Chapter Four #3
I’m yet to get the answer that would fill my heart with joy—that the view from the top of the clock tower was so breathtaking they forgot their problems and just existed in that moment.
That the three statues of the Mastelli brothers were so intriguing they wondered what they meant.
That Campo Santa Margherita was idyllic, and the strawberries in the market so fresh and ripe they couldn’t help buying some.
That sitting in the front outdoor seats of the vaporetto and feeling the wind on their face was even more invigorating than the glass of wine they’d had at an old bacaro in San Polo.
That’s what I want to hear. But maybe I’m too much of a dreamer…
“I like this square,” Daisy says. “Every little corner of Venice is wonderful and full of history and secrets.”
Her eyes meet mine, and we smile at each other for an exhilarating instant.
I love to hear her complimenting Venice.
I feel proud, as if someone is saying good things about some music I wrote or played.
That’s how much I’ve claimed the city for myself.
I want others to love it and feel it the way I do.
It was here in Venice where I let go of the pressure—mostly self-imposed—of being an orchestra musician.
I came here to play my violin only for myself, with no purpose other than to get over the pain of having slower fingers.
The pain of being imperfect, no longer good enough for the life I used to live.
Then I met Luigi and realized I didn’t have to put myself through the pain.
That to beat it, I didn’t have to keep playing until I became my old self again.
Venice showed me the answer. Living here, apart from the world I thought was the only one for me, I learned I could be someone else.
Someone who could leave the past—and everything attached to it—behind.
I want Venice to change Daisy’s life too.
“Do you see that church?” I point at the simple but imposing beige brick building at one of the corners of the square.
“It’s Chiesa di San Giovanni in Bragora,” I tell her, and she squints to see it better.
“It was built in the eighth century.” Daisy lifts her eyebrows, impressed by how old it is. “Antonio Vivaldi was baptized there.”
I wait. She must know the name. I hope she does.
“The composer,” she says, and I smile. A lot of people don’t know he was a violinist born in Venice, and I’m happy to inform visitors of that fact.
“Are you familiar with The Four Seasons ?”
She bites her lip, thinking. “Maybe I’ve heard his music before, but I’m not sure.”
One of my usual mistakes is assuming people know as much about classical music as I do, but I try to be fair and control my urge to immediately educate them.
Daisy opens her purse and takes out her phone and a pair of wireless earbuds. “I’m going to fix that right now.” She offers me one of the earbuds. I put it in my ear, and she opens her music app and searches for Vivaldi.
The first movement of “La Primavera” starts playing in one of my ears. I startle and laugh when Daisy jumps in her seat with a loud “Aaah! I know this one!”
“Isn’t it perfect?” I close my eyes to savor the intricate melody that matches the current season but then realize it’s even better to hear it while enjoying the Venetian landscape, where Vivaldi’s music was born and immortalized.
I open my eyes and catch Daisy observing me with an admiring look. “You love classical music as much as I love gelato. Right?”
I smile. “My grandma gave me my first violin when I was five. That’s when I started having lessons in Milano.”
Daisy’s eyes grow in surprise. “Do you still play?”
“No.” I look down, trying not to regret starting this subject. “But I used to play with the biggest symphony orchestra in Milano.”
Now her eyes are positively bulging out. “Are you telling me that before you were a bartender, a concierge, a tour guide, a fairy godmother, and a seduction teacher, you were a professional violinist?” She chuckles, incredulous. “Wow.”
I laugh a little. “Why is that so hard to believe?” I suspect she didn’t think a man like me could be sensitive and dedicated enough to be an orchestra musician.
I like to tear down her biases.
She shrugs, disconcerted. “I don’t know. I guess it’s just unexpected.” She narrows her eyes, studying me. “But now that I know, I can see you have the…pose.”
I snicker. “The pose?”
“Yeah…” She looks flustered, and it’s adorable. “I mean, good posture, elegance…” I laugh again. “It’s true,” she insists. “You have the air of a musician.”
“Well, thank you then.” I bow, and she smiles.
“Sorry. I think it’s awesome. Truly.”
We look at each other while the second movement of “La Primavera” plays in our ears. It’s the perfect soundtrack. It will forever remind me of her and this one perfect moment.
“What happened then?” she asks after what feels like a long while. My pulse—which had been faster than it should have been when sitting on a bench—accelerates even more as I realize it’s time to dig into the ugly bits of the past.
