Complete.

Complete from our immaculate meal.
Vino, Bread and Olive Oil, Fried Calamari, Spaghetti Bolognese, Tiramisu.
We vow to indulge ourselves with one last drink.
The square is filled to the brim with young attractive locals.
Italiano fills the air like words on a menu from the family owned pizza joint I’ve frequented since a child.
We are painfully aware of just how underdressed we are amid the sea of expensive Italian wardrobes.
Versace, Dolce and Gabana, Gucci, Roberto Cavalli.
I had only witnessed most of these names in fashion magazines.
Here, people will skip a meal, walk for a week, just to afford the latest fashions.
In my flip flops, warehouse denim and naked lips, I order a Prosecco and Cab.
A nearby man mimics my undeniable California accent.
Overcome by the sheer genius he possesses in the Classic Shakespearian Dichotomy of Tragedy and Comedy, he laughs hysterically.
“Can I get a glass of Prosecco and Cab?!?!”
He even has a difficult time finishing the sentence.
I obviously mispronounced a few items of the local color.
I am made painfully aware that I am underdressed.
We sip our large glasses and not so large servings.
I finish mine first.
It’s not a race, but I always win.
We smoke a celebratory cigarette for a day well done.
I don’t inhale.
I just keep my hands preoccupied and my mind less distracted.
Job well done, Philip Morris. Job well done.
It grows late.
The square has still not cleared, but rather grown in numbers.
We quickly realize that this is the “Before Dinner Drinking Period.”
As this same congregation inhabited this place even before we chose a restaurant.
We return our glasses to the bar and resume our exodus to our outlying hotel.
Complete.