Reality Bytes

by Jane Frances

  Once their room service breakfast had been delivered, the Do Not Disturb sign was hung and the safety chain fed across the door. Cathy checked the contents of the breakfast trolley while Lisa found and turned both mobiles off, smiling engagingly as she headed back toward the bed. The white terry cloth bathrobe she donned to receive room service slipped from her shoulders.

  “Here, honey.” Lisa reached for the toast Cathy had buttered. “Let me take care of this for you.”

  Cathy handed the toast over. She had no problem being fed breakfast by a marvelously naked woman. No problem at all.

  They didn’t leave their room all day, again taking advantage of room service for lunch. Cathy could quite happily have stayed in their self-inflicted solitude for the duration of the evening as well, but Lisa insisted they at least poke their heads out of the door for dinner. They decided on the hotel restaurant.

  Over dessert, Cathy presented Lisa with her gift. It wasn’t greeted with quite the resounding enthusiasm she expected.

  Lisa drew in her breath as she flipped the lid on the tightly sprung box. Inside was the Tag Heur watch she had drooled over in the duty free store but hadn’t tried on, instructing the sales clerk to put it back in the display cabinet once he announced the two-thousand-dollar price tag. “This is the one…Cathy, when did you buy this?”

  “Just one lunchtime last week.” Cathy took the watch from its box, slipped it around Lisa’s wrist and did up the catch. “It really suits you.”

  “You have to stop doing this, Cathy.” Lisa turned her wrist and examined the watch. She stared at it, fingering the sports face. “You promised no more expensive gifts.”

  “Don’t you like it?” Cathy knew she had sidestepped Lisa’s request to stop buying costly gifts on a whim, primarily because Lisa could not afford to return the gesture, but she had been hoping for at least a little bit of enthusiasm. After all, it was their first anniversary.

  “I love it.” Lisa shook her head as she continued to examine the watch. “But it’s just too much.”

  “Nothing’s too much for you, sweetheart.”

  Lisa acknowledged Cathy’s comment with a quick glance before looking again to her wrist. “Is this set to the right time?”

  “Of course. Perth time.”

  Lisa reached inside her jacket and pulled out an envelope. “Present part one.”

  Inside the envelope were a dozen vouchers, each redeemable for a night’s worth of whatever the holder desired at “Lisa’s casa di celeste piacere”—Lisa’s house of heavenly delights.

  The vouchers had obviously been designed and printed on their home computer, each individually numbered and with an expiration date that just happened to coincide with their last night in Italy.

  Cathy waved the small stack in front of her. “Anything I desire?”

  “Uh-huh.” Lisa nodded. “Anything.”

  “You may live to regret that, my girl.” Cathy laughed and put the vouchers in her purse. Part one of the present promised great fun. Loving to receive gifts as much as to give them, however, she was intrigued to discover what part two was. “What else did you get me?”

  “You’ll just have to wait.” Lisa gave an enigmatic smile and turned attention to her chocolate mousse. She offered her spoon. “Try some of this—it’s bloody fantastic.”

  It would be another couple of hours before Lisa relieved Cathy of her curiosity. They lingered over the rest of their meal. In between dessert and coffee Lisa begged a need to go to the bathroom. She was gone long enough that Cathy wondered if she had fallen in, or if she had dashed to the hotel gift shop to buy the second part of the gift she had alluded to, but she held back from commenting when Lisa finally returned. The waiter, clearing their plates, assured them it was a beautiful evening so they took a long stroll along streets still bustling with life.

  “Let’s go back to our room.” Lisa eventually steered Cathy in the direction of their hotel.

  “My God, Lisa.” Cathy entered their suite to find it festooned with flowers. Vases of roses adorned nearly every surface.