“An accident,” I say, looking at my hands. “A car crashed into me as I was riding my bike, and I broke my left hand, among other things.”
She grimaces, feeling my pain—figuratively, of course. She can’t imagine how much it hurt. How much it sucked. “Oh, I’m so sorry…”
I divert my gaze, not wanting her pity. I’ve long buried my past, even though sometimes the pain threatens to creep through the barriers that keep it confined.
The emotional pain, mostly. I’m well physically, and the only time I feel the consequences of the accident is when I try to play.
But as long as I don’t pick up my violin, I don’t have to deal with any of it.
“It took me years to fully recover,” I tell her. “I can play violin now. I just…don’t.”
Daisy shifts, leaning closer to me. “Why not?” She stares at me intensely, and I’m afraid she’s judging me for giving up. She doesn’t understand. No one does.
I adjust myself on the bench and look at her as calmly as I can. I don’t have to tell her everything . I can, for instance, leave out that my fiancée left me when I became unemployed and felt useless.
“My skills are only a shadow of what they were in my prime,” I say. This truth devastates me and still pokes me from time to time. I look at my hands and slowly wiggle my fingers.
To my surprise, Daisy takes my left hand and brings it closer to her eyes.
She runs the tips of her fingers over mine, examining them in a slow, delicious way.
Her skin is soft and smooth, not the calloused fingertips of a musician, and I get shivers all over my body.
My breathing accelerates. I want her touch. I don’t want her to stop.
She lifts her gaze from my hand to my eyes, and I feel more farfalle partying inside me.
“They don’t look useless to me.” She folds my fingers, testing the joints, and I need to fight my urge to lift them to her face and caress her cheek, showing her how they are not useless at all.
“I didn’t say they were.” I smirk, and she smirks back.
“Then why don’t you keep practicing? You’re just rusty.”
Because to succeed as a violinist, you need to be more than good. You need to be perfect. And I’m far from that.
I don’t like admitting this, though, so I tell her another truth instead. “Because I don’t want that career anymore. I want to manage Hotel Marchesi.”
She seems to accept my answer. But perhaps that’s because she’s too focused on the sexual tension growing between us.
Her fingers slide through the spaces between mine, and I let them interlace, fitting perfectly together like a puzzle piece, big against small.
We hold hands for a couple of seconds, in which I fully appreciate the fluttery sensation this causes in my body. All the while, Vivaldi plays in the background just for us.
“Lorenzo,” she says so low, it’s almost a whisper. “I…” My heart thumps, eager for her words, her voice. “I…can’t.”
She detaches her hand from mine and uses it to adjust her hair as if she needs to find something safer to do with her fingers. My stomach drops with disappointment. I look at her, but she’s staring at her lap.
“I’m sorry,” she mutters, and silence crushes us for half a minute as I try to find something to say.
This moment…these feelings…it shouldn’t be happening. Here we are, listening to Vivaldi and having a deep conversation about my past while we should be focusing on her seduction skills.
It was a terrible idea to offer help the way I did. Luigi is right in everything he said. I’m hopeless. I let my selfish desires control me.
Overcoming my addiction to playing the violin opened me to other vices.
The absence of what used to be at the core of my identity, of my soul, created a void I itch to fill with other pleasures I consider safe, like casual sex.
But this time, desiring someone I shouldn’t might be more harmful to me than an unhealthy obsession with an instrument.
I sigh, my shoulders sagging, my limbs weak and heavy. Well…what’s done is done, I guess. Daisy and I are very attracted to each other. Now we need to decide what to do with this attraction. It changes the dynamic of our professional relationship, whether we like it or not.
“We can’t keep seeing each other like this.” Daisy looks at me, and I can see this is not what she wants. She wants me. Us. Here in Venice. In every corner and narrow alley where we can hide.
And God, I want that too.
“Forget the project if you don’t think it will work,” I dare say, on impulse.
Daisy shakes her head, smiling. “I can’t give up on Jeremy. I need him. He’s all I have.”
She looks down, blushing. I don’t think she intended to say something so…personal.
I swallow hard. She loves the guy, and falling in love with him would make sense, of course. I promised to help her. I told Luigi I would succeed. I can’t be a dick just to satisfy my dick…and then lose the one thing I really want.