"Marriage is neither heaven nor hell, it is simply purgatory."

-Abraham Lincoln

LUCA

The champagne pops like a Beretta and I'm taken back to the days when I used to be in the field when gunshots rained like hurricanes and if one was new to the game, one might piss their pants with fear but for the veterans, there was a numbness to the scene.

It was a nostalgic feeling, one that seemed to come back to me right now, the feeling of anxiety and numbness, minus the piss of course, though I wasn't on the field, no, instead I was at my wedding seated next to the woman who'd I'd only just begrudgingly recited vows with.

She sat frozen in a state like a subject in a photograph. Pretty, she was like a present wrapped up all nicely in a tulle monstrosity of a white wedding dress. A doll she was with her primped and teased dark hair which was pulled up and away from her eggy shape of a head. The girl, Iris, my....wife, stared blankly as a new, sanded down canvas at the odd wedding centerpiece arrangement of orchids with their Purple Hearts. Crimson roses the shade of a fresh kill. And the innocently shaded lavender irises.

The tension between us was very much contrasting with the high paced blend of classical music that charged the room. Aged wine was drunk and course after course was served to the celebrating wedding goers that did not contain any close friends of either party.

I side-eyed the girl and her big, deer-like eyes, it was as if looking at a newborn doe, fragile and innocent. She was an eyesore, so pure it repelled me. And not for the last time I cursed my decision and my father.

"Would you like more wine?" A squirrely little waiter inquired, a bottle of aged Cabernet Sauvignon in hand.

I sent the bottle of wine a withering look. I did not drink wine.

I needed something stronger to deal with this affair.

"No, but you will be getting me a whiskey neat." I pinched the bridge of my nose as the formation of a headache brewed.

"Yes sir, right away." The wine was tucked away quickly by the man whose hands shook more than the earth during a quake.

The shaky waiter who was about to slither off for my request realized that there was indeed a bride by my threatening side.

He spared her and her half-filled wine glass, a hesitant glance. "Er ma'am, would you like more wine?"

Iris heard nothing. So I cleared my throat at the comatose bride I'd managed to get shackled on to me trying to draw her attention. That was ineffective.

"Iris," I said. Her name rolling off my tongue with more distaste than I'd planned. The waiter who stood to the side, watching the scene as if he wanted nothing more than to escape.

Iris' hand rested gently on the silk dinner table, and without much thought or care, I placed my hand atop hers and leaned in close to her ear, my lips just a few millimeters from brushing her pinna.

With a warm, deep and satiny voice I caressed her name. "Iris."

This produced results.

She recoiled with impressive speeds as if a jolt had brought her back to the land of the living. With eyes wide, she gathered herself quickly and like Picasso, paints on the most perfect smile, one learns from many years of practice.

"I'm fine. Thank you." Iris tells the waiter though it's doubtful she knows what he'd said to her.

The squirrely waiter with the bucked teeth, as if finally freed from our odd pair, nodded and scampered off to get my drink. His speed, impressive. I moved back in my seat away from the girl who cradled her hand in her lap as if nursing it. You'd have thought she'd been electrocuted and not simply touched by the man she'd just been wed to.

I rolled my eyes, at her exaggeration and tried to make small talk with the girl I'd been shackled onto in an event to settle a debt. On normal occasions I wouldn't even bother with her type, wouldn't even glance at the perfect princess but unfortunately, this was not a normal situation.

"So...Iris, I hear you do psychology?" I gave her what I hoped to be a smile but it could have also been a grimace.

She looked at me, her nose crinkled like she smelt something displeasing and her lips pulled down into a frown. "I would prefer if you refrained from speaking to me."

And for a second as she said this all former docility is gone, there's a bite to her tone and clip to her gaze. Something that both intrigued and irritated me.

I ground my teeth behind my smile.

"My apologies."

She said nothing, returning to that comatose state she'd abandoned for a second.

Luckily for me, the waiter had set down my drink and as it had descended on the table just as quickly had it been raised to my lips, in a silent salute to her which she answered with contained hatred, I took a sip of the amber liquid and meditated on the knowledge of how this will be the beginning of hell.

