spring in verona was awfully beautiful

most of dario's friends just accepted the fact that the seasons were changing and that the time of the tourist was approaching, it happened every year

but he always appreciated it, made sure to capture the beauty of the blooming flowers and shortening skirts or dresses in his little notebook, scribbled lines of poetry amongst tiny sketches of his surroundings

tourist season was always fun, that everybody knew; pretty girls - and boys - visiting the city where romeo and juliet were said to have lost their lives to the pitiless grasp of love

gino, one of dario's best mates was a real ladies man, charming the foreign girls with his italian accent and the smooth way he talked, calling them all sorts of nicknames

not that dario wasn't capable of that, oh, he certainly was, but he simply had not met someone - especially a mere tourist that would leave at the end of the season anyway - that he was willing to give as much time and passion as he did his notebook

if he was honest, he was even a little bit afraid that if he ever did, he'd end up having to write about his own experience like shakespeare did about romeo, and that was the one thing he did not want in his usually-bright notebook; heartbreak

there was no place for sorrow inflicted by a lover between the small doodled flowers and figs

a warm evening in april, the perfect time to sit at the piazza delle erbe with leo and rocco, listen to ABBA and watch the 10th grade of a school trip admire the square

while leo was calling his girlfriend, arguing about their shared car, dario's pen scratched over the rough pages of his book, writing a few lines that'd found their way into his head when he'd spotted you

he was so caught up in his work, that he hadn't even noticed you he had been writing about coming up to him

the sight of the page was replaced by a phone screen, his eyes focusing on google translate

"can you buy us wine, please?" had been translated into Italian; "puoi comprarci del vino, per favore?"