Chapter 16: Double Standard?

September 27, 1994, Munich, Germany

I shook my head and followed Elena into my room. She went straight to the phone and made a call.

“«Eine Flasche Champagner für Zimmer 603 bitte, und einige Früchte ... Ja, das wird gut.»”

She hung up the phone and walked over and sat on the couch.

“Don’t stand there like a fool,” she laughed. “Sit down!”

I went over to the couch and sat down, though not too close to Elena.

“Elena...” I began to protest, but she interrupted me.

“You asked me to dinner, did you not?”

“Yes, I did.”

“Then why are you so surprised that I came to your room with you?”

“Because you’re married,” I said.

“And I said you Americans have silly notions of love and romance! My husband has a much younger girlfriend to keep him occupied when I’m away, and I have had several love affairs while traveling! Neither of us is jealous! Americans take such things far too seriously!”

I chuckled, “You might be surprised.”

“Oh?” she asked, kicking off her shoes.

“I live with four women, three of whom are current lovers and the fourth is a former one. I’m legally married to one of those three women.”

“But your reaction?”

“I don’t have love affairs with married women,” I said.

“So it’s OK for you to have lovers? But not for a woman to do so? You sound like one of those Sicilian peasants who think making love to one of their women is a blood insult worthy of killing you, your family, your friends, and all your neighbors!”

“And the family dog,” I chuckled, “I do know a few Sicilians, so I understand what you mean.”

“I’m waiting to hear this explanation of your double standard,” she said, then continued in a voice positively dripping with sarcasm, “I’m sure it will be quite good.”

Well, I was reasonably sure it was sarcasm, but with her accent and inflection it was hard to be completely sure.

“I don’t have a problem with the idea of you having lovers; not at all. And I don’t care how many. Have a hundred or two, if you wish! My rule is that I don’t do anything with women who are involved with another guy because I can never be sure how he will react or how it will affect their relationship.”

“Bah,” she said waving her hand dismissively. “It’s the same attitude. You don’t touch the property of another man!”

“It’s not LIKE that!” I protested.

“I’m nobody’s property,” she said. “And it’s not up to Beppe to decide who I’m with. That’s for me to decide. Just like it was for him to decide to take a sixteen-year-old lover. Bah, you Americans are as bad as the peasants! They think it’s OK for them to bed any woman they wish, but God forbid a woman takes a lover of HER choice!”

“I’m not talking about property; I’m talking about me staying out of trouble.”

“It works out the same way! You are afraid of the man’s reaction to you touching HIS woman. Property. I thought you were an intelligent, modern man but it turns out you are just a backward peasant!”

I started laughing. She was goading me much the same way Katt, Bethany, Jennifer, and others had. There was no doubt in my mind. She jumped to the conclusion, probably logical, that I’d invited her to dinner because I was interested in a love affair, and she wasn’t opposed to the idea, and had decided at some point during the evening, that she wanted to have one. It hadn’t been my intention, at least consciously, but I could see how, from her point of view, I’d made such an offer. Now I was frustrating her and she was trying to goad me into what she’d assumed I wanted from the start.

“You’re laughing?” she asked.

“Because you’re trying to goad me into something. You’re being purposefully hyperbolic to get me to do what you thought I intended from the start!”

She cocked her head and looked curiously at me, “That truly wasn’t your intent?”

“It wasn’t,” I said. “I enjoy meeting people and I prefer not to be alone for the most part. You seemed nice, so I asked you to dinner. I had no ulterior motives.”

“I suppose there is a first time for everything,” she laughed, her fun, casual demeanor returning.

“You get propositioned quite often?”

“What do you think?” she said with a silly smile.

“A beautiful, raven-haired Italian woman with lovely green eyes, long legs, and a nice figure? Yes, I’m positive you do.”

“But I’m also VERY picky. The man has to be intelligent, cultured, worldly, and not out of proportion. You know, not overly fat. It helps if he’s good looking, but too often ‘pretty boys’ are terrible lovers because they think they are God’s gift to women. They should be professionals, well-groomed, and well-dressed. And they have to be mature. I have one little boy to care for at home, I don’t need another!”

“And your husband is OK with this?”

She laughed, “He’s screwing our sixteen-year-old French au pair! He has nothing to say! And that’s fine. It keeps him off the streets and home with our son when I’m away. I’m still surprised that you weren’t trying to seduce me. It worked, even if you didn’t intend it.”

I chuckled, “Obviously, or you wouldn’t be here and wouldn’t have ordered champagne and fruit.”

“I like champagne, and fruit is a healthy way to restore energy!”

I laughed, “You’re too much!”

“What? Can’t a woman be assertive? Seek out her needs? Are you just another American chauvinist who expects his woman to lie there while he takes two minutes, then rolls over and goes to sleep leaving her unsatisfied? And worse, not caring that’s she’s not?”

Now she wasn’t goading me; she was serious.

“I take it you’ve had bad experiences with Americans?”

“One. But I’ve been propositioned by several and have turned them down because they talked the way you’re talking now.”

“But you’re here,” I said.

