cargo shorts, admiring the self-assured swagger of this sexy young male animal prowling the streets, like a tiger ready to pounce. I quickened my pace as he passed the steak house and turned onto his side street, and came up closer behind him, and called out softly, “Marco”.

He whipped around, his eyes bright, and he grabbed me and kissed me full on the lips, right there in the middle of the sidewalk. He was holding me as tight as I was holding him, and he said, “I was so afraid that you wouldn’t come back – that it was all just a dream, or a fantasy.”

I looked deep into the blue pools of his eyes, and said, “Of course I came back – and I never want to leave again – not ever.”

And, I never have…