January 16th 2003

"So what do you think of the blushing bride?"

Maximus asked thoughtfully as we undressing for bed. Lily was flat out in her small child's bed across the room, breathing heavily in her sleep, her hair a wild mess of curls on the pillow and her thumb in her mouth. I covered her over and slipped the thumb beneath the pillow. She grunted and pulled it out to curl up in a ball and carry on sucking. I gave up.  I turned as Max dropped his pants and ripped off his shorts. He hates to wear them and cannot wait to strip the encumbrances of modern clothing from him.

Walking to the bathroom, peeing noisily, he asked again. "Well, what do you have to say?"

I walked in and sat on the edge of the bath, catching my reflection in the large mirror. I was wearing a light cotton strappy vest and a little pair of shorts and idly wondered if Max was going to be in the mood tonight. Last night we had been exhausted; Lily had been wakeful and had ended up sleeping between us. No sex. Somehow I knew tonight he would be expecting some fun and games. "She's very beautiful. Voluptuous. Exactly what Jack would go for, I think. He loves those Spanish ladies..."

"Beautiful indeed." Maximus chipped in. "No doubt beautiful but...Jack is a fool in love and with money. How long has he known her? A matter of weeks and he proposes? Why doesn't he just take his pleasure and be more circumspect?"

I tutted and put my arms round his waist as he washed his hands. "You asked me to marry you after six weeks. Come on, Max, don't be a hypocrite."

"That is entirely different. I knew I was going to marry you from the first..."

"Well, I didn't and I think Jack knows his own mind, don't you? What are you getting at, Max? Something's bothering you."

"I am not sure. She reminds me of a woman I once met long ago. I was a young soldier- a very junior cavalry optio. On leave in Tarracona- near modern Barcelona, I believe...I had just sailed in from somewhere I was stationed- north Africa. Anyway...I was in one of the taverns by the port with a few comrades...you can imagine our mood. Nine months with the legion and our first real taste of freedom. I had money in my pocket and and...well...you fill in the rest..." he grinned cheekily and I stroked his cock suggestively.

"Something to do with this fella, no doubt..." I murmured appreciatively.

He turned and stroked my hair, absentmindedly running his hands down my arms and arousing himself on my body. "I met this woman- she was a wild beauty, traveling with some sort of players...you know the usual detritus of the world that hangs around in such places? I smiled at his tone; he can be so judgmental. "She was beautiful and bewitching, small, fragile, swelling breasts overflowing her bodice, eyes flashing with promise. I was flattered; she came straight to me, ignored my friends and we left shortly afterwards. I remember little else. I may or may not have had my pleasure of her but the next thing I knew it was the following morning and I was lying in a filthy ditch outside the town. I had lost my money belt. A whole season's salary gone. The little bitch had drugged and robbed me- maybe even charmed me- I do not know..."

I repressed a giggle. "So you were rolled over by a pretty wench. Wouldn't be the first young man in this world. What's that got to do with Isobel?"

"I don't know", he said gruffly, "A feeling, nothing more. Isobel is very like her-both physically and in her expression- it is quite uncanny. She is charming and pretty and appears to adore Jack quite openly and yet...I saw her looking at the other men and the appraisal she gave them. It was beyond sisterly..."

"Did she come on to you? Is that what you mean?" I felt a stab of annoyance that she might have been trying to undermine me on such an occasion.

"She looked at me. As if she could see my soul. Just as the other one did. Knew what I was thinking. It was most disturbing. I thought I heard her laugh at me- but it was in my head- and she merely smiled and moved on. I felt then that she was challenging me and I felt a shiver of fear. I shall pray to Hecate and Diana of the night to ward off her influence if she should be what I think her to be..."

Fear? Maximus feel fear? I was a little ill at ease but wondered if this was just his occasional tendency to superstition showing. He has a certain naivety over such things, as all people did in his day, and he is reluctant to break taboos or tradition. Perhaps this was one of such irrational moments.

"I'm sure it's fine. She's just new and you are a splendid spectacle for any woman. That is really a pretty fantastical notion, Max. You were once slipped a mickey and rolled over by a sharp whore and her mates? Nothing to do with this. Come...let's go to bed...while Lil is dead asleep, remind me what makes you such a splendid specimen..."