“Because at dinner, the bar, and while we were walking, you seemed like a worldly, experienced man with modern attitudes. That changed when you got into the room. I thought your protest at first was because you didn’t want to cheat, and that is something I can respect, even if I think it’s foolish. But you wouldn’t be cheating, would you?”

I shook my head, “No.”

“You still haven’t explained yourself,” she said.

There was a knock at the door and I got up to answer it. A waiter brought in an urn with a bottle of champagne on ice, and a tray with various fruit and two champagne glasses.

“«Soll ich die Flasche öffnen?»” he asked.

“«Ja, bitte, »” I replied.

He opened the bottle and returned it to the urn, setting the cork on the table. I signed the bill and he left the room, closing the door behind him. I poured champagne into the glasses and handed one to Elena.

“It started in High School. The circumstances don’t matter, but I threatened to make love to a friend’s girlfriend and he took serious exception. He roughed me up a little bit and that started me on a course of avoiding girls who were involved with other men.”

“Exactly as I was saying,” she said. “He behaved like a peasant! Next would come the vendetta, from the blood insult.”

Pete was no Neanderthal, but he did have the basic idea that Elena was rejecting. The same was true for most of my friends, with the notable exceptions of Mikael, Katt’s husband, and Josh, Mary’s husband.

“It’s a fairly common idea in the US that you don’t do such things.”

“Exactly as I said!” she repeated. “But I think you are missing something very important. I’m no silly little girl with notions that allowing you to enter me implies you love me! I warned Beppe about that, but that silly French girl imagines he loves her because she surrendered an alleged treasure to him! Now it’s his problem to deal with. I know he’s just having fun, and she’ll go back to France in a year with a smile on her face but her heart broken.

“If he’d taken a married woman as a lover, or at least one who was older than a teenager, he wouldn’t have that problem. I think your Ben Franklin said something about that. Married women don’t behave that way. They know sex and love are different. I love Beppe, and only Beppe. But I have other lovers.”

I laughed, “You do know the last of the eight reasons Franklin gave for preferring older women, right?”

She nodded, “Because they are grateful!”

“And you would be grateful?” I asked with an arched eyebrow.

“That would depend on your skills, which, if you are telling the truth about your lovers at home, I suspect are quite impressive. Or perhaps it’s just impressive,” she said with a smirk.

“A former lover once said it was slightly above average, but I have nothing to compare it to. That was the girl I mentioned before.”

“So you DID have her!”

“Before she was serious with my friend.”

“I still think you have a double standard, even if you refuse to admit it.”

“And you think the only way for me to prove that I don’t is to take you to bed?” I asked.

She shook her head, “That would prove nothing other than you have blood filled with testosterone, like any red-blooded male. And I’m not the one you have to prove it to, anyway. You have to prove it to yourself. And the way you became so defensive, I’d say you realize I’m right.”

“I’ll admit that you’ve made good points. Whether or not you’re right is something I’d have to think about.”

“The sign of a wise man - he listens to criticism, considers it, and, if warranted, changes his behavior. Also the sign of an attentive lover who won’t object to being told what a woman likes. Contrary to what some men I’ve met have said, we are not all the same!”

I chuckled, “I pointed that out to a doctor friend of mine when she complained about her lover. I asked if she had told him what she liked and wanted and she said she hadn’t. I challenged her on how he could possibly know if she didn’t tell him and she pretended to like whatever he did!”

“I’m not sure which of those two is the bigger fool - the woman who pretends to enjoy sex or the man who is ignorant enough not to know and simply assumes what he does will be pleasurable!”

I realized there was one advantage to the young, inexperienced girls I was with - they weren’t really in a position to fake it, and I could gauge reasonably well if I was doing the right thing or not.

“And your husband?”

“A skilled and talented lover. And your lovers?”

“I have NO complaints of any kind,” I said.

“Are you attracted to me?” she asked.

“I think that’s obvious from how I described you before,” I said.

“And the fact I have a husband?”

“I’m considering my opinion on that at the moment.”

“There are actually two things that need to be discussed.”

“Birth control and diseases,” I said.

“Well, if you’re aware of the topics immediately, then I don’t think there’s an issue. I take pills, but I insist on condoms because neither pills nor condoms are completely without risk. As for disease, one can take no risks in this world.”

“Assuming for the sake of argument it’s going to happen...”

She interrupted, “For the sake of argument?”

“Yes. Anyway, I was going to say I had a vasectomy a few years ago, but I’ll use a condom if you insist. As for disease, I have a card in my wallet showing my last test date from July.”

She laughed, “I can prove my test as well. And if I can see the scars, I may let you enjoy me without a condom!”

I laughed in response, “Let me? I thought that was already decided on your part!”

“But not on yours,” she said - a statement, not a question.

I nodded and she shook her head. She opened her clutch purse and pulled out a cell phone. She dialed a number and spoke in rapid Italian, then put her finger over the microphone.

“The silly nymphette,” she laughed. “Breathless, so I know what SHE was doing!”

She moved her finger and spoke in rapid Italian, listened, and then spoke again. She laughed and handed me the phone.

“Hello?” I said.

