by Greg Herren
I wanted to get up and run out of the restaurant.
He laughed, reaching across the table and patting my hand. “You need to just relax and enjoy yourself, Church Mouse,” he said in a soothing tone. “I’m not going to bite you. It’s a beautiful day, we’re about to have a wonderful meal, and we can use this time to get to know each other better.” He tilted his head to one side again, narrowing his eyes in an appraising way. “Surely you’re not this shy?” He said it almost like he was talking to himself. The delighted smile on his face grew even wider. “Perhaps you are, at that. How old are you?”
“Twenty-three,” I replied, raising my chin a little defiantly when he laughed yet again. I bristled a little. I knew I looked younger than my age—I was always carded when I went out to buy Valerie’s cigarettes for her. It was annoying.
“But you’re just a baby!” He sounded delighted, and his eyes twinkled, his amusement growing as I shifted in my chair.
“I’m not.” I managed to get the words out as our waiter placed glasses of ice water in front of us. He started laughing, and I felt myself growing more indignant. “Please don’t laugh at me. I’m a college graduate, and I’ve been living on my own for the last year in New York.” I couldn’t decide whether I was angry, embarrassed, or just plain foolish.
Things were definitely not going the way I had hoped.
And my words didn’t have the desired effect. In fact, he only laughed harder. My cheeks burned with mortification until he finally wiped at his eyes with his napkin and got hold of himself. “I’m terribly sorry,” he said, a contrite look on his face. “There’s nothing worse than being laughed at, is there? It’s just—” He let his voice trail off. His eyes got serious. “I haven’t laughed much in a very long time.”
I felt both my anger and embarrassment fading away.
I bit my lower lip and looked down at the place setting. Of course he hadn’t been able to laugh since his partner had died. I couldn’t imagine that kind of suffering, the pain he must still be going through. It had to have been horrible to lose the love of his life in such a terrible and unexpected way.
“It’s okay, I really don’t mind, really,” I finally said, running my index finger through the condensation on my water glass. “Valerie laughs at me all the time.”
“I’m sure she does.” His face darkened. “How can you stand working for that awful woman?”
I shrugged. “She’s really not that bad, Mr. Romaniello. She—”
“If we’re going to be friends, Church Mouse, you’re going to have to call me Carlo.” He interrupted me with a kind smile. “I don’t eat meals with people who call me Mr. Romaniello.”
I felt my cheeks reddening again, and I couldn’t stop myself from smiling. “Thank you, Carlo.” I nodded politely. “But seriously, she isn’t that bad, really. She’s more bite than bark, and she’s used to—”
“You sound like a wife defending the husband who’s just broken her arm,” he interrupted me again. “Seriously, Church Mouse, the first step to getting out of an abusive relationship is to admit that you’re in one.”
“But—” I stopped my protest when I saw the twinkle in his eyes and the sly smile playing at the corners of his mouth. “You’re teasing me.”
“I’m sorry—you must think I’m terribly unkind,” he replied. “How about we find something else to talk about? I won’t say another word about your employer—but I have to ask, however did you end up working for her?”
So I wound up telling him the entire story of my father’s death and how I come to work for Valerie in New York. The waiter came—Carlo ordered for me—and he occasionally interrupted me to ask a question. At first, I spoke hesitantly—no one had ever shown such interest in me before—but the longer I talked, the more confident I felt. And by the time I was finally winding down the incredibly dull story of my life, the waiter was placing our salads in front of us.
“Interesting,” Carlo Romaniello said after watching me for a moment. He buttered a roll and tore it into little pieces.
“I’m not interesting.” I said, adding sweetener to the tall glass of iced tea I’d been too busy talking to drink. “You must be so bored—I’m so sorry to have run on this way. You must think I’m horribly self-absorbed.”
“On the contrary, I think you’re very refreshing—a nice change from all the truly crashing bores I’ve unfortunately had to get used to spending time with.” He winked at me as the waiter presented a bottle of wine to him. He took a sip and nodded, and the waiter filled our glasses and left the bottle.
