Chrissie travels to Italy for online boyfriend.
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Chrissie’s fingers shook as she dialled the number on her piece of paper. She listened to the ring tone and her heart almost stopped beating as the voice of a woman answered on the other end.
“Hello, Signora!” she said in her best Italian. “I’d like to speak to Mario, is he there?”
The lady said something fast that Chrissie interpreted as Mario not being there.
“Will he be at home tonight?” she tried, not sure whether she’d said it grammatically correct. Again the lady on the other end spoke too fast for Chrissie to understand. She did think she’d heard a maybe so she decided that she’d call again later.
“Please tell Mario I’ll call again tonight. I’ll call at 8 so I’d appreciate if he’d be home by then.”
She hung up and looked around the airport. She couldn’t believe she’d done it. A week ago, she’d been on her computer, chatting with Mario like they’d done almost every night for over a year. Then the next morning her dad had been called to attend a conference at the last minute and her mother was coming with him. When they’d asked Chrissie to come along she’d begged them to send her on the Italian course in Rome that she’d been begging to go on for so long. She was 21 now and old enough to look after herself for a month in Rome. What they didn’t know was that in a small town in northern Italy sat a 22-year-old Italian with whom Chrissie was madly in love.
Mario and Chrissie had met in a chat room for university students the previous summer. They’d quickly discovered that they had a lot in common and before long they spent hours talking every night. After a while their friendship had turned into flirting and they’d started doing voice chats, even though their command of each other’s spoken language wasn’t great. Three months ago Chrissie had admitted to Mario that she was still a virgin and Mario had returned her confidence by telling her that so was he. They admitted to each other that they were falling in love. Their chats got increasingly daring and on occasion they’d guided each other’s hands during mutual masturbation. Chrissie knew that Mario was the reason she’d turned down all those advances in the past. She also knew that she wouldn’t be able to function properly if she couldn’t be with him soon.
For the last couple of months she’d begged her parents to let her go to Italy, but they’d wanted her home for the summer. It was bad enough that she was so far away during the rest of the year. Mario couldn’t afford to travel across to see her either. Then it had all changed. She’d been hoping to catch him online this last week while all the arrangements were being made, but she knew that he’d been sitting exams and he’d warned her that he wouldn’t be around. So she’d travelled all this way with his phone number on a piece of paper, hoping that Mario wouldn’t have gone off to Paris with his friends yet as was his plan after his exams. Well, she was here for a whole month so she should get hold of him sooner or later, she just didn’t want to waste any time.
A few hours later Chrissie stepped out into the evening heat. The apartment she was renting for the month didn’t have any air conditioning, but like all Italian houses it had been built to stay cool during the hot summer months. The streets were a completely different story. During the drive from the airport to the apartment building she’d figured out why Italians had a reputation as dangerous drivers. The temperature was high and it affected everybody. Even now, at 7. 30 it was still unbearably hot. There was no phone in her apartment. Her landlady had explained that these days all students had cell phones, but Chrissie could go to the station, a 10-minute walk away, where there were public phones. There would also be somewhere for her to get a bite to eat.
At the station, she got out the phone card that she’d bought at the airport and dialled Mario’s number again. She knew it by heart now. Once again she listened to the sound of a phone ringing on the other end. It didn’t take long for a male voice to answer. It sounded like Mario, but she guessed it could be his dad.
“Good evening,” she said. “I’d like to speak with Mario.”
“This is Mario,” replied the voice, making her heart skip a beat.
“It’s Chrissie,” she whispered, with tears falling down her cheeks.
“I’d know your voice anywhere,” he replied softly. “Where are you? I looked for you online last night and today, but you haven’t been there.”
“I’m in Rome.”
“In Rome?” Mario’s voice was full of hope and disbelief. “In Italy?”
“Yes,” she laughed softly. “I’m in Rome, in Italy.”
Chrissie quickly explained to Mario what had happened and how she’d now found herself so close to him, but yet so far. Mario told her that he’d been planning to travel to Paris the next morning, but he would naturally cancel those plans for her. She told him where she was staying and gave him the details of her language school, hoping that he could leave a message for her there tomorrow, and they agreed that she should call back the same time the next day to find out how soon Mario could come to Rome and how long he could stay.
She hardly slept that night. She could blame the heat, the noise of the traffic, the jet lag, but she knew that her insomnia was a direct result of her conversation with Mario. He’d said that he thought he’d be able to come down and see her by the end of the week. She was shaking with anticipation. How would his arms feel around her? Would he want to hug her when he saw her in real life? Would he want to kiss her? Would he want to make love with her? All those things that they’d talked about doing were now on the verge of becoming reality. How would they feel when they saw each other? When they’d first started talking Mario had had a very strong idea of what his ideal woman looked like and Chrissie knew that she didn’t live up to those ideals. Life at college had put a few extra pounds on her, giving her soft and rounded curves and rather big breasts. Her copper coloured hair was straight and as far as she was concerned, her only good feature her beautiful blue eyes were hidden behind her glasses. She was not the supermodel that Mario had fantasised about. How would he react to her when they met? Would he decide that she was a disappointment? Would he regret leading her on?
The next morning Chrissie had a very Italian breakfast of a cappuccino and a brioche at a bar around the corner from her apartment building. She then navigated the streets of Rome to arrive at her language school. She got there early and was ushered into an exam area. Having sat a test and done a quick oral assessment it was decided that she should join the intermediate class. She spent the rest of the morning feeling completely overwhelmed and wondering what she’d gotten herself into. It was so hard, but she persevered. The difficult coursework at least took her mind off Mario. During the break the students checked for messages, but the only thing there for Chrissie was a message from her parents, letting her know that they’d arrived safely. Nothing from Mario. At the end of the class, she spent 15 minutes talking with some Canadian girls who’d also just arrived. They asked her if she wanted to go on a guided tour with them, but she knew that she wouldn’t enjoy it until she had news from Marco. She checked for messages on the way out, but there was nothing for her.
She decided to find a food shop to get some basic supplies. She couldn’t afford to eat out every day and shopping would pass the time and help her practise her Italian. The receptionist at the language school showed her on the map where there was a shop and she exited the school with the map in her hands, trying to get her bearings.
“Chrissie,” said a voice behind her, a voice she recognised. She turned around slowly.
“Mario?”