A Dad story. You know, my father was a very good writer. He should have been officially published. He should I think have been vaguely famous as a writer. But there you are, sometimes things don't happen that should. Actually, in this world, mostly things don't happen that should, and things happen all too often that shouldn't. I attribute that to the consequences of Original Sin. But I digress.
DELORES
"Do you love me, really?" It is a question I hear from her--more often, now. Always I assure her, sometimes with words, sometimes with a kiss, fumbling ways men attempt to allay female distress. I take her in my arms and hold her tight, and glory in the sinuous loveliness of her body against mine, as it was then, long ago and I think, to tell the truth--not that I don't love her--but that I love her more, that I knew her in a different incarnation. She lived in another time and place, and I felt then the way I feel now. I do not tell her where, when and with whom. Surely, she would not understand.
She persists. "Was there someone before me? Was she as pretty as I?"
I could tell her that she was. I could tell her that when we first me I thought that it was a miracle, that she had come back, so remarkable was the resemblance, that it really was Delores who had returned to me after all these years. But I won't tell. I simply hold her close and stroke her long black hair. She is quiescent.
I feel a tremor of fear. Women sense things. The dread overwhelms me that she knows. I fear that somehow I will lose her for a second time.
But for now, she is asleep. I lie awake and remember Delores.
It is a name that has its origins in sadness, and, as it happens it was a time of joy sundered suddenly and turned to sadness.
I saw her first in a Florentine night club that was called, Il Pozzo di Beatrice, The Wall of Beatrice. She sat alone at a table as if waiting for someone. She was dark haired. More correctly, her tresses were long, ebony. She was dressed elegantly, also in dark shades. A tall glass rested on the table, which she sipped from time to time. There were no other uniformed men in the establishment. Like she, the other guests seemed too well caparisoned, too well fed and clothed to be victims of war.
When it became clear the one she expected was not coming, I approached her table and addressed her in my limited Italian. "Are you waiting for someone?"
"For my husband," she said. My expectations were shattered, but she smiled and told me she had been waiting for him for several years. She noticed my consternation, laughed and waved me to the empty seat. She continued, "He was reported missing at El Alamein. We used to come here often." She smiled and looked at me with amusement out of two very wide set blue eyes. It was at that moment I fell in love.
There is no new story here. We danced in perfect harmony. We walked together over the old Roman Bridge. We sipped Lacrima Christi on the Fiesole Hill overlooking the Duomo, the domed Cathedral, from the hills where Boccaccio regaled his friends with bawdy stories hundreds of years ago. We took a place abutting the Palazzo Vecchio, the Old Palace, where Michelangelo's David stood. We were in love, in our sanctuary, in the year the war ended, and the whole world was external to our love.
She asked me frequently if I truly loved her, whether she was my first love and would I come back to Italy for her. I promised always that I would.
One day she was gone. She left a note with a single phrase. "I love you but I must go." No explanation, just a sudden departure and inexplicable cruelty. I was distraught. At this point I blotted the memory from my mind and I turned and looked toward Elsa, who had been sleeping next to me.
She was awake. I was unaware she had been watching me for some time. She looked at me with her very wide set blue eyes. A tear made its way downward. "You were thinking of her!" she exclaimed.
I took her in my arms. She sobbed, "I felt you had gone away somewhere. It was like a bad dream. Don't ever leave me again, not even in memory!"
I pressed her sinuous body against mine and caressed the jet black hair that fell disordered against my breast, and kissed away the tear.
"There is no her, no yesterday," I assured. "There is only one love in my life."
I did not say her name.
Beautiful 😍
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