“I don’t really drink much,” I confessed as I picked up the glass. I swirled the red liquid around dubiously. The truth was I didn’t drink at all. Once, when I was in my early teens, my father decided to teach me about wine. I’d had several glasses, and spent the rest of the evening on my knees in front of the toilet. I didn’t like liquor—the taste of it wasn’t appealing.
But I wasn’t going to tell Carlo Romaniello that.
I sipped the wine as he watched me. “What do you think?”
“It’s kind of—” I searched for the right words. “Fruity and a little dry?”
“You’re a fast study.” He smiled at me.
I don’t remember what all we talked about, but it seemed like the time flew by—the next thing I knew the waiter was offering the check, which Carlo took, slipping a credit card into the leather folder. My phone vibrated—it was Valerie.
I frowned at it, excused myself, and walked outside to take the call. “Where are you?” she demanded before lapsing into a coughing fit.
“I went for a walk,” I replied, closing my eyes.
“Did you clear my schedule?” She coughed again. “God fucking damn it, I am going to cough up a lung here. The doctor has just left—I apparently have strep throat, damn it all to hell, and am contagious.”
“Oh, no!”
“Yes, well. I have to stay in bed for three days or so, and he doesn’t want me to do anything other than rest. So you’re going to be on your own for the rest of the week. But that doesn’t mean I won’t have things for you to do.” She went on to give me explicit instructions, as was her wont. The reality was what she wanted me to do would take me, at most, five minutes—but since she was always convinced everyone else was an idiot, she was still giving me instructions on how to properly carry out her wishes when Carlo joined me on the sidewalk, a big smile on his face. When she was finally finished, she said, “Get that done, and I’ll be checking my e-mails…if anything comes up, I’ll be calling you.”
“Thank you, Valerie.” I disconnected the call.
“Is she feeling better?” Carlo asked.
I shook my head, and he smiled when I told him the news. “Good, then you can keep me company for the rest of today.” He winked at me again. “I might just press you into service for the rest of the week. Can’t have you getting bored.”
I felt a little thrill and hoped he wasn’t teasing me again.
I couldn’t help but think, as Carlo whisked me around South Beach the rest of that afternoon, from boutiques to art galleries to shops, that I could write an excellent article called “A Day with Carlo Romaniello.” When I commented on the fact that almost everywhere we went they knew him by name, he said, “When you have money, sales people working on commissions make it their business to know your name.”
It was a bit overwhelming.
It wasn’t like I was unused to going into high-end galleries or stores; as Valerie’s assistant I was in and out of them all the time running errands for her. But even the executive editor of Street Talk magazine who had everyone in the popular culture zeitgeist wooing her for column inches and mentions didn’t command the kind of respect Carlo Romaniello got the instant he stepped through the doors of any shop. He asked me my opinion on everything—from sculpture to paintings to photographs. At the Versace store, he tried on suits and asked my opinions. He even had me try one on myself—a lovely charcoal gray suit that was more expensive
than everything in my closet combined.
Once I removed it and put my own clothing back on, he wanted me to try on a suit of black wool, but I demurred. “Don’t you want to see how you look in it?” he asked.
I shook my head. “No.” I fingered the sleeve longingly but didn’t change my mind. “It would just make me sad.”
“Sad?”
“That I can’t own it if it looks good,” I replied. “I don’t see the point in trying on clothing I can’t ever afford, or shopping for things I can never buy. It just—it just makes my life seem sad.” I crossed my arms. “And my life isn’t sad. I know you probably think it is,” I said hurriedly as he opened his mouth to interrupt, “you’ve made it clear you don’t like Valerie. But I like my job, I like what I do, and I like my life. So, I don’t have the time to follow my dreams? Someday I will.”