  Lisa took Cathy’s hand and led her around the suite. They stopped at the dining table where a vase spilled over with white roses. “White is for the purity of my feelings for you. It’s also for innocence”—she winked—“but we won’t go into that one right now.” One of the roses was plucked from the vase before they moved to the coffee table. “Pink symbolizes your gentleness and sweetness and the happiness I feel to be with you.” Again one of the roses was taken and Cathy was guided toward the entertainment unit. A vase of yellow roses stood next to the television. “Yellow is for the bonds of our friendship and to show how much I care. And finally…” A stem was plucked and Lisa led Cathy into the bedroom. A vase of brilliant red blooms sat on the nightstand next to Cathy’s side of the bed. “Red is a sign of my love. My deep and true love for you.” Lisa took one of the red roses and added it to the small bouquet she now carried. She held the bunch to Cathy, giving the slight smile Cathy recognized as a rare flush of shyness. “I know it’s not much compared to—” Lisa indicated to her wrist.

  “Oh, Lisa.” Cathy hushed her with a finger over her lips, scolding herself for even entertaining the thought that Lisa had dashed from the restaurant to purchase a last-minute gift. This was anything but last-minute. It was planned and it showed a real romantic side that Lisa liked to pretend didn’t exist. “This is better than anything else you could possibly given me.”

  Lisa quirked her eyebrows slyly. “Anything?”

  “Well, almost.”

  “And what would you find preferable?”

  Cathy had sat on the bed and patted the mattress. She reached for her purse, which she had tossed onto the bed. “I think I want to redeem one of my vouchers now.”

  Cathy smiled into her latte, remembering the night. Lisa must have diverted her attention from the piazza as her voice broke into Cathy’s thoughts. “You look like the cat that ate the canary. Just what are you smiling at, Ms. Braithwaite?”

  “Just this place,” Cathy said as she sipped on her coffee, the warmth that spread from her stomach to her limbs not entirely attributable to the hot liquid. “Although it stinks on so many levels, I’m actually going to miss it.”

  Lisa laughed at the combined reference to the bad food, sweaty crowds and pervading smell of urine evident on almost every exterior vertical surface. “Me too.” Lisa reached across the table.

  The little furnace Cathy’s thoughts had ignited was fanned by the gentle stroking of Lisa’s thumb across her palm.

  “Ti amo.”

  Cathy returned her own quiet “I love you” and sighed contentedly. At that moment she thought it impossible to be any happier. Rome would soon be a distant memory, and she was holding the hand of her favorite person on the entire planet. Life just couldn’t get any better.

  Except for maybe one thing. An excited squeal stopped Cathy from plumbing the blue, blue depths of Lisa’s eyes and she turned her attention to a table two down from theirs, recently vacated by a stout couple with broad English accents and now occupied by a little family of three. Their tourist status was suspected from the Michelangelo T-shirts both adults sported and confirmed by a language Cathy quickly divined as being German. The family was obviously footsore from their own day of sightseeing. The mother gratefully accepted a tiny cup of espresso, watching with even greater gratitude as the father assumed responsibility for overseeing the consumption of a bright pink gelato by their daughter. It was the presentation of the gelato that caused the squeal of delight, and the blonde girl, hardly big enough to see over the tabletop, was in typical ice-cream-induced raptures. Judging by the already spreading pink ring around the girl’s mouth, Cathy could tell the father had a long, sticky clean-up task ahead of him, but he appeared unperturbed, chatting happily with the mother as he intermittently wiped gelato away with a moist towelette. The mother reached over to smooth a stray strand of her daughter’s hair, and the child accepted her parents’ ministratio
ns without fuss, little legs swinging under the chair as she continued to get more gelato on her than inside her.

  The happy family scene was one played out any number of times all over the world, but as was usual these days, Cathy found herself emotionally torn as she looked on. Part of her was delighted. The other part, the little empty bit she discovered over Christmas, found it almost too painful to watch.

  There was a pressure against her hand. “Hey.” Lisa squeezed her hand again. “Now you look like you’re a million miles away. What’s on your mind?”

  Cathy blinked once to refocus on Lisa. “I want to have a baby,” she blurted.

  There was a snort of derision from the other side of the table and Cathy saw eyes that only moments before had reflected concern crease with humor. Lisa lifted her coffee cup to her lips and took a sip. “Yeah, good one, Cathy.”

  A good minute passed, and in the silence of that minute Cathy watched Lisa’s humor slowly fade, then return, then fade again. The cup was placed quietly onto its saucer.

  “Are you serious?”

  Cathy nodded.

