Summer Story by Lady Eva

Roman Reverie

He got lost in a reverie....


Rome in July.  It was hot and noisy, packed with slightly annoyed, well heeled locals and open mouthed, gobsmacked tourists. He came to join the throngs, splitting off to see the Eternal City while his traveling companions went on to the southern beaches for relief from the heat.

It's not the best month to see Rome. Herds of tourists spill endlessly like cattle from the old city's nooks and crannies. Shouts and laughs clink and clank out in every language imaginable. They jostle to throw coins in the Trevi fountain or pose with the sweaty locals who dress up as gladiators in front of the Coliseum. But this is always part of visiting a city like Rome.  You have to ignore the frenetic noise, enter a sort of hypnotic state, and let the city speak.  So he walked around Piazza Navona rather dreamily that night, smiling and pleased with himself for being so adventurous.  He had that euphoric feeling one only has when traveling, when you can leave yourself behind. "Anything could happen", he thought.

A soft purple sky draped down behind the ancient buildings. It was warm, even at 11 pm, and the Piazza was filled with music and twinkling lights. African vendors smiled at you with aggressive cheerfulness and held out handfuls of braided bracelets.  Packs of women in summer dresses struck poses at cafe tables, holding small glasses of bad wine. And the men, some Italian, some Armenian, or Albanian, circled the square like hunters looking for a conquest. Maybe to pick a pocket or to find a girl to seduce.  Their lazy, confident smiles boasted of frequent success.

None of this dance interested the young man. He was here for art and beauty and culture! The finer things.  At 22 he was heavily inclined towards romantic thoughts. He fancied himself a literary type adventurer like Keats or Byron as he admired the Egyptian obelisk at the centre of Bernini's fountain. He paused a moment and considered writing down his thoughts in the small, still empty travel journal with the artful tie closure that sat in his backpack. Perhaps he would sit at one of those cafe tables and strike up a chat with a woman if the wine wasn't too expensive. His eyes lazily moved over the crowd to find a spot. It was then that he finally noticed her.

She was seated in the centre of the square having her caricature done by a fat, loud man, who was smoking with one hand and sketching with another. The man was reassuring her of her beauty as he explained that his drawing would be a joke and not to be taken seriously. The woman smiled at the man indulgently.  It was easy to see she was not at all bothered.  In fact, she was barely paying attention. She had been watching the young man with the backpack the whole time.

This story is a beginning, a revisiting of a past life made by a much older man who since had discovered who he was and where he was meant to be.  He was no longer that romantic adventurer who met his love, his life, his mistress in the Piazza Navona in Rome one summer evening when he was 22. Together they had traveled far away from that square, to many other ancient cities, and finally to a small house in the Scottish countryside. He lay in the field outside of that house now while she sat inside, contemplating whether or not she'd have him prepare pasta for supper. Those two people in the square were like long lost ancestors looking out from faded photos. He remembered them with fondness, trying to piece out how they had evolved in to the people they were now.  It had started with that smile, then a whispered line he had to ask her to repeat as he knelt down on one knee to better hear.  "Have you ever been owned?" she asked. He didn't know what she meant. He hadn't even known he wanted it until she had explained it. And once she had, he knew he would want nothing less, and moreover, with no one else but her.

She was calling. It was time to prepare supper. It would be pasta tonight after all, she had decided. With olives. He got up, brushed the grass off and went to her.