Maximus' mind soon slipped from Isobel to me; he was already erect and assailing me before we left the bathroom. His left hand crept up the loose opening at the top of my sleep shorts and his middle finger was inside me with rather an insistent urgency as his other hand cupped my breast.

"Careful, Max...can't you take your time? How about a little lovemaking first?" I complained.

He grunted and pulled back. "It's late. She will wake if we are too noisy..."

I stomped out, annoyed by his pathetic excuse. "That has nothing to do with whether you can actually try to turn me on or not! This just about you getting your kicks - or do I get a say?"

He paced up and down. "Uma! Be reasonable. I'm sorry- I was just...hasty...for once..."Then he said no more and walked to the bed, hauling back the covers and getting in. He was sulking now.

I climbed in at the other side and picked up a novel, pretending to read. He rolled over and feigned sleep. Suddenly he turned back. "I am sorry. I didn't mean to ignore your desire. I was just over eager. I want you. Where is the wrong in that?"

I threw down the book and slithered down to lie in his naked arms. "I'm so sorry, Max, I think I'm overwrought. I have been feeling a little snappy all day..."

"Are you due to bleed? You know how difficult you are then..."

I smiled. "You have such a way with words, Max. No, not for another week. Just tired I think. It's been hectic."

"Yes." He ran his hand down my body and eased closer. "You should take more care of yourself. Just in case. You want to be strong in case we decide...."

"Decide what? Is this going to end up in the usual argument? Max, I don't want to have another baby this year. Let me take this slowly. Lily is not quite two yet. I have just got her out of nappies and such. I want to enjoy her before I go back to all that...."

"We are none of us getting younger! Do we have the luxury to wait? Say it is another girl...?"

I pulled away from him to sit up. "Is that a problem? We keep trying till we have a son, is that what you mean? A baby without a dick is somehow second rate?"

He threw himself back on the pillow and grunted in annoyance. "You know I love my daughter quite as much as I could love any son...but a son is...a son is a man's line...his name...you know how I feel about such things."

The trouble was, I did. His words might have put the backs up of most modern women but they were not meant in his mind as we would take them. Sons mean the future to a Roman; daughters, no matter how well loved, mean someone else's line. I cannot change that notion in his head. I have to accept that his world view is singular and has a right to be respected, even if it wearies me sometimes.

"I know, Maximus..."I rolled back over him and rested my arms on his brawny chest. " I do appreciate how you feel. Just give me a little time...a few months... until she is a little older and begins kindergarten...let me have that space..."

He lifted me by my hips and placed me on his body, his cock, still semi-erect, trapped between us, "I will do anything you ask, Uma...you know that. Just give me a son..."

How can you really argue with a man like Maximus when he asks you something straight from his heart? When I think of all he has suffered, I feel so humbled that my own selfish twenty first century issues of independence and freedom of choice stifle my natural urge to be his partner. I fell upon him and kissed him, writhed on his groin sensuously and let him know my true self by my actions not my words.

"I promise...soon...everything...anything..." But words soon failed me as the sweep of our passion took us to places far away from the world of mere speech. He is master of me and his touch still excites me in ways I had never known existed. As he ploughed into me and I rose and fell in his arms, I knew I could never really hold out against his will. I knew I never really wanted to. You take your choices in life and I never pretended that marriage to Maximus would be easy or smooth-sailing. But the rewards, oh my God, to be loved like this, is worth any price. I care not what the current politically correct stance would have me say. He is my man and he is worth any sacrifice.

May 2001

Morning and soft light dappled through the lace curtains that framed the open French windows leading out to the balcony beyond. I could smell the scent of lemons on the breeze.  It was already warm, even though it was not yet eight o' clock.

The room was dim despite the shaft of morning light that danced on the counterpane. It had an aura of dreamlike reality about it as if dreamscape and waking world had somehow fused into a new reality. I couldn't quite manage to grasp what the explanation of it all was; the answer danced away from me as I tried to scoop it up.

I stirred and tried to move but seemed pinned down by a large weight.  It took my sleep- soaked brain several seconds to register the cause of my temporary paralysis. Turning my head I saw the body sleeping wrapped around me and clarity broke over me like a shower of stardust. Maximus. My dream was real. Last night had really happened. We had made love like we were the only man and woman in the entire world - or that's how if had felt to us at the time. I relaxed and watched him sleep and marveled at the miracle that had brought him to me. There was nothing as perfect as he in the entire universe.