🌺

As the party winded down—Thank God—, Iris and I stood at the exit, the car to take us to our destination waiting patiently as my family stumbled drunk out of their wits, to wish me the best on my wed to the "ragazza che è di perfezione" (girl who is of perfection). A term that I regarded with bitter distaste.

Iris who stood a little off on my left had a perfectly carved smile on her lips as her parents, who happened to be the only ones attending the wedding on her behalf showered her with hushed words and loving pats. My parents on the other hand didn't offer me any loving pats, my mother who was by my father offered me a tiny smile but not much else. My father, the emotionless husk held my gaze with a glare of a thousand burning suns.

It was a warning to me.

To which I responded with rolled eyes at the man. Now impatient with the gathering and it's seemingly inevitable end, side eying, the girl and her parents, I couldn't help but feel as if they'd never stop cooing at her. It was as if she was still a spoiled little girl and not a twenty-three year old woman.

What the fuck had I gotten myself into?

"Apologies, Mr. and Mrs. Harding but-"

"Of course, Luca. How rude of us to take your bride from you." Julius Harding interrupted sheepishly.

I didn't spare him with the pleasantry of saying it was no big deal or I didn't mind, I simply looked at the girl who hugged herself as if embracing a soldier who'd come home from war. She understood, she knew it was time for us to go. So Iris kissed her parents goodbye and half-dragged herself to the car door which had been open since the wedding started two hours ago.

Climbing into the car at the pace of an atm on payday, I got in behind her and shut the door. The congregated wedding goers waving us off, their smiles juxtaposing our own smileless faces. The girl backed herself in the furthest corner of the car as if she were a wounded puppy and me, her assailant. It was irritating and at the same time refreshing, for me, to see a woman wanted to be far away from me, as usually it was quite the opposite. As if moths they were drawn to the power, the riches and the dangerous allure men like me exuded like pheromones.

And that wasn't narcissism, those were facts.

So who was this girl to not want to be close to someone like me?

By the time we reached the airport, my ears rang from the deafening silence and the clattering cans hitched onto to the back of the Royce that announced our matrimony to the wider public. Henderson, the driver pulled the car up on the tarmac next to the aircraft meant to take us to the special destination planned by my mother. That destination was the small island nation Maldives, a sunny scape where sand slipped through toes like ichor and the waters were the shimmering colors of a peacock's fan of feathers.

"Are you coming or not?" I asked expectantly, now standing erect outside the car.

During their drive, the girl seemed to have come to from her comatose state. It seemed she'd finally accepted her reality as being truly reality.

Iris left the car on her own side, coming round to stand by me. I suppose the husbandly thing to have done at that time was to take my bride's hand and lead her to the jet however I wasn't feeling quite husbandly so instead, I walked ahead and she trailed behind, the wedding dress that she hadn't bothered to change out of dragging along.

Dean, the pilot and Anna, the stewardess stood by the stairs, ready to welcome us aboard.

"Dean." I greeted the man who'd been flying me across seas for years.

"Mr. Donario, sir, we're all ready to go."

"Great." I nodded him off, already taking my regular seat by the window.

Anna brought me my regular drink of whiskey neat and I thanked her as her hands grazed mine a little too long. Anna was new, a replacement for the last stewardess who'd gotten too attached to the moments we spent together in the sky. She, Anna was the daughter of a very close family friend therefore those moments would not be duplicated, so there would be no need for another unnecessary replacement.

At 4:30 pm, the wheels of the jet touched the tarmac of the Maldivian airstrip, and by 4:40 pm our luggage had been loaded into the back of the Maserati, I'd rented for the 'joyous' occasion. The girl, who hadn't been spared a glance during the eighteen-hour flight - instead spreadsheets and income statements had been sent doting looks – had changed out of that hideously frumpy gown and into shorts the pattern of a black and white picnic blanket and a plain white tee. A floppy white hat sat atop her curls protecting her head from the beaming sun rays.

"I hope you enjoy your trip, sir." Anna smiled whilst fluttering her lids at me.

"Thank you, Anna."

. . . .

Iris stared out the window as we drove by the large span of the Indian Ocean. Before finally speaking.

"I should apologize for my behavior yesterday during the wedding. It wasn't exactly a wifely thing to react the way I did to you."

