It was April, a long time ago.

 

It rained at dawn most mornings.

I remember laying next to you in our hotel room,

watching flashes of lightning explode through lace curtains and counting the seconds until thunder boomed.

Fat drops of rain hammered our balcony furniture in bursts like Chinese fire crackers.

I was surprised you could sleep through it.

 

You encouraged my clumsy Italian, laughing when no one understood,

then made me over tip waiters to reward their tolerance for my bad accent.

The world seemed to go out of it's way to please us. We walked between rain storms.

When we were late for a train the train ran late. We stepped easily into the coach as the doors closed,

as if it had been waiting patiently, just for us.

 

There was never any thought of forever. We stretched one stolen week into two by canceling work and

postponing promised home comings in a dishonest half hour on long distance phone calls.

I never learned your real name. I never told you mine. We both had someone waiting at home.

We agreed to allow ourselves this guilt free time together if we never attempted to repeat it.

We rented a room over a restaurant that smelled of pizza and none too virgin olive oil. We made love in a lumpy bed.

We got drunk on cheap local wine. We walked on narrow cobblestone streets and left coins in the cases of street musicians.

 

You found an old fashioned straight razor at the market. Thereafter every morning, you, biting your lip with concentration,

would cover my face with thick lather and shave me. I mimed desperate prayers to heaven that you wouldn't slip and kill me.

You laughed and told me to be still or that prayer might be my last.

 

One night I asked if you trusted me. You nodded yes, trembling as I used your long winter scarf

to tie your hands together above to the iron railing of our bed. When we made love you woke the old couple in the floor above

who hadn't heard much since World War two.

Afterward we lay silent and exhausted in the dark. Then you said we'd probably just committed a mortal sin,

but could we please do that again?

 

Days and nights blended into one another. We tried to do with time what we did with tiny cups of espresso

we sipped in the piatza with our croissants. We made a little last as long as possible. We savored every moment of it.

 

That last morning the rain came at dawn as usual but didn't let up. At the Gara we sat miserably, waiting for your train.

You wore a thin coat over a summer dress and shivered. I sat close and wrapped my warm jacket around you.

You put the big straw summer hat I bought you next on your luggage. You said your suitcase would ruin it if you put it inside.

You cried a little. I wanted to.

 

Time was a painfully thick syrup we could barely breath through that morning.

When the train arrived you boarded and sat by the window, looking resolutely forward.

I remained on the bench, watching you, memorizing your profile.

I wanted you to turn around, blurt out your real name and where you lived.

I also prayed you wouldn't because I knew I wouldn't be able to let you go.

 

The train began to move. A minute later I was still sitting on that bench, stunned with loneliness, looking at an empty track.

I boarded my flight home a few hours later.

 

That was April, a long time ago.