But I had to return to the mundane - a pressing need to pee. And it was difficult to extricate myself with his leg wedged firmly over my bladder. I wriggled and he moved slightly, whispered something in my ear, but held on. Despite my discomfort, I smiled and smelled his maleness- warm musk, the trace of his aftershave and the unmistakable perfume of sex, rich and ripe on both our bodies, our lips and the sheets soaked in our essences. It smelt like the finest fragrance I had ever known.

I pushed gently on his knee, stroked the hair of his upper leg and he grunted, finally giving way just a bit, but only to reposition  his leg down toward my thighs. He was determined, even deep in sleep, not to let me go. I tried to slip from his grasp so I could roll out of bed, but his hand clamped firmly around my waist.

"I have to pee, Max," I said. "I really HAVE to pee!"  He sighed, some part of what I said reaching his brain, and he relaxed his hold to roll onto his back and sleep on. Wriggling to my feet, I staggered forward, suddenly aware of how weak I was and just how much my body ached. "Oh my God!" I thought to myself, "We did us some damage last night..."

Zigzagging across the room, my right hand clutched to cup my groin as what felt like a Niagara Falls of stale semen trickled down my legs, I headed for the bathroom. Once inside, I sat down and peed. It hurt. I was red raw and swollen; it felt like I had been stretched beyond repair.

In the dark of the bathroom, I stared at the wall before me.  Then I started to giggle. Memories were coming back to me and I was having difficulty believing what I remembered. My disciplined, serious minded lover, so taciturn and controlled, had unleashed a different man inside him last night; we had enjoyed the most wild, erotic and dirty sex I had ever known- not to mention the most romantic. I had been in love yesterday when I walked down the aisle and answered "I do." But compared to how I felt this morning - just twenty-four hours later- that emotion already seemed shallow and insignificant. I hadn't known or even guessed the true nature of this wonderful man. My god among men was now my sex God also. I heard the bed creaking and it brought me around; he must be waking up and here I was looking a mess. I finished, mopped up, flushed and washed my hands, standing at the sink, seeing a shadow of me reflected in the mirror.

My eyes moved slowly down my body. I could see down almost to my knees. I have never felt this way in my life - to be in a place where I'd be feeling proud to have such evidence of love on my body. My pale skin was tinged red here and there with patches of beard burn- mostly in intimate places, around my mouth, my breasts, at the top of my thighs. The very image of it brought a flood of moisture to my sex and a lurching excitement in my core.  My neck was mottled with love bites and there were others scattered around my belly. I blushed but felt no shame- I adored the signs of his possession of me.

At that moment, I caught the movement of his reflection in the mirror behind me and I watched him move into the bathroom until he was standing behind me.  He stood at the toilet and urinated, legs akimbo and holding himself with no sense of arrogance. He was just being a man. Our eyes met. I saw the same expression in them as in mine. Amazement and desire, love and pride.  I noticed a livid bite mark on his chest and a few bruising kiss marks around his neck; even his cock looked tender and I saw him wince slightly as he held it - we had both marked each other in last night's frenzied love.

His eyes studied every bruise he'd put on me. He touched his fingers along the bites and the red raw patches. Stepping to my side, his hand dropped between my legs, prodding me gently to widen my stance so he could see what visible damage he had done there. He grimaced at the swollen flesh but it excited him; he was getting an erection and the sight of it made my insides contract.

"I love you. I have never dreamed such a man as you existed," I whispered as he pulled me against his body. I lay my back against his chest and turned my face to his; he jerked it back softly so that we could watch each other in the mirror.

"And you are the most beautiful woman I have ever seen," he sighed into my ear. I saw his eyes. The bright shine of tears sparkled in them. He had cried last night and so had I; Maximus, as all men of his culture, did not fear tears and the sight of them did not seem to me to make him weaker- just the opposite. He was man enough to share his deepest emotions with me. With me alone. His love for me was vast and limitless- it almost frightened me in its all-encompassing intensity.

Stroking me softly, soothing my tender flesh with his rough hands and murmuring sweet endearments, rolling my breasts in his large palms, he leaned me forward against the cool marble of the counter. I was wet already and still glistening with his ejaculate from the night before- his fingers tested me and helped to widen my legs and he slipped in. I gasped- it did hurt- but when he went to pull out, I shook my head and gripped him tight. This was the pain of love- real, raw, vital and pulsing. I wanted it. I had never felt so alive before.

