Page 5 of XOXO

“God, that man last night was an animal,” one girl in front of me spoke in Italian. “He was boring, but he had so much stamina.”

“You lucky bitch,” her friend huffed. “They stood me up and I had to spend all last night alone.”

“Oh, don’t be sad. We will find someone for you on Rendezvous," she said. “Someone to fuck you so good you can’t feel your legs.”

I blushed at her bluntness.

“Yes, it’s our last night. We need something memorable before we see what France has to offer.”

I had a perfect view of their phone so I could see when they opened the app. They swiped left and right so quickly I couldn’t see the men except the few they had to have a discussion about. They went through at least thirty men before they felt satisfied with their matches.

“Maybe I should match with someone just in case,” the girl who had had a good night said, opening her app. “I want to see all that England has to offer.”

A ping from the other girl's phone had them leaning close together again.

“Oh, you matched with someone!”

I adjusted my posture, hoping to see which one matched with her, fully vested with how their night was going to go.

“Mmmm, he’s a maybe, I think I want to wait for a little bit to see if I match with anyone else.”

They continued talking in Italian about the tour, commenting on the beauty and charm of the English countryside. I did the same, watching the landscape, taking a deep breath as my mind thought about the app they were using. I had only heard of dating apps, never needing to use them. Dating had never been my priority. When I returned home from school and living on my own, they pushed me into an engagement with Lorenzo immediately.

I was twenty-nine years old with two notches on my bedpost. It had never bothered me before, but now I felt like I hadn’t lived enough in my twenties. Coming to Europe was supposed to be fun, enlightening and a chance to do the things I had always wanted to do. It was spontaneous, and I was realizing I wasn’t good at. Maybe this was a sign that I needed to do something I never would have done on my own.

Opening my bag, I looked for my phone, realizing it was in my back pocket. I got my phone out, staring at it wondering if this was the right thing to do. Being salacious wasn’t me, but neither was going against my parents. I opened the app store, and typed Rendezvous in the search bar. It came up immediately; the icon begging me to click on it.

“Alright, we’ve made it!” the tour guide announced. “We will spend two hours here. Now if everyone could follow me out, we can get started.”

We stood up as I looked out the window in shock that we had arrived so quickly. That had been happening a lot recently, I got lost in my mind and time seemed to fly by.

“You coming?” One of the girls looked at me.

“Oh, sì, scusa,” I said, speaking Italian automatically.

“You speak Italian?” one of them asked in Italian.

“Yes,” I replied, excited to use my Italian. “It’s one of my favorite languages that I speak.”

“Are you from Italy?” The other asked.

“No, I’m from America,” I said, stopping myself from cringing.

“Oh, what other languages do you speak?” The other woman asked.

I listed off the six languages I spoke adding in Mandarin and German, but that I wasn’t fluent.

“You sound beautiful. My name is Lucia and this is Paola,” she said, as we got off the bus.

“Nice to meet you. My name is Violeta.”

“It was fate that we met. Your name is beautiful,” Paola said, threading her arm through mine.

“Are you visiting?” Paola asked.

“Yeah, I’m hoping to travel through Europe for a little bit,” I said, as the tour guide had us follow her as she started talking about the quaint town.

“How fun! Your friends didn’t want to come to this tour?” Paola asked.