“Hello! This is Giuseppe, Elena’s husband. She thinks you need my permission to be with her. If she wants to, it’s up to her. I’m not going to come after you with a gun or knife like in the movies!”

I laughed, “«Buona. Molte grazie!»”

“«Tu parli italiano?»” he asked, surprised.

“No; I know a couple of dozen phrases and a bunch of words because my first mentor, God rest his soul, was an Italian from the Old Country. His granddaughter is Chairman of the Board of the company I own.”

He laughed, “Now I understand! I’m not like that; go have fun. I need to go! I was kind of busy!”

“«Ciao!»” I replied.

“«Divertiti!»” he said, and the line went dead.

I handed the phone back to Elena who put it in her purse.

“What does «divertiti» mean?”

“Have fun, you know like a diversion.”

I laughed, “That fits. So he was screwing the au pair when you called?”

“I could hear it in her voice. She’s afraid I’ll kill her and tries to hide it!”

“And let me guess, that’s exactly what you WANT her to think!”

Elena smirked, “It makes it much more fun for Beppe! It’s so silly, really. Right after we hired her, she took my son Tomasso swimming in our pool, and put on this string bikini. It was so obvious that she was showing off her body for Beppe. I wanted to tell her, ‘If you want to screw him, just say so!’ but it was much more fun watching her try to seduce him. It was easy, because Beppe likes the younger girls, though usually ones in college.”

“And I’m sure he plays it up that he’s YOUR property and she’s stealing from you?” I grinned.

“Something like that, yes!”

“How did this come about?” I asked.

“We met in Corfu. We were both there with other people and decided we liked each other and became lovers, even though we stayed with the person we were with for some months afterwards. When he broke up with his girlfriend, we started dating, but I was still with my boyfriend. It was no big deal and when we decided to get married, he didn’t require me to stop seeing Silvio. And I knew he was chasing an American college girl studying in Roma. When I started traveling a lot, we agreed that such trysts were OK on condition of using birth control and being sure about diseases. As I said, it keeps him off the streets! How did your situation develop?”

This wasn’t the time to explain the three-way marriage, and in the end, that didn’t matter to the conversation.

“It’s complicated, but in a sense, not all that different. I had a number of lovers, and when I met Jessica, the woman I’m legally married to, she was in medical school. In the US, doctors in training work 96-hour weeks and are away from home most of the time. So we came to an agreement that I could have other lovers. She has the freedom as well, but doesn’t exercise it. Honestly, as she’s said, when would she have the time?”

“Working that much? Unless it’s another doctor on a hospital bed for thirty seconds, which wouldn’t be worth it, I can’t imagine!”

“It’s not so bad now, but she’s decided she doesn’t want anyone else. She’s free to do it, if she wishes, but she doesn’t choose to.”

“Are you sure she’s not concerned that you’re possessive? That you would take it as a blood insult and use your karate on the person?”

“I don’t think so. She was a virgin when she came to me at twenty-five and she’s always said that no man before me was ever worthy of her. That was nine years ago.”

“Wow. I don’t think I know anyone who’s not a nun who is a virgin at twenty-five, and most of the nuns I know weren’t virgins when they became nuns!”

“Many, if not most, Americans still put a very high value on virginity.”

“That foolish peasant notion perpetuated by the Church? So silly. And you can be sure she’s not carrying another man’s child by waiting thirty days!”

“It’s a bit more complicated than that,” I said.

“Do YOU place that value on it? Will you insist your daughters remain virgins until they marry and brandish a lupara like some Sicilian Mafioso?”

I chuckled, “I have no problem with my daughters taking lovers as soon as they feel they are ready. And with my eldest, I doubt an army of Mafiosi with luparas would deter her!”

“How old is she?”

“Six.”

“And you think that?”

“You don’t know my daughter! Or her mother! She’s not my legal wife, but she’s the most sexually uninhibited person I know and has a sex drive that would tire a squad of US Marines!”

“And you satisfy her?” Elena asked with an arched eyebrow.

“She says I do, and have since she was sixteen.”

“Hmm...” she said with an impish smile. “So, are we going to put that fruit to good use?”

“I was planning to eat some, sure. Unless you had someplace you preferred that banana went!”

Elena laughed and smacked my shoulder, “I see you can be very risqué when you choose to.”

I chuckled, “You have NO idea.”

Elena’s hand went to the third button of her blouse, as the first two were already unbuttoned.

“So...” she asked with twinkling eyes.

How did I get myself into these situations? Not that I was complaining about the availability of gorgeous women who wanted to have sex with me, but in that a simple casual request to have dinner had led directly to this situation. The funny part was I hadn’t been aware, while Elena had been fully aware. I hadn’t even been thinking about it consciously. Had I subconsciously? I didn’t think so, but there was no way to be sure. At this point, it didn’t really matter.

What did matter was my first, and longest-standing, rule. One, that since it had been fully articulated, I’d only violated with two girls - technically with Sofia and actually with Katy. Something Katy said to me back then came to mind. Something she said AFTER we’d made love despite my weak protest. ‘Your rule, not mine.’ she’d said. Was this another situation where I was trying to substitute my own values for that of the girl’s? The answer to that was both ‘yes’ and ‘no’.