He was gentle and tender, cushioning my body with one arm while he slowly rotated and hilted. He did not pound me as had done the night before when both of us were too far into our desire to hold back. This time he soothed me with his body as a mother might rock her baby. I was his precious girl and he simply wanted to use his body to show me the words he found so difficult to say.

I was his home.

I was his wife and the hope of the future that he had never believed he would have.

I arched against him, insensible to the sensitivity of my bruised flesh and received him in. We rocked to and fro and he moaned. I whimpered. He called on the gods. I prayed to Jesus. We used each other's names like a mantra to beat the rhythm of our love.

By the time we came, we both could hardly stand. Sinking onto the unit, Maximus barely managed to hold me upright. He said he would have to come out, I begged him to stay inside, but he could not and he slipped from me, a wet trail of love trawling down my thigh.

With a quick movement he gathered me up into his arms and carried me to the shower where under warm jets of water he knelt and washed me with a soft cloth, cleansing his seed and gentling the inflamed skin. Then he wrapped us both in towels and carried me back to the bed where he patted me dry and  covered me over before drying himself off and crawling in next to me. He held me close; his lips planting tiny busses along my forehead. "I will give you everything you need, Uma. You will never want for anything again," he vowed.

I smiled and stroked his face. "I have everything I need right here in this bed. All I ask is that you never let me be alone again. I didn't know how much I longed for you until you found me."

He did not answer, merely let out a deep sigh and tightened his hold on me; we both fell back to sleep, safe in each other's arms.

The rest of the ten days followed in a dreamlike perfection. Swimming in the cool clear waters, fooling about in the waves, strolling along pebble beaches, boat trips to Capri and the tiny islands of Il Galli, wandering down the narrow streets of the town, through alleys and squares that had been built five hundred years ago and were still occupied as homes and businesses, drives to tiny villages perched impossibly on the terraced heights of the imposing cliff tops. We took the ferry to Salerno and the taxi to Paestum, the great ruined Greek city with its incredible temples and swimming pools. I watched Max's face; he shrugged. "Greek cities like these were mostly in ruins in my day. No one had lived there for six hundred years!" I laughed and realized he was right. Even I had fallen into the trap of seeing the ancient world as some amorphous homogenous lump when it was in fact the story of the development of civilisation and vibrant dynamic forces that ebbed and flowed just as much as in our current world.

But Pompeii affected him - as did Herculaneum. There he saw the remnants of his world, walked along streets of shops similar to ones he had once known, looked into houses and temples and saw his reality. He was quiet and said little. In the gladiator barracks at Pompeii, a smaller and more open-aired establishment than the foetid cells of the Colosseum, he stood, head bowed.

"Are you OK?" I whispered, my lips close to his ear.

"Yes," he smiled. "Just praying for the spirits of the departed. Many men died here. It could have been me." He took my hand and walked away without a backward glance. "But I didn't. They did. It was not my time. Now I know that my destiny is still to come and we never know what life will bring. Most assuredly pain and suffering- for we must all prove ourselves- but there are rewards, there is pleasure. One must never lose hope, as once I did."

I felt that at last he had reached acceptance of his trials and had embraced a reason for his survival- even an explanation for why some must suffer for others to thrive. The man I was with was no longer the emotionally scarred silent warrior that I had met. He had reached catharsis and his true nature was beginning to bloom once more. If I had any part in that, then I was proud; it was the most important thing that I had ever done.

Maximus is a very amusing man with a dry and laconic sense of humour. He can also be playful- like a large puppy- and loves to use his strength. He picks me up and throws me over his shoulder, carries me on his back across the beach, launches me into orbit in the sea to come down with a splash. It is a side of him I never imagined- but it is there. Although he can be quite reserved in public, he is not without his moments of spontaneous demonstration- buying me a whole arm full of flowers, asking a mandolin player to serenade me, suddenly kissing me as if he cannot contain himself. I suspect he won't behave like this when we are home- here he feels incognito and free. Before those who know us, he will always treat me with respect and distance- even more so now. I am his wife and the more uninhibited we become in our intimate knowledge of each other, the more proper will be his behaviour before the world. Such was the way of his time.

