“An espresso and a glass of water, please.”
He placed the orders with a bemused waiter, who clearly hadn’t been expecting any customers so early. In fact, I suspected that we’d interrupted his morning gossip with his cronies, a group of grizzled old men who eyed us curiously, but relaxed when they heard Sebastian speaking in Italian. The waiter ambled away with reasonably good grace.
I stared across at Sebastian’s beautiful sullen face, wondering why we were even bothering. I realized his eyes looked rather red: obviously he’d chosen to dive straight into a bottle of whiskey last night, or grappa, perhaps. He stared out at the water, refusing to look at me or to speak. Not a great start to ‘talking’.
Our coffees arrived along with a basket of rolls, and I wondered who was going to break the silence first.
He pushed the basket towards me.
“No, thank you. I’ve already eaten.”
“Did you check out of that place?”
“Yes.”
“Did you pack up my stuff?”
I blinked at him. “Of course!”
“Okay, thanks. What do I owe you for the room?”
“Nothing. Forget it.”
“Just tell me what I owe you, Caro.”
“Seeing as you didn’t stay in it, I don’t see why you should pay.”
“Is this how you’re going to be?”
“How would you like me to be, Sebastian? Because, honestly, I just don’t know.”
He grabbed a roll and started tearing it into pieces.
“Look, maybe we should just cut our losses,” I said. “I’ll get a cab to the airport and you can… do whatever you want, Sebastian.”
For a moment I thought he was going to agree, but then he looked down at the crumbs on his plate.
“I don’t want you to go,” he muttered.
I waited for more: an explanation for his behavior, perhaps. But he was silent.
And then realization hit me with the force of a Sherman tank, why he was struggling to find the words: he’d never done this before. Ever. He hadn’t had a girlfriend in any real sense of the word since he was 17, and that relationship had ended abruptly without any desire for reconciliation on his part. From there, he’d plunged straight into a turbulent affair with me, which hadn’t exactly honed his relationship skills either. By his own admission, he’d fucked Stacey’s best friend as his version of solving their problems. He had no clue how to cope with the complex emotions of an adult relationship. Last night, his first reaction had been to run and hide in a bottle. No wonder he was finding this so difficult. As far as relationships went, he was on virgin territory.
I considered the fact that he actually wanted to talk to me was a step forward.
I’d been married for 11 years, and although that had ended in dismal failure, at least I had some vague idea of how relationships worked, or should work. And I’d dated two guys since Sebastian. Sort of. Sure, those hadn’t panned out either, but for quite mundane reasons. Bob had moved to Cincinnati with his job; and Eric had traded up to a younger, wealthier model; I didn’t count the one night stand with Allessandro, a reporter I’d met in Mexico. We were still in touch, occasionally.
“Sebastian, you’re going to have to tell me why on earth you’d want me to stay,” I said, gently. “Last night you said some pretty unpleasant things: and I’m not going to accept your explanation about having drunk too much. It’s pretty clear that you’ve been hanging on to a lot of anger – towards me. And I don’t know what I can do about that.”
He slouched down in his chair, looking for all the world like a sulky teenager. He seemed to be waging some sort of internal battle, but eventually he straightened up and looked me in the eye.
“Caro, did you really try and find me when I turned 21?”