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With my sight gone, I experienced intimacy with Charlotte almost entirely through touch. I couldn’t look at a photo of her and soak in her smile, or the beauty of her hair falling around her face, or the swell of her breasts against her dress. I had to touch her to remember her, as all of my memories of her were sensation only.
And God, I missed touching her. I missed the way her lips felt on mine as she smiled. I missed the silky strands of her hair through my fingers. I missed the soft weight of her breasts in my hands. I missed her kisses, especially the maddening way she’d skim her tongue over my lips, then graze her teeth with a hot little gust of breath, before finally giving me her whole mouth, granting me entry. Christ, just that kiss made me hard. Every time.
I imagined it then, of having her in the shower, up against the wall, naked and wet, her skin warm and slippery… I groaned and took myself in hand, needing the release, the relief. Some shred of pleasure in this wasteland of misery.
But I couldn’t have even that. My supersonic hearing picked up a knock on the outer door. Room service. I didn’t have time to finish and figured it would probably be best tonotgreet the guy with a raging hard-on. I turned the water to icy cold and the heat of imagined passion flamed out. My anger, however, burned brighter.
With a tray of delicious-smelling food waiting for me, I ran my hands over my suits, trying to remember which was the dark gray sharkskin, and which was the light navy. I couldn’t concentrate. My fingers, like tired eyes, couldn’t focus. I spent a good five minutes I didn’t have trying to remember where I’d put my goddamn ties. By the time I was dressed, the spaghetti was cold, but I sat down to devour it anyway.
After, I threw on my suit jacket and shoved my lifelines into my messenger bag but for my phone. I asked it how to say, “Where is the ticket office?” in Italian and then spent another few harried seconds searching for my goddamn cane that had rolled under the bed.
“Dove si trova la biglieterria?”
“Great. How do you say ‘fuck me’ in Italian?”
“Fottermi,” my phone helpfully replied.
“You got that right.”
chapter forty-three
“What did you get?”
“Pistachio,” Annalie said, taking a swipe of her gelato. “You?”
“Chocolate.”
“Chocolate…what?”
I smiled into the Italian sun that I was certain was completely different—and better—than any other sun. “Just chocolate.”
“Pfft,” Annalie sniffed. “So boring.”
“I beg to differ,” I said as we strolled along the Piazza di Trevi, heading toward the glorious fountain. “This is gelato. In Rome. It’s the best chocolate there is.”
Annalie thought about this for a moment and then nodded. “I’ll allow it.”
I laughed. My new BFF had honed her English skills on GIFs.
We had the day off, until our show that evening at seven. Annalie and I were trying to cram as much of Rome into our short stay as we could. But we quickly learned the folly of our ways—Rome was too much. Too full of beauty and museums and history, that we amended our excursion to one museum, one lunch, one gelato and the Trevi Fountain and a pinky swear to come back and do it all again, but better.
With Noah?
My smile drooped, thinking of how the beauty of Italy—of the entire world, really—was now locked behind a black curtain that would never lift. Annalie and I sat on one of the concrete benches near the Trevi Fountain and I closed my eyes—experiencing the bustle of tourists and inhabitants, conversations, little cars and burbling water—the only way Noah could.
Don’t feel sorry for him, came a voice that sounded suspiciously like a certain beloved Frenchman I knew.The beauty of the world is not closed to him; he just experiences it differently now.
That’s what Noah was currently trying to do, I realized—fall back in love with life and living.
A sudden commotion from the other side of the Trevi Fountain caught our attention. I turned to see a huddle of people surrounding someone on the ground. The fountain obscured the fallen person.
I started to rise with a half-baked idea to help, but there were already plenty of Good Samaritans at work. I turned back to Annalie.
“I hope whoever it is, is okay.”
Annalie nodded, more intent on her gelato. But something itched at me. I didn’t like to ogle other people’s misfortune, but I had to look. I turned in time to see a man being helped into a cab. I only caught a flash of leg and something long and white. A cane?
“White cane,” I whispered and slowly got to my feet. “No…”