But those ten days were quite different from later or before. I think he was just so happy all the time and it was an emotion he wasn't really able to deal with. Every time I think of him that trip, I think of him laughing. He was always laughing. Mornings in his arms tangled in sheets and legs with Max smiling lazily, watching me wake up grumpily as usual. His playful grin when he pulled me into the shower with him, or slapped my bum as I walked past; the shy smile when I caught him gazing at me while I was eating. The giggle when he teased me or splashed water all over me in the pool. The dirty laugh as he attacked me in one if his caveman moments. Walking towards him in the square after I had been shopping and seeing the light dance in his eyes as he watched me approach. The full strong laugh when we shared a joke or saw the humour in something we observed or did. It was like as if another man had possessed the serious, grim-faced Gladiator but, of course, that was not the explanation at all. This was the real Maximus before his life had become a nightmare of pain and bitter revenge. He had found his true self again.

We couldn't get enough sex. I mean- it was actually quite worrying. I thought one of us would probably kill the other before the honeymoon was out. I just couldn't stop him and well, every time he came up for air, I just wanted to do it all again. I don't how his engine could produce spunk that fast...I must say, he ate enough for about three men but then I was ravenous all the time, too. I supposed that after all these years of abstinence he simply was making up for lost time and it had been a dry season for me as well. Nevertheless, we were pretty out of control a lot of the time and regular trips back to the room were common. We would be out of our clothes and into each other's at the drop of a hat. Sometimes we didn't make the room. We did it in the sea once or twice on remote beaches, a cave on Capri, the changing room of a rather elegant lingerie shop in Sorrento, the restroom of a restaurant in Naples and in a field somewhere. I also gave him some oral relief one night at the opera staged in the grounds of a Roman theatre. We had the VIP box.

We were lying in bed one morning trying to recover when I raised the issue of our apparent sexual obsession with each other. Maximus was leaning against the ornate wooden bed head, one leg bent and his head resting back, taking steady breaths; I was face down on the pillow next to him. Struggling onto my elbows, I muttered... "You're going to kill me, Max."

"Not if you don't kill me first," he grunted and eased back his skin, wincing at the tender flesh. "I am ruined. I swear that it will fall off if we don't take a break..."

I rolled onto my side lazily and had a look. It did look red and the skin beneath his head was split slightly. I pulled a face. "God only knows what my cunt looks like then. That is the actual field of battle..."

He laughed throatily at that. "Well, I always get a few wounds but I never lose the war..."

We lay back and rested, too exhausted even to wash. "Maximus...how long was it actually? I mean... you mentioned not far short of three years in your film and then it must have been going on for two years as a slave and then it is a year since you arrived....almost six years? Without sex? How did you manage?"

He made a slight chuffing noise in his throat, the one he always makes when he is uncomfortable with the line of conversation. I saw him look over at me with his tightlipped face on. "A man manages."

I snorted and wriggled my legs in amusement. "Manages? Is that Max- speak for having a wank?"

"Uma...must you be so crude? If you mean did I...seek relief in my hand..." he paused and spoke the words through gritted teeth. "...the answer is...rarely."

I shot him a look. "Rarely? So what did you do? Put up with it? Jesus, it's a wonder you didn't explode..."

"Don't be so ridiculous, woman. Use your imagination. A man like me masturbate?" He got out of bed and walked to the bathroom; I lay back and wondered what he meant. Jumping out of bed, I ran after him and sat on the edge of the bath as he peed.

"What do you mean? Use my imagination? You didn't wank, you didn't explode...so what did you do?"

This time, there was no reply and the face said it all. He stepped into the shower and started to wash himself. I waited outside until he had finished and then took his place. I was thinking and trying hard to reason my way out of this one. He didn't mean what it sounded like. The film was pretty clear on that. Max refused Proximo's offer of a girl or boy. He shrugged away the attentions of whores. He was offended by Lucilla's comment about rich matrons being pleasured by gladiators. He might have kissed her but he took it no further. Maximus was an honourable man.

