The Story of X: An Erotic Tale Read Free Page A

handsome signore —waking up in an enormous room with enormous windows letting in the enormous Campanian
     light; there are palm trees rustling in a garden outside, the faint noise of Neapolitan
     traffic rises as a sweet and soothing susurrus. A butler maybe comes in, stooping
     past portraits of ancestors, carrying fresh breakfast. I see silver pots of coffee,
     dishes of lime marmalade; I see lemon slices on china and freshly squeezed blood orange
     juice spilled on endless white bed linen. Blood on pure whiteness.
    A naked woman. Is there a naked woman in this imagined scene? Yes, there she is—misted
     by the Bruges-lace curtains, standing nude and pensive and beautiful at the sunny
     sash window. Marc Roscarrick rises, also naked, and aroused, and lean—his body like
     hard, dark, Amazonian wood. He crosses the parquet floor and embraces her slender
     naked waist; he kisses her pale neck, and she gasps and turns. And it is me, it is
     me at that window, me naked in his bedroom; I am his mistress, and as I feel his firm
     hands on my waist I turn and smile and kiss his sweet face, and then I kneel in prayer
     on the hardness of the parquet floor and I reach for his desire, and, and . . . and.
     And.
    And down there in the Via Santa Lucia a kid on a Vespa is looking up at me. At me,
     here: barefoot in my shorts, mouth half open, erotically daydreaming. The kid is maybe
     sixteen; even from this distance I can see him grinning. Then he scoots away, toward
     the Castel dell’Ovo and the corniche and the dreamy blue Tyrrhenian.
    This is absurd. What is happening to me? Erotic daydreams? This isn’t like New Hampshire.
     This certainly isn’t New Hampshire.
    I need to concentrate. I still need to unpack my clothes and my laptop. Clothes first.
    But—wow. This is an unexpectedly depressing process. I have brought lots of Zara with
     me: almost a whole new wardrobe, purchased last month from their store in Union Square
     in San Fran. At the time I thought I was being clever—in California the clothes looked
     so European and chic and suitable, if not perfetto . They were also pretty cheap.
    Now, however, as I unfurl the dresses and pantsuits I cringe. I know Zara is Spanish
     but somehow it all looks a bit . . . American. Or rather, it looks a bit suburban and shopping mall . The clothes are nice enough—black cotton pencil skirts, short printed summer dresses,
     a jacquard miniskirt, a cute lace tube thing—it’s all summery and pleasant, cottony
     and fresh, but here in the actual Italian sunlight it seems to lack real style and
     sophistication. This will not impress. This is nothing. I’ve only been here a day
     but already I know: everyone down there on the Via Toledo is wearing Prada at a minimum . Everything is silk and cashmere and fine raw linen. Even the traffic inspectors
     look like they are patrolling on a catwalk, not a sidewalk.
    But I have no choice; these clothes will have to do. I do not have the money to upgrade.
     So I will have to rely on natural attributes.
    Which are?
    I walk to the long antique mirror hanging from the wall opposite the old iron bed.
     The light is slanted. I look at myself. In my shorts. Barefoot. I have a smudge of
     dust on my round face from the unpacking.
    My hair is moderately fine, and swayingly wavy. Most of the time. I am five foot five,
     and 120 pounds—and some people say I am rather pretty. Once a man told me I was beautiful.
    Once .
    I step closer to the mirror, examining myself like I am a slave girl in the market—a
     Roman slave girl in the Piazza del Mercato; I have been doing my research on Neapolitan
     history.
    My nose is cutely upturned, or perhaps it is just a bit crooked? I get far too many
     freckles. My teeth are near perfect. My ears are stupidly small. Oysters make me sick.
     And I have only had three lovers.
    Three.
    The mirror rattles as a truck passes below, over the black cobbles of a side street.
     Three! I have had three lovers, and I