Maria

Chapter 6

"Luca" I whispered.

"Hello Maria" The deep and husky voice felt like velvet in my ears. He had a  very serious look on his face, with his eyebrows furrowed and his eyes resembling of a disappointed mother, I wonder what he wants from me.

"W-what do you want?" I stuttered. At this point my legs felt like noodles and my tongue felt like a bristly sponge as I grow to become more nervous.

"I want you to come with me for a walk" he says with a slight smirk.

"Uh okay" I surprisingly complied. Something in my gut wanted to be around him more even though his presence does seem alarming.

He softly takes my hand and in that moment everything in my mind went blank. Suddenly the music had died down and the voices and laughter became evanescent. It was just Luca and I in that moment. And I didn't mind it, and in matter of fact I pleased by it.  As he takes me out of the crowd of people , I follow him through a series of doors. I couldn't help but think is this what Cinderella felt like? In that moment of meeting the prince, she fell into a spiral of emotions and fell in love with a complete stranger in one night. Even though people had judged her actions for decades I couldn't help but compare this moment to hers.

Maybe I'm just lucky. Maybe not everyone gets to experience what I'm going through right now. What I'm seeing and hearing. And what I'm feeling. What if god plans to only have certain people experience the kind of lust I've developed for Luca. My mind ran rapid with ideas.

We then paused at a dark wooden door and he looks back at me with a wide grin.

"You ready?" he asked calmly.

"Y-yes" I hesitated. He opens the door with his left hand, his right holding mine.

I took a step into the backyard of the mansion, to see the most extraordinary place come into my view. The center of attention was a ravishing and immense fountain that in the crystal clear water was a reflection of the clear sky full of stars, it had looked like painting, so perfect, so unreal, it had looked like a page ripped out of National Geographic.

As we take more steps forward, I begin to notice the neon yellow fireflies dancing around the tall yet skinny trees that shaded the garden centering the light on them. Statues of naked Greek goddess surrounded the grand fountain.

"I wanted to get you out here alone" he says while taking a seat of the fountain's concrete edge letting go my hand.

"Can I ask why?" I said with a hint of fear hidden in my voice. Taken back by my surroundings, I was unaware that we were out here alone.

"I would like to get to know you" he says looking up at the stars and then back at me, I couldn't help but crack a smile.

"What do you wanna know" I asked. I felt like I was in middle school all over again. Texting guys for the first time, desperately trying to find a topic about myself to discuss to make the conversation intriguing, I had hoped that this conversation wouldn't end up like that.

"What do you want to get out of life?" He says looking directly into my eyes. He seemed very interested into what my answer was going to be. Honestly, no one has ever asked me a question like that nor have I given thought to it. It's a very odd yet straight forward question.

But only one thing came into my mind in that moment and it seemed like the perfect answer.

"To find happiness," I pause myself before explaining my answer. I looked at him once more to see what his reaction was and it had amazed me. I've never had a guy be completely in tune with what I had to say, but then I remembered that he did take me out here to talk to me one-on-one so it had made sense.