What does that mean in Roman terms? I applied my scholarship to the issue. Romans treated sex like a bodily function- abstinence was actually damaging to health, excess was debilitating to the moral fibre of a man or woman. Good men were sensitive to the feelings of their wives but they did not refrain from necessary copulation. The taking of a slave or prostitute, the keeping of a mistress or catamite were seen as appropriate ways of dealing with the sexual urge. How did that transfer to Max? He was a typical Stoic, follower of the exceptionally disciplined and moral Marcus Aurelius. Aurelius had a wife and many mistresses. He had fathered lots of children, legitimate and illegitimate. He certainly didn't regard celibacy or fidelity as necessary. He even tolerated his own wife's affairs.

Was Max so different from the rest of the men of his time? Or was I missing something?

I dried off and slipped on a bikini and sundress; Maximus was on the balcony reading. "Max...did you ever take a woman after you left home that last time?"

"Will you not leave this topic alone, Uma? It is none of your business." Max had never reacted so dictatorially to me before.

"Don't avoid the question."

"Yes." There was a pause while that one sunk in.

"But...you didn't succumb to temptation when you were a gladiator?"

He put his book down and looked across. No reply.

"But...you told Proximo you didn't want a girl or a boy. You put that disapproving face on..."

"As I recall I didn't answer him- just as I am not answering you."

I gave him as blank a stare as he gave me. "So, you did have women in the cells. You did pleasure women who came in and paid for you?"

He stood up and turned his back. "And if I did? Why should I not? What comfort was left to me in life?"

"Max- I'm not judging you! I don't blame you. I just hadn't realized. When you said 'it has been so long" I thought you meant since you know...with your wife..."

He turned back and walked over to me. "You are my wife now. I meant so long since I had felt love, tasted the body of the woman I love, rested inside her...that is what I meant..." His fingers played with strands of my hair.

I smiled at him but then a thought struck me. "When you crossed...what did you do then?"

He shrugged. "What I always do."

"You mean you slept around- whores, girls you picked up?"

Another slight hitch of his shoulders and tilt of his head. "A man doesn't discuss this with his wife."

I sniffed. "I'll bet he doesn't. So you had plenty of sex until you met me, right? And then you went cold turkey?"

"Cold turkey?"

"An idiom. Means you went without very suddenly. You renounced the pleasures of the flesh? On the principle that we remain pure until we married?"

"That  I remained pure?" He repeated my words with a slight mockery which he quickly closed down. The grimace that followed his words showed me he had detected his own error.

"Oh no...oh no, Max...oh please...oh no..."My hand flew to my mouth to stifle the cry. Realisation swept over me then. I knew it as clearly as if he had spoken the words to me. "You've been fucking around all the time, haven't you? All that shit about saving ourselves? It was about your notions of feminine purity - not about you. So what did you do? Pick some tart up after you left me each night and let her suck you off? You bastard, you bastard...you complete and total bastard..."

He tried to place a hand on my arm and I swatted him away. Running out, I picked up my bag and made for the elevator. A group was entering as I ran up and they held it up for me. The doors closed immediately and took me down to reception.

A day tour was just leaving for somewhere- I paid and got on. I didn't care where I was going- anywhere. Just to get away from him. I felt sick. I felt like a fool. I had adored him for his amazing control and strength. I thought he had waited all those years, faithful to the memory of his wife until he had fallen in love with me and then he had still struggled with his honour code to ensure he did the right thing. I thought I had found the one man who was different from all the others. But all the time it had been a sham. He was just like other men- worse in fact. They at least regarded my rights to my body to be my own. Maximus had no such concept. The dice always fell in a man's favour.

I stared out of the back window of the air conditioned coach as it negotiated the hair pin bends of the stunning Amalfi Drive. But I saw nothing. Round and round in my head, I played out the events of the last seven months and began to reinterpret them without the tint of my rose-colored glasses. If he had only said something before. If he had only tried to explain how he felt. I would have understood. I knew his world and the way it worked. Why did he not give me a chance? Would he always act as if that was his right? Would I have to worry every time he was away from me that he would be unfaithful? Even the worse scumbag from my era would know that marriage presumed fidelity even if he didn't keep to it. My husband actually believed it was a manly thing to betray his wife if his needs required- spilling in his hand was a shameful thing for him to do.

God Almighty! What had possessed me to think that I could hold down a relationship with a man of his era? Didn't I know enough to understand the glaring flaws in their psyche, the cruel and unbending pragmatism that made them world beaters and the founding fathers of our civilization but also revealed them to be a singularly unpleasant bunch of people? Hadn't I shunned the romantic notions of the heroic past years ago through the enlightenment of academic scholarship? How I hated the lightweight depiction of Roman heroes in historical novels as some kind of virtuous larger- than-life figures when they were actually one of the most debauched and violent periods of history...