“You really are something, Church Mouse,” he said, shaking his head. “That Midwestern Kansas common sense is something I wish more people I knew possessed.” He laughed and led me out of the store. “So, why don’t you tell me what your dream is? Or is that too personal to share with a stranger?”
I turned my head as we walked down the sidewalk so he couldn’t see the sudden tears that filled my eyes. No one had ever asked me before—not my father; no one had ever cared enough about me to ask—and at that moment I felt like I was, indeed, someone to be pitied. I was just a dumb kid from Kansas with a miserable job living in a miserable little apartment with a miserable boss who treated me terribly. I was no closer to making my dreams come true than I had been a year earlier when I first arrived in New York.
“Have I upset you?” he asked, concern in his tone. “I didn’t mean to, and I’m sorry. I really did just want to know.”
I took a deep breath and gave him a tentative smile. “No, you didn’t upset me. I’m the one who’s sorry, Mr. Romaniello. I’ve taken terrible advantage of your kindness.”
He reached over and brushed a tear away from my right eye. “Now, Church Mouse, why would someone being kind to you make you cry?” He took me by the hands and turned me so that I was facing him, looking up into his brown eyes. “I’m enjoying myself. I’m enjoying your company. I can’t remember the last time—” A shadow crossed his face briefly, and I knew what he was remembering. He took a moment to get hold of himself, and went on, “Unfortunately, I have a dinner engagement I can’t get out of—but with Valerie sick, you’re free now tomorrow, aren’t you? Why don’t you spend the day with me again? And you can tell me all about your dreams.” He pulled his cell phone out of his pocket. “What’s your cell phone number?” I gave it to him, and he punched it into his phone. My phone started ringing, and I stored his number.
“Thank you for today,” I said. I was really sorry to have the day end, and realistic enough to know I’d probably never see him again.
He took my hand and pressed it. “It was my pleasure, Church Mouse.” He hailed a cab and waved as it pulled away.
As I walked back to the hotel, I found myself whistling.
Chapter Three
I spent the evening in my room and ordered dinner from room service while a series of documentaries on the History Channel played on the television. I wasn’t watching, of course—I was sitting up in my bed, with a book open in my lap, replaying the events of the day over and over again with a smile on my face. I remembered the sound of his laugh, the way the corners of his eyes wrinkled up when he was smiling, the way his dark eyes twinkled when he teased me. At one point I did an image search, dragging the images off websites onto my laptop’s desktop. He was so handsome—and I would compare his face to Timothy’s. Carlo was handsomer than Timothy, I decided, because Carlo’s looks were real. Carlo looked like a handsome man you might see in a coffee shop, or pass on the street, or see across the room in a restaurant. Timothy, on the other hand, had an almost unreal beauty—almost cold, like some marble statue of a god you’d see in a museum. Remote, distant, and untouchable, there was a quality of almost smug disdain in Timothy’s eyes as he posed for the cameras, a sense he was thinking, Worship me, you mere mortals! You can look but you can never touch, you can dream about me but you will never have me.
I much preferred Carlo’s looks.
I allowed myself to indulge in fantasies, fantasies where Carlo fell in love with me and took me away from my life and made me a part of his world—but we were so content with each other that we didn’t need parties and play premieres, or to be around other people. We simply basked in each other’s company, and I wondered what it would be like for him to hold me in his arms, to feel his lips on mine, on my skin, and to share a bed with him.
And I would catch a glimpse of myself in the mirror across the room from the bed, and see the reality of my plain looks and undistinguished body.
I had been attracted to men before—handsome but vapid male models that drifted through the hallways at Street Talk, gorgeous men I saw on the streets or the subway, but this was different. This was more than a physical attraction, and stupid and pointless as it was, I knew I was falling in love with Carlo Romaniello.
Once I admitted it to myself, I laughed at my own foolishness.
He was merely being kind to a church mouse.
“That’s fine,” I said to my reflection in the mirror, with a determined tilt to my chin. “I’m glad to be of any use to him.”
