stay,” I said once more. I swallowed hard, hoisted my duffel back on my shoulder, grabbed the handle of my suitcase, and began dragging.

  The problem was, I had no idea where I was going. It was one thing to decide to stay in Rome, but it was quite another to figure out exactly how to do that. I did the calculations in my head; I didn’t have enough to stay in a hotel for the next thirty days, but a new airline ticket home would cost me a fortune, too. What was I doing?

  I headed away from the river. I doubted my decision more with every step. As the sun rose higher in the hazy Roman sky and the dust began to rise in the air like it always did when the streets began to bake in the heat, it was becoming harder to breathe. I was sweating everywhere now, and my pathetic date skirt and too-heavy polo shirt were sticking to me like glue. I knew without looking at my reflection in one of the shopwindows that my hair was a mess. I usually blow-dried it straight, but left to its own devices, it looked like a pile of burned straw.

  I glanced up and recognized the top of the Pantheon ahead. Its perfectly rounded concrete dome seemed to glow like a beacon, and for some reason, Michael Evangelisti flashed into my mind again. He had mentioned the Pantheon, hadn’t he? Isn’t that the neighborhood he’d said his friend Karina lived in? I stopped and dug in my wallet until I found the folded piece of paper he’d given me with the name of the restaurant where Karina worked. I stared at it for a long moment, just thinking.

  I couldn’t stay with some Italian woman I knew only through a cheating, lying man with whom I was barely acquainted, could I? I stopped in my tracks and thought about it. It wasn’t like I’d be forgiving Michael. Staying in a room rented by someone he’d known years ago wouldn’t bring me back into contact with him. And if I wanted to stay in Rome, I had few other options.