My thoughts raged on mile after a mile until the coach stopped at the ludicrously inappropriate Torre di Greco and its commercialised cameo factories. Imagine if you will just how interested I felt in those saccharine little ornaments now? While the rest of the tour bus oohed and aaahed over them, I sat at a wayside café, bought a strong espresso and a packet of cigarettes and ruminated on my naïve stupidity.

From there we went to Vesuvius. I negotiated the shaley hike with my loaned walking stick and peered down into the crater, wishing that another eruption come now and cover up every last fucking remnant of the Roman world. I would go home and take a job on the makeup counter at Harrods. Forget about history and all that crap and start living in the shallow world I knew. And he could go boil his fucking head.

Lunch at a small taverna and I glared at anyone who even tried to join my table; my travelling companions soon got the message. A local Romeo tried to chat me up, sitting down with his lascivious tongue hanging out. Oh, he was gorgeous alright...thick curly black tangled locks, deep brown tan, liquid chocolate eyes, white linen shirt hanging open to reveal perfect physique and a thick but not excessive covering of body hair, tight jeans framing a slim butt and bulging package. Said his name was Luca. I said "Piss off, Luca. I wouldn't fuck you if you had two dicks." His English was limited but he got the point of that. He stood up and told me I was missing the best fuck of my life. I gave him the bird. He shrugged and looked for another victim.

Finally the last stop of the day. Herculaneum to look at the remains. I found a bench near the coach and decided to sit it out. Two elderly American ladies from our tour group beckoned. "All this way and you aren't even going to see those lovely ruins?" One asked.

"No." I answered brusquely.

"Don't you like the Romans?"

I smiled sarcastically. "Bloody hate them. Sick of hearing about them. Wish I could dynamite every single remaining Roman source in the world...including and most especially a certain gladiator...is that definitive enough for you?"

They looked shocked at my reply as they might well have been- I was inordinately rude- and they backed off, leaving me to sit and glower in my petty childish way.

I was once on a plane and I got it into my head that a guy nearby (who was probably no more than a nervous flier) was an Arab terrorist. I spent seven hours in abject fear and then slept the remaining seven hours of the flight. Fear made me exhausted. I realized then that you can only feel extreme emotion for so long and then your body switches down. It was the same with this anger of mine. As soon as I had inflicted upon Maximus every torment that I could imagine and then fantasised the awful scenes when I told him dramatically that I was leaving him for ever, I wore out my bitterness and just felt distraught. A numb calm came over me. Sadness flooded my being. I saw us as a great tragedy- two lovers who were fated to be parted by the curse of out apposite philosophies. What a Greek drama that made!

And then slowly sense returned. 

I thought about Maximus and how he must have grown from a boy on his father's estate in a sleepy country area of northern Spain learning from the behaviour of those around him. His father, a serious and religious man, loved Maximus' mother who had been told that after Maximus was born she should not have any more labours- she had barely survived his birth. From that time on, his father (still a young man) had refused to put her aside as most people believed he should have done, loved her all his life, never shared a bed with her again and honoured her by sleeping with a succession of comely slave girls upon whom he fathered many children. Maximus grew up with these half-brothers and sisters and regarded their existence as normal; he said his mother was fond of them.

Max's first sexual experience had been with a girl owned by his father; she had made the move on him, although he suspected it had been prompted by his father. Shortly afterwards (when he firmly believed himself in love with this slave girl) he had been dispatched to join the legions and had soon realized that what he had thought was love was merely infatuation. From then on, he had watched other men and their interaction with women and learnt from them.

Mostly he had been uneasy with some of the excesses he saw, which were so at odds with his father's example to him, and he generally preferred to keep his intimate life private. But he used camp women and captives just as others did. It was life as it existed for men- women, too- and no one told him that it was demeaning or abusive for, of course, it was never considered to be so. He had never raped a woman or slept with any who did not wish it freely. Where he believed he might have fathered a child, he had always left a sum of money for its welfare. What more might a man do?