Her words of bullet shot through the malice I'd harbored unbeknownst. Though she didn't look at me, I could hear the sincerity in her words.

Not.

Her words were sugarcoated, coated with a sickly sweetness that covered what she really thought. Instead of feeding me what was beneath, she was giving me bittersweet obligation. I could have given her the same but I wanted to break the hard candy shell and see once again that fiery woman who'd looked at me with such displeasure.

But that's what I wanted, my father instead wanted me to play good babysitter and a good babysitter I would be, to clear my debt.

"I didn't mind."

She rolled her eyes, her action reflected by the window as she glanced out at the sea.

We didn't speak after that. She continued to stare out the window until we got to the hotel and even then when I was checking us in, she still didn't speak, I didn't care really, I'd come to find her voice far too annoying due to how fake it sounded.

"Luca Donario." I gave him, the receptionist my name.

"Oh yes sir, the Lover's Idyllic Villa. Very nice sir." He appraised his own services.

"Yes well, I called back the same day my mother did, to book a second villa. And-"

Samir, the receptionist interrupted me. Something that didn't quite sit well with me. "Apologies sir we thought it was an accident and canceled it. And unfortunately, there aren't any more villas vacant." He suddenly became very patriotic.

"You see sir, the Sunrise Pinnacle is a prestigious resort and spa that prides itself on being the second home of many high ranking celebrities and -"

"Yes, Yes. It's amazing," I waved him off and leaned closer. "And you're sure you have no vacant anything? Not even a broom closet?"

My words must have felt like a slap on the cheek to Samir because shock was written all over his face.

He awkwardly laughed. "You are quite the comic, sir."

I pursed my lips and took the hotel's keycard from his hand, resigned with the technicalities. I would share a villa with my wife.

To get to our villa, a chauffeur was called. He had a tiny golf cart and Samir, the receptionist called him Tarik. He was a short, stocky man who was overtly friendly like most patrons at the villa. He was chatty as well and talked our ear off from we got on to the cart to when we got off at our villa.

Since I valued my sanity, I'd already made my way inside.

"You simply must try snorkeling, madam. It's a sight to see." He rambled off to the girl yet another thing we simply had to try.

"Of course, it sounds amazing, Tarik."

"It was lovely to meet you, Madam Iris. I do hope you enjoy your time."

"Thank you." the girl gave a nod to the man who she'd entertained during the journey. "Goodbye Tarik."

Tarik drove his cart away, the girl waving him off. She stood outside the villa and I watched the girl who in turn was watching the sunset. Watching the way the colors blended together seamlessly from vivid orange to a dusty yellow to conclude the day. I wondered what she thought of as she stared at the last light of day.

Did she think about how the sunset marked the end of the day? Was she thinking about what the night was to entail for us 'as husband and wife'? Would she be able to fake her way through that?

I didn't wonder any longer, one, because I didn't care to dwell on her inner workings anymore and two, because it was clear she wouldn't come inside until nature's impressive color show had come to a close. The luggage had been brought in by one of the hotel's happy elves while Tarik talked our ear off. Setting up station with aid from the office I tucked away in my bag, I got to work scanning the investors I would have to negotiate terms with once I'd return from this unnecessary trip.

Before I realized work as it always does seem to consume me. By the time I came to and looked at the clock, it was almost 8 pm. Iris has long since come from outside, but her other means of escape was the bathroom which she'd shut herself within until only a few minutes ago when she'd peeked out.

The screen of the laptop I'd been doing work on revealed the reflection of her buxom figure in a white babydoll. It wasn't a devilishly sexy lingerie. In fact, it left much to the imagination. And painted her like a girl innocent, ready to be devoured by any big bad wolf.

It wasn't ever really a kink of mine, purity that is.

But seeing the girl like that...

Well...

Still didn't do it for me. And it never would.

She skipped over to the bed, sitting on the edge as if she were waiting for punishment from her Daddy. Nibbling at her nail bed, her chew toy whenever she felt either anxious or nervous. Therefore her cuticles would be horrendous at this point.

After half an hour, she laid herself on the bed. Stiff as a plank. And I listened to her bated breath from where I sat.

I would not touch her.

Not now. Not ever.