  Lisa tilted her head to one side, as if studying Cathy from a different angle would help her understand. It didn’t seem to. Her brow creased with incomprehension. “In case you hadn’t noticed, we’re missing a vital piece of equipment for that.”

  “We don’t need it, Lisa.”

  Lisa guffawed and her face relaxed. “Cathy…honey…I’m good, but I’m not that good!” Once again she lifted her coffee cup to her lips, this time sniggering into it. She wiggled her eyebrows suggestively over the rim. “But if you want to go to our room and give it a try, I’m up for it. I won’t even call in a voucher.”

  “Lisa.” Cathy spoke softly, then appealed to her without words, hoping to convey through her expression that she was not joking.

  It worked. Lisa actually spluttered into her cup. Cathy’s heart sank as she reached across the table to whack Lisa’s back. The fact she was choking over the idea did not bode well.

  “Thanks.” Lisa coughed and wiped her watering eyes with a napkin. She sat back in her chair, again tilting her head and studying Cathy.

  Cathy could not bear the silence. “Tell me what you’re thinking.”

  Lisa shook her head. “I don’t know yet.” She pointed to Cathy’s latte glass. “Are you done?”

  Usually Cathy and Lisa took their time over coffee, sometimes ordering a second, but always lingering long after they finished their drinks. Over half of Cathy’s latte remained but she nodded. “I’m done.”

  “Shall we go? I feel like a bit of a walk.”

  Cathy knew Lisa processed things best when in motion. “Sure.”

  At the exact moment they passed the happy-family table, the daughter emitted a high-pitched scream. Cathy’s glance revealed why. The child now held an empty waffle cone and pink gelato dribbled over the mother’s very new-looking Nikes and onto the pavement. Lisa smiled sympathetically to the parents, but when she next caught Cathy’s eye, she conveyed an expression that clearly asked, “Do you really want one of those?”

  Cathy’s heart sank even further, and when they made it back to their room—in record time as Lisa had set a cracking pace—Cathy could not but help notice her roses were looking a bit sad in their vases. She busied herself with her daily task of changing their water. Even though this was their last night in Rome, she wanted to extend their life as long as possible. She caught Lisa watching her, leaning against the bathroom doorjamb as Cathy emptied water from the vases and replaced it with fresh.

  “Cathy…”

  “Yes, honey.”

  Lisa shifted her weight to her other foot. She scratched her head, looked around the room and opened her mouth as if to say something, then closed it as if reconsidering. She scratched at her head again. “Cathy…when you said you wanted a baby…did you really mean a baby?”

  Cathy smiled. As opposed to what? A piglet? “Yes, Lisa. A baby.”

  “Oh.” Lisa shifted her weight again. She didn’t meet Cathy’s eye, instead focusing on the clear glass vase Cathy held in her hand. “I might take a drink onto the balcony. Do you want one?”

  “Sure.” Cathy watched Lisa’s retreating figure with concern. She quickly finished refilling the vases and gave their bases a wipe before placing them back around their suite.

  A glass of Chianti was waiting when she stepped onto the balcony. Cathy moved to sit in the chair opposite Lisa, but Lisa beckoned her to her knee.

  “I do love you,” Lisa said as she placed her glass onto the small balcony table and wrapped her arms around Cathy’s waist. “But I do wish you’d give me some warning before making your big announcements.”

  “It wasn’t an announcement, Lisa. It was just an expression of a desire for a child. I haven’t exactly picked out the nursery furniture yet.”

  “But you have thought about it, haven’t you?”

  “Well,” Cathy admitted, “I have been turning the idea ’round for a while, yes.”

  “And when was I going to be let in on it?”

  “I thought I just did.”

  “Yes, you said you wanted a baby. But in the whole time we’ve been together you’ve never asked if I wanted one or even brought up the subject of having children.”

  “I guess I just assumed,” Cathy faltered. Making assumptions about Lisa and her behavior had caused Cathy problems just over a year ago. In fact, jumping to incorrect conclusions nearly prevented them from even getting together. And here she was, doing it all over again.

