“You’ll be happy to know that all of our rooms have ocean views, and the view from your room is particularly striking.” With that, she stops in front of a door and pulls a card key out of her pocket. After swiping it over the digital lock, she swings the door open, prompting Matt and me to step inside.
“I’ll leave your additional keys here,” she says, placing two cards on the entryway table. “I hope you enjoy your stay and if you need anything, please don’t hesitate to ask.”
She steps out into the hallway and the door clicks closed behind her, leaving Matt and me completely alone in this deeply romantic hotel room. This deeply romantic hotel room that’s all ours for the night. My stomach flips, so I busy myself by striding forward. I enter the main space of the room a second later and my breath catches. This place is an advertising photo. Seaside flawlessness with a breeze included. All white walls and deep blue accents. The fluffy down blankets on our two full-size beds that look so comfortable that it’s a mystery I’m not cocooning in one or both of them at this very moment.
I move on to the glass-covered desk, which has a bottle of prosecco waiting with two inviting glasses beside it. There’s a plate of chocolate-covered strawberries off to the side, and as uncomfortable as I originally felt around all this extravagance, I’m starting to think I could get on board. It would take time and effort, of course, but I’m willing to put in the work.
Stepping away from the desk, I then walk out through the balcony doors, and I’m not prepared for what I see when I do. Blue. So much perfect, perfect blue. I know that we’re only facing the ocean, but it feels like we’re in the middle of it. Surrounded by it. On a desert island all our own.
I step out as far as I can go and my hands grip the iron railing. Waves collide with the mountainous coastline and the water seems to go on forever. I’ve never experienced this level of natural beauty and I doubt I ever will again. I don’t know how to process. I could laugh, I might cry and both options would be appropriate. I’m still standing in overwhelmed silence when I sense rather than see Matt standing beside me.
“What are you thinking?” he asks.
I try to think of the right response. I should say something clever or funny, but nothing comes to mind. Maybe I don’t have to be entertaining. Maybe I can just be here with him. “Thank you for this,” I say softly.
Matt smiles down at me and steps closer until our shoulders touch. “Thank you for coming with me.” His gaze falls to his hands, and I glance over to see that he’s holding a midsize brown envelope. He opens it up and pulls out a few photos. He flips through them, and I shift closer to look, too.
“These were the last pictures taken of my dad,” he says. “A few months before he passed, when he stopped getting better, he and my mom came down here for a weekend. They asked me to come with them, but I convinced them to let me stay back in Rome with my aunt. It was my friend’s birthday, and I didn’t want to miss it.” I don’t say anything. He looks out at the bay before gazing at the pictures again.
“I was so selfish. I didn’t grasp how sick he was. If I knew what would happen, I would have been here. I’ve regretted it ever since.”
He hands me the pictures and I look through them. His dad on a balcony not very different from the one we’re on right now. His dad smiling on a little boat. His dad on a high cliff, looking out over the water.
“I want to try to re-create the pictures,” Matt says. “That’s why I wanted to come here. I wasn’t there before, but I want to be here now.” He looks at me, and I stay quiet. “Do you think that’s weird?”
My throat feels tight. I shake my head. “I don’t think it’s weird. I think it’s nice. So nice, in fact, that we should start now.” I take out my phone and step back.
“Big smile,” I tell him, centering him in the middle of the photo. Matt turns and flashes me a grin. I make sure to capture it, then move back to his side to show him the image. “It looks good,” I say.
Matt nods and shifts back to gaze out at the water. He’s more vulnerable now than I’ve ever seen him. It doesn’t last terribly long, just a few seconds before his emotions are tucked safely away, and he’s smiling again as he pivots to face me. “So our mission is set. You’ll get your fabric photos and I’ll get my dad photos. I even rented a boat to maximize our chances of success.”
“You rented a boat?” I ask incredulously. “You won’t be the one sailing it, will you? Granted, I’m starting to trust you more, but not with my life on the open seas.”
“A fair concern. Which is why I rented a boat with a captain.”
“That’s good news,” I reply, reaching forward and taking Matt’s large hand in mine. “Shall we?”
He squeezes my hand in response and pulls me toward the balcony door. “We shall,” he says. “Anchors aweigh.”
A half hour later Matt and I are aboard a lovely midsize boat with Captain Sebastian, who was less than thrilled to see us. Once he begrudgingly welcomed us aboard, he proceeded to tell us that we can play whatever music we want on the portable speaker he has for his cell phone, but he got to play the first song, which wound up being “The Business” by Tiësto. An unexpected choice, but I was into it.
We’ve been sailing ever since, and I’ve taken a million-plus pictures already. Every turn we take, every length we travel, is more beautiful than the last and I’m blissfully lost and deliriously in love with the tones and the colors of the sea and the island. My mind is exploding with ideas of how my material might turn out and I’m itching to get back to New York to print it all out.
Even though it’s possible that I’ve already gotten the shot, I keep taking pictures galore as we continue to sail. Options are vital and I need lots of them.
Our speed eventually slows to a near-halt, and I move to sit next to Matt. “Are we going around the entire island?” I ask.
Matt nods. “We will, but we’re stopping at the blue grotto first. That’s where my dad took one of his pictures, right outside it.”
I scour my brain at the mention of the name. “The blue grotto sounds familiar.”
“It’s a famous cave,” he says. “The sunlight passes in through an underwater cavity, which lights it up and makes the water glow blue.” He twists to the left and points off the side of the boat. “That’s the entrance over there.”
My eyes follow his hand and I find the mouth of the grotto set into the coastal mountainside. There’s a flight of stairs from above leading visitors down to the water, but you can only access the cave by boat. About ten men on little dinghies float around outside the entrance, taking on passengers from larger boats or from the stairwell, and then bringing them into the cave. I watch as one dinghy goes in, and the four passengers aboard lie down flat as their sailor uses a rope to pull them inside. Seconds later they’re snatched inside the darkness of the opening and out of sight.
As someone who’s always been a little claustrophobic, I feel woozy at the sight.
My eyes never leave the cave’s entrance as I keep on talking to Matt, my voice sounding shaky, but not overly so. “Just to clarify, your dad took the picture outside the cave, right? Not inside? We can just take the picture here, then?”