But my defiant thoughts were just that, and I knew that I wanted to be more than that to him. I wanted him to care about me—love was too much to ask for. He was used to men like Timothy, men with handsome faces and stunning bodies with sophisticated tastes and senses of humor, men who sparkled in the limelight even if they didn’t crave it, and carried it off with aplomb and style. Men who wore designer clothing tailored to fit their bodies perfectly, rather than irregulars with designer labels bought at discount stores by a man who had no grasp of what went with what, who went to discount hair salons and could never duplicate the style again with gels and sprays and products.
The world Carlo Romaniello inhabited might as well have been the moon.
And no matter how much I hoped and prayed, he wasn’t going to call me again. What did I have to offer someone like him?
Nothing.
The best I could hope for was he would simply forget about me, rather than remember and laugh about me with his friends over drinks at some glittering party, telling the story of the pathetic young man he spent some time with one afternoon in South Beach.
When I turned off the lights and went to bed, I was resigned to the reality of my life. Tomorrow, I would go to the beach in my cheap blue board shorts—being careful not to burn. I would do whatever Valerie needed me to and just hole up in my room reading books, trying hard not to be miserable and lonely, missing him, and trying not to get my hopes up every time my phone rang.
I dreamed of him that night, a dream so incredibly vivid that when I woke up in the gray hour just before dawn and realized I was still in my hotel room, I almost burst into tears from disappointment.
For the first time in my life, I knew what I was missing. One afternoon with Carlo Romaniello and my life now seemed empty, devoid of everything that made life worth living. I saw my life through his eyes and was overwhelmed by the nothingness of it. It was like the rest of the world was inside at some wonderful party, and I was outside with my face pressed up against the glass, watching them and wishing I could be inside with everyone else instead of outside and miserable.
With Valerie sick and confined to her room, the rest of the week stretched before me like some horribly empty void.
As the sun rose and my room filled with the morning light, I wrapped my arms around my legs and wondered what to do with myself.
I ordered my usual coffee and fruit breakfast from room service, and once again, my head resting on my drawn-up knees, replayed the previous afternoon in my head, trying to view the things he’d said to me and the way he’d acted dispassionately like a disinterested observer rather than a lonely young m
an who could so easily mistake kindness from a handsome older man as something more than what it actually had been.
No matter how bitterly disappointing it was to admit the truth to myself, I did. I wasn’t ever going to hear from Carlo Romaniello ever again.
“I’m truly pathetic—Valerie is so right about me,” I chastised myself, getting out of the bed and going into the bathroom. “He’s never going to call me—he was simply being polite and just appreciated a bit of company, that’s all it was, nothing more.”
But deep down, I couldn’t help but hope that he would call me again. As I went through my morning routine, I kept seeing his face in my mind and the way the muscle in his arms moved and his distinctly masculine smell or the sound of the deep hearty laugh when I amused him, which seemed to be every time I opened my mouth.
I turned on the shower and scrubbed my skin until it turned red, washing my hair thoroughly. You’re only twenty-three, I reminded myself as I scrubbed away, it’s not too late to make changes in my life. No more excuses. Now that I know what I am missing, I can make changes before it’s too late. I can start living instead of just going through the motions.
As I toweled dry in the steamy bathroom, I decided I was going to work on my writing. Even if Valerie was as dismissive or insulting or condescending about it as she always was, I would keep pushing her about her promises to let me write for the magazine, even if it was just pieces for the reviews section without a byline, rather than just sitting around waiting for her to give me an assignment. I could spend time writing on my laptop on my lunch hour, and if I spent an hour writing before going to bed every night rather than wasting time reading things on the Internet, I would get that much closer to my goals.
And I would make myself go out to gay clubs more often, to try to get more comfortable in those environments. I needed to make friends, I needed to find a lover—even if it was just a casual fling that meant nothing. I needed to lose my virginity, and to do that I had to overcome my shyness.
