Chapter 2

2nd Act.

The second act shows the darkness and the perversity of the tyran Scarpia, who rules upon Rom. Cavaradossi has been arrested and Scarpia gets ready for dinner. At his invitation, Floria Tosca comes to meet him and negotiate her lover’s freedom. Scarpia dreams of abusing her.

We hear Tosca singing in the background.

As soon as the first notes of the act diffuse in the theater, the door opens and the young woman enters. She comes straight to me and takes the very same position close to me that she had before the entr’acte. Tosca enters Scarpia’s office.

Cavaradossi’s interrogation starts.

I do not move at all.

The music follows the torture session.

The young woman glues her body on mine. She does it on purpose, not after some sort of surprise as we both reacted at the end of the first act. She rubs her clothes and her body on me. I position my right hand where it was lying before, very low on her hips. My fingers now slowly caress her hip in a gentle and light movement. She does not move. I approach my left hand as well. It rests on the other side of her waist. I slowly start caressing her back.

She moves slowly to push me back towards the corner of the balustrade. It is much more like some teasing because she also slowly rubs her hips and her ass on me. Hopefully she is a bit shorter than me and her strokes only target my thighs. My overweigh shows with a (modest) belly that rubs against her back. She goes on with her movements and even starts to stand on tiptoes and makes herself taller to rub a much more strategic part of my anatomy with her ass.

I take it for an invitation to go further.

The disposition of the gallery makes us vulnerable to looks on our right side. Other people sit barely half a meter away from us, and other spectators are standing behind them. There is nothing but shadow and empty space on our left side. This is the end of the gallery. In the other part of the theater, the closest people sit quite far away. If they look at the stage, they cannot see us. I have to be careful with what I am doing otherwise hundreds of people will be able to enjoy another show – and to create difficulties.

My hand caresses her left side. Softly.

Sometimes, I have the feeling that she moves on purpose to meet my fingers above her pull-over. I get bolder and touch her bare skin under the sweater. No doubt anymore, she enjoys my caress on her soft skin. My hand moves up to get a feel of her breast, but somebody moves at the very same time and I can only check that she does not wear a bra under her clothes. The hand is hidden under the sweater, but the movement is not very discreet and I prefer to retreat to her waist and the skirt. Here, my hand will be hidden by the balustrade. My exploration of her body will remain unseen.

The sounds of Cavaradossi’s torture have now broken Tosca. She tells Scarpia to look for Angelotti in the garden of the house. Cavaradossi is led to Scarpia’s dining room where he discovers that Tosca has betrayed his friend. Some notes later, an agent announces Napeleon’s victory at Marengo and the march of the French army on Rome. Cavaradossi starts a victory song that is one of the main arias of the play, and gloats to Scarpia that the tyranny is soon coming to an end.