So, when my father says I look desperate, I think:you have no fucking idea. I’ve not yet begun.
I slip away the moment he starts moving toward Senator Alfieri who’s so fucking obvious under that eye mask with his fat stubby figure and that limp.
Dante already has his hand extended, exuding that fake charm he usually saves for powerful people.
I move through the crowd, through a curtained doorway, and then I’m outside.
The night air greets me, cooler and scented with salt water and distant flowers. Gondolas glide below, lanterns swaying.
I lean against the stone railing and breathe deeply, my heartbeat beginning to steady even though my body still feels charged with tension.
Alcohol used to blur this feeling. But tonight it's not working. I want hands on me. I want to lose myself completely.
From the corner of my eye, I spot a shadow. I turn to look more fully at it, and the silhouette slowly materializes into a man.
He leans against the far end of the balcony, half-swallowed by the dark where the torchlight doesn’t reach.
He's tall, that's the first thing I notice. With broad shoulders that strain the black of his tuxedo.
A sharp, severe mask of matte obsidian covers the upper half of his face, with only the hard line of his jaw and a mouth that looks like it was carved for sin.
He leans against the balustrade and looks out at the canal as if I’m not there, and the very quality of his silence is so complete that I find myself offended by it.
"You’re hiding," I start.
"So are you," he murmurs in a voice that immediately shifts my thoughts into dirty territory.
He has an accent I can’t place exactly. Italian but southern, or it was Italian and other things have happened to it since.
"I’m not hiding," I say, my voice coming out as a breath. "I’m escaping. That’s different."
"How so?”
"Hiding is passive. You wait for something to stop. Escaping is a decision."
He turns his head to look at me then, and even with most of his face concealed I feel the full weight of his attention land on me like a physical pressure.
"What are you escaping from?" he asks.
"My father. A room full of people trying to impress other people doing the same thing. And myself, a little. You?"
"Same," he says. "Minus the father."
He looks down at the canal again and I look at his hands where they rest on the stone. Just below the cuff of his jacket on the left wrist, I notice a tattoo.
Three olive branches curling around something. I lean slightly closer and the something resolves into a key. The key isbroken at its shaft, the teeth pointing upward on one half and down on the other.
"What's that?"
He looks down at his own wrist as if he’s forgotten it’s there. "A tattoo."
"I see that. I’m asking what it means."
He’s quiet for a moment. The canal shifts below us.
"It’s a map," he says, "to a place that doesn't exist anymore."
I look at him, waiting, but he doesn’t elaborate. Before I can stop myself, I reach out, fingertips brushing the inked skin.
