I arrived hungry. Hungry for human connection. Hungry for something new. Hungry to remember what it was like to be 23. It had been a year of COVID-induced quarantine, of living with my family with minimal to no interaction with anyone my age, let alone of the opposite sex.
And so I arrived for my master’s in this small, dinky town in Emilia-Romagna—a place most would see as a desert, metaphorically speaking—with my senses heightened. I found something to be lusted after in the flour-dusted pizzaiolo (immediately vetoed when he showed up to a date in ripped skinny jeans), in my classmates, and, most of all, in the owner of the cheese shop. A love letter could be written to this shop alone, and although I’ve traveled much of Italy by now, I’ve yet to find one that surpasses its excellence. My weekly run was always a treat, both for the superlative gorgonzola and the chiseled arms (thanks to a climbing hobby) that scooped out kilos of said stinky cheese. Floppy hair and an omnipresent puka shell necklace gave him a boy-bandish charm that spoke to middle-school me.
He mainly paid me no mind—and validly so. I spoke about three words of Italian, and he, one of English. Though that didn’t stop me from throwing on an extra coat of mascara and running some possible conversation starters through Google Translate every time I stopped by. I would order my cheeses, stumble through the phrases I’d “memorized” to no avail, and be on my merry way.
A few months of this and my birthday rolled around. Arriving at the divey bar where my friends and I hung out every night, I caught sight of him in the corner, his forest green apron exchanged for a simple jeans (neither skinny nor ripped) and t-shirt look—surprising, considering I’d never once seen him around town.
“Buon compleanno,” he came up to me. I didn’t even know he knew my name. My tongue loosened by a few too many Negronis, those Italian phrases fell into place and we talked all night before “taking a walk” to “get a bit of air.” We kissed on a belvedere with a view.
He came to my birthday party later that week, and, like teenagers, we made out on the dance floor. The next day, “Will you stop by the shop tomorrow to say hello?”
I didn’t have much time before I left for my internship, but we made the most of it. Lunches on the town, dinners at his (once, radicchio risotto with the aforementioned gorgonzola, our mutual favorite), breakfasts of scrambled eggs because he wanted to try living like an American. When I went by the shop, his aunt would give me free hunks of 24-month-aged Parmigiano. Most of the Italian I know, I learned during this period. Although he signed up for an online English course “for me”, Italian became our primary language.
When he counter-offered an internship at the cheese shop so that I could stay in town, I genuinely thought about it. When I gently refused, sticking to my original plan of Puglia, he helped me move out of my apartment. “Don’t forget me,” he texted on the day I left.
I should’ve. Forgotten him. But he made it hard. Daily texts like “mi manchi più di tutto” (“I miss you most of all”), and, when I questioned my post-grad plans, “rimani in italia con me” (“stay in Italy with me”). I did stay in Italy, but not because of him, and when I returned, he was nowhere to be found. I’d text him for drinks, only to be hit with a “mi spiace, non posso passare” (“I’m sorry, I can’t pass by”). An invite to dinner was met with “stasera non riesco” (“I can’t tonight”).
I saw him again, but only to get some cheese for the road; I left for Rome the day after. A container of gorgonzola was the first thing to populate my new fridge.
