Rosa finished washing her clothes, sighing. She let them dry in the sun and wiped the sweat off of her face. Ever since the death of her husband two years ago, things had never been quite the same for her. She never remarried, and was a single mother for all of that time. But it impacted her son even more than it did her. Tulio was only ten years old when his father died, and while he never witnessed his death in person, he fell into a deep depression when Rosa told him the news. It took him almost a year to recover from it, and even still, it had an immense impact on his attitude. With her husband gone, Rosa was forced to rely on Tulio to bring in extra money for them. However, she was unaware that he was, in fact, a pick pocketer; he had lied to his mother and said that he begged on the streets, not wanting Rosa to be ashamed of him. But poverty wasn't the only hardship the two had to face, far from it; for one, an outbreak of the plague had recently started. Rosa feared that either she, Tulio, or both of them would become infected. She knew that the chances of survival were low, so she became extremely cautious and reclusive. Another thing was the risk of resorting to... older professions if they were low on money. Though she was a devout Catholic, Rosa would be willing to sell her body if times were desperate enough. She knew it was considered a sin, but she obviously would starve to death without money.
Rosa rested in the shade, though prevented herself from drifting asleep. She thought of her deceased husband once more. Giovanni... how she missed him. Rosa started to reminisce about the day he met him.
She was barely seventeen years old. In fact, her birthday had been only a few days prior. She and her parents had been visiting Cádiz and were prepared to head back to Seville. As Rosa was walking on the shoreline, however, she took notice of a crashed ship. She ran to the crash site, hoping for survivors; unfortunately, all men on board had died. All but one... Rosa took pity on the young man and convinced her parents to take him back to Seville with them so that he could recover. So she brought the man to her house. Though she was by no means a medic, she did her best to tend to the man's wounds.
"Grazie," he said to her weakly. Rosa realized he wasn't a Spaniard; he was an Italian, and didn't appear to be fluent in Spanish. However, their languages were similar enough that he learned more of her language fairly quickly. A few days later, Rosa was able to get his name; Giovanni Lombardi. Giovanni wished to return to Italy, but both he and Rosa knew that he needed to make a full recovery in Spain, first. As the weeks passed, Giovanni began to recover from his wounds more, and also learned more of Rosa's language. When he knew enough Spanish, she decided to ask him about the crash. Giovanni reluctantly told her the story.
"I'm a sailor, yes? My crew and I, we come to Cádiz port to make a delivery... but the winds were oddly strong that night, and it was hard to see. I think it was a rock we hit... then everything went black. When I woke up, you were there, and... I was the only survivor," Giovanni said, sighing.
"I'm so sorry..." Rosa placed a hand on Giovanni's shoulder.
"Please, don't be. It wasn't your fault. And besides... if you hadn't found me, I would have died from my wounds, Rosa."
Rosa smiled at him. "Gio... you're still going back to Italy, right? Your wounds have all almost healed..."
Giovanni thought for a moment and sighed. "Rosa, I... I don't know. I've enjoyed your company very much, and everyone else here seem nice too. I know I have my parents and siblings who are worried for me over there, but..." he stopped himself, looking into Rosa's eyes.
"Go on," she said.
"I just want to say that... I love you, Rosa. I thought about you all night. I thought about how I'd tell you this. And, well... I would be willing to stay here just to be with you," he replied. Rosa blushed at this.
"Oh my god, I-I thought... I feel the same way. But I never knew that we both had the same feeling about each other," she said, looking flustered and slightly nervous. Giovanni smiled and just went in for the kiss. Rosa blushed again, this time a deeper red than before.