  Over that Christmas, Cathy had been delighted by the rapport Lisa quickly developed with her older nephew, six-year-old Aaron. Aaron adored Lisa, who was not only willing to partake in the rough-and-tumble games of a young boy but seemed to enjoy them as much, if not more, than he did. The two of them, when left to their own devices while Cathy, her brother and the rest of his family went on a shopping excursion for baby clothes, transformed the lounge room into an elaborate fort. Cathy returned home to find Lisa emerging from a maze of sheets and cardboard boxes, a metal colander on her head and wielding a shield fashioned from a plastic bin lid. Lisa looked somewhat embarrassed being caught by the grownups, but it wasn’t enough to stop her from mounting the broom that served as her horse and charging after Aaron, who was leading the crusade against the mutant penguins that had escaped their home in the freezer.

  “I guess I just thought, since you’re so taken with Aaron and you’re so good with him, that you had thought about maybe…”

  Cathy trailed away when Lisa shook her head.

  In the ensuing silence, Lisa said, “Just because I like kids and they seem to like me doesn’t mean I’ve thought about taking the next step. Jesus, Cathy, it’s not like we can just decide to stop using contraceptives like other couples. It’s a bit more complicated for us.”

  “So you don’t want children then?” Cathy didn’t plan for her voice to sound so petulant, but it did. So she wasn’t too surprised at the touch of annoyance in Lisa’s reply.

  “I didn’t say that.” Lisa touched the tip of Cathy’s chin with her index finger. “I’m saying I need some time to think this through…just like you already have.”

  Cathy nodded. She couldn’t argue with that request. So, although she was bursting to discuss the issue at length, she knew it wasn’t the right time. She moved the topic away from children and instead they discussed plans for their next stop on their Italian adventure, the Amalfi Coast. Tomorrow would be an early start, their coach to Sorrento leaving at six a.m.

  Cathy glanced at her watch and said, “So we really should get packed before we go to dinner.”

  “I guess so.” Lisa released her hold on Cathy’s waist.

  “Are you coming in, honey?” Cathy stopped at the balcony entrance when Lisa made no move to stand.

  “Soon.” Lisa picked up her glass of wine. Cathy decided to just let her be, even though she didn’t come in to start packing anytime before they left for a local restaurant an hour
later.

  Chapter Eleven

  “I’m sorry, Virg,” Toni apologized as she held Virgil flat to the floor in order to stop her from running out the back door. She edged around the wood, only releasing her companion once the gap between the door and the jamb was becoming too narrow for her hand. “You know you’re not allowed out here just yet.”

  It was a gorgeous Saturday morning. Toni had planned on having a read and a coffee in the sun, but Virgil’s determination to escape as soon as the door opened made carrying anything outside impossible. So, while Toni had dragged one of her outdoor chairs from under the eaves and into a sunny spot in the middle of her lawn, she sat in it empty-handed.

  “Oh, Virgil, don’t look at me like that.” To avoid looking at the mottled lump that appealed to her from the windowsill, Toni turned her chair so it faced the back fence.

  It wasn’t the most inspired view. The jarrah pickets that comprised the fence were broken only by the jarrah picket gate that gave access to the lane. A smattering of shrubs skirted the fence line, but apart from that grass grew right to the boundary. She did a visual sweep of the rest of her garden. That wasn’t exactly inspired either. She never gave much thought to her backyard. Essentially it was all lawn, with a clothesline and garden shed flanking a side fence. A single plane tree had been planted off-center by whoever owned the place around twenty years prior. A deciduous tree, it provided welcome shade in summer and let the sunshine through in winter.

  Toni gave an envious thought to the back garden immediately across the lane. The yard—Lisa’s—had been fully landscaped. Before Lisa moved into Cathy’s, her backyard was used as an extension to the house. She entertained there, relaxed there, even cooked there.

  Toni did another sweep of her barren landscape, imagining what it could potentially look like if she put some time and effort into it. Her gaze came to rest on a small mound of dirt in the far corner. A now-dead rose lay across the mound. She had placed the flower there after burying Virgil’s dove. The dove had no mark, no blood or signs of broken skin. The poor creature had no-doubt died of fright. Toni turned her mind to the two information sheets she’d found packaged with Virgil’s bill. One detailed Virgil’s respite care; the other was a fact sheet outlining the damage domestic and feral cats were doing to the environment, along with tips to pet owners for the responsible management of their feline charges.