I watched him watch the football match on the TV screen. Even before he said a word it was instantly clear to me that he was Italian (his shoes shone and he was wearing a pink shirt with a confidence that eludes English blokes) besides he had a unique energy and appetite that seemed to ricochet through the bar and then ping right into my being. I watched as he cheered his team when they made a decent pass, as he pulled at his hair when they let a goal slip through, as he hugged his friend with delightful, firm enthusiasm when his team equalised - and I was mesmerised.

The excitable and exciting stranger seemed to sense I was watching him. He turned and caught me undressing him with my eyes. I wondered whether he knew I was projecting way past the first carnal encounter, down the aisle and straight into the maternity hospital. I was defenceless; his deep, dark eyes stripped me of any ability I had to feign indifference. I fought my instinct to reach out and stroke his glorious bronzed skin. I wanted to run my hands over his well defined and athletic body. Whilst not especially tall everything about his presence seems purposeful and powerful. His being in the bar made me feel strangely safe and excited all at once.

He pulled him self away from watching the football and came over to where I was stood behind the bar. Alison would probably have described him as swaggering, I saw a saunter. He leaned close enough for his citrus cologne to drift into my consciousness.

‘I take a beer and, you too, if you are available,’ he said. He held my eye despite my best intention of dragging my gaze away from his, I found I could not. Did he mean he wanted to buy me a beer? Did he mean he wanted to take me somewhere? Could he mean he wanted to take me sexually? Could he possibly be being to brazen? I hoped so.

‘Where would you take me?’ I asked choosing to understand his comment to mean more than an offer of a beer.

‘Wherever you want. To a restaurant. To a movie. To a new sort of ecstasy.’

He dropped the last suggestion with indecent aplomb and waited for my response with a cool confidence. I should have been offended or outraged. At the very least I should have pretended to be one of those things, instead I offered my phone number.

‘No. I won’t take your number,’ he said firmly.

‘You won’t?’ Suddenly I was embarrassed. Had I got it completely wrong? Had I miss-heard him? Had I imagined the chemistry which was zinging between the two of us? Had the lethal dart of attraction just struck me?

‘I wait here with you until your shift is finished.’

‘But that’s five more hours.’ I objected gently, grinning not trying to hide my amusement.

‘I have forever. I know you are worth the wait. If you give me a number, I call, you might have met another man by that time. I can’t risk it. Rather I wait for you. I must not let this go. I sense it is important.’

I had heard similar before. Italians are prone to this sort of impassioned announcement – it’s one of the things I like about them. But I had never felt such chemistry before. Roberto’s presence made my throat dry.  He’d detonated a bomb of unprecedented excitement. I felt sparkling shafts of exhilaration shoot and spread through my body. Lust lodged in my skull.  Desire drenched my innards. Longing shuddered down every nerve in every limb.

The bar rapidly receded. I didn’t care if there were customers to serve or crisps to fetch from the store room. Suddenly there was only me and this Italian man, everything other was a dull, sludgy irrelevance.

We cleaved to one another for the following five hours. By turn we chatted, laughed and silently stared at one another. He told me that his love of fast cars and football. He introduced two or three of his pals but I could barely harness their names to my memory as he was all consuming and everything other was less. He told me that he’d only been living in England a week but already had an interview for a job in an advertising agency in Soho. 

‘And your family?’ I probed.

‘My family have a business in the wine trade,’ he said simply; then he sipped his beer in a manner which suggested he found the turn in the conversation difficult.

‘A vineyard, how amazing.’ I imagined rows of green vine things, like soldiers in the sunshine.

He shrugged. ‘Not really. Quite normal.’

I could not comprehend how he could describe running a vineyard as normal. It must be the most romantic thing in the world. I assumed he was attempting to be modest. I wondered if they still crushed grapes by stamping in them. Probably not, some European regulation doubtless prevents it but maybe they still celebrated festivals by producing wine through the traditional methods. The Italians are big on festivals. Not that I was sure that I’d actually want to feel grapes ooze through my toes. I’m not really that earthy. Worse yet, someone else’s toes. Yuk. It’s enough to send you teetotal.

He sighed. ‘Actually, I have come to England after terrible argues with my family. I need to prove myself. Make career here.’ I admired his independent spirit and didn’t need to ask for any detail on the nature of the arguments as he added, ‘Sometimes families are stifling. I need to be away from my family for a time. You understand?’ I nodded enthusiastically. Yes, yes I understood. I understood everything about this man. ‘I think you really do,’ he said with a gravely voice that shook with sincerity.

A sincerity that transcended all that had gone before.