He was careful with women who were of a better class- as a young man, there had been a few love affairs, mostly unconsummated in deference to the virtue of these young girls and out of respect for their families. It was expected by their fathers that young men such as he should find their sexual relief elsewhere from their daughters' bodies. He had strayed with Lucilla- there was no doubt about that - and there was a chance that Lucius might have been his son. It had been a tempestuous and passionate alliance and they had both hoped to marry but Aurelius had considered it out of the question, marrying Lucilla off to his co-heir, Varus and sending Maximus off to the back of beyond with a promotion. His action proved a stroke of genius. Maximus revealed himself to be one of the most instinctual leaders of men the emperor had ever known, not to mention one of the most formidable warriors. It was ironic that as he came to know the taciturn young general better, he saw in him the very qualities he had dreamed of in a soldier-emperor and understood the mistake he had made. His most gifted child, Lucilla, and this exemplary officer would have made a race of gods for the future and safeguarded Rome forever.

I'm speculating, of course. Max simply told me "I had an affair with the princess. I behaved recklessly and took her virtue. I was lucky not to die for it. The emperor reprimanded me and sent me away and I determined to win back his belief in me." That winter he married the local girl that his father had wished him to and in time, they fell in love. It was not the fiery passion that he had known with Annia Lucilla but it was a quiet and deep emotion that resonated in his soul. He was a man of spiritual beliefs who loved his family, his land and his duty. He had a beautiful, voluptuous wife, whose gentle adoration of him and her silent support gave him the foundation he needed to weather the great pressure of his military life. Now he had peace and fulfillment. His life had seemed blessed.

But most of his married life, he had been alone. Well, not alone. Never that. Surrounded by a world of men and obligation, of duty and danger, of sublimation of his needs to that of a higher authority. In that world of men he lived as men must live to survive. On lonely nights he took a woman and felt a measure of that peace that he ached for, that world he owned, safe and secure because of his efforts, that dream that one day he would return to where he would receive the reward for all that he had done. This was my Maximus. These were the forces that had shaped him. He did not have the luxury of my hindsight and years of reading and researching behind him to understand the intricacies of my world. He had been thrust fully grown and formed into an alien world and tried his best to swim against a current that threatened to overwhelm him. I had floated past and he had held onto me as a lifeline. We had both found within each other the very thing that our lonely lives lacked. It didn't mean that we were at one in our heads. He was the other side of my spectrum. The yin to my yang. The night to my day. The right to my left. The past to my future. The love of my life.

I sat on that bench and let my love for him sweep away the bitter taste of my fantasy lover. I loved him warts and all. He didn't ask me to build him up in my mind to be something that he wasn't. He had never lied or been false to me in his own estimation. If I couldn't accept that his behaviour was shaped by ancient forces and that, whilst he was not immutable to change, he must not be expected to change without reason or understanding, then I would lose him and he would lose me. It was only through my example that he would see the world through new eyes. But did I ever really want him to lose all the qualities that made him stand apart from the rest?

MAXIMUS

Marriage is an unnatural state that we must accept for the good of our state; it is an arrangement unsuitable to the natural inclinations of both men and women but must be endured. Who said that now? I forget. It was a quote favoured by tutors for debating challenges in my boyhood. It usually carried the motion however poorly the speaker put his case. Had I agreed with it when I gained experience of marriage? Not really. My marriage was happy; we were both fortunate in our choice. But, it isn't easy. No one should ever expect it to be.

Marriage to Uma was...well, what can I say? I was besotted with her as she was with me. I have never known such sexual excess in my life, never knew such pleasure was attainable. Wild, unrestrained erotic pleasure together with deep, passionate love. I had thought the two emotions were somehow contradictory- and I still think that in my world they were largely thus. The women who could provide the former and the ones who offered the latter were rarely found in the same body. But Uma was that women. Beautiful, uninhibited, experienced, curious, spontaneous....and yet she has a deep and devoted love for me that shines in her eyes when she looks at me; she lets me have my way when I know it is hard for her modern sensibilities to accept, she supports my life as well as any wife should. She is perfect in my eyes. How I wish to do the same for her and be a man, in her understanding of the word.

The past days have been a heady, intoxicating exploration of our needs and desires, the final step in the relationship we have forged these months. Happiness, that elusive spirit, seemed to have decided to live amongst us for once. But I should have been aware that there is no such thing as perfection. Even Elysium must have its drawbacks- you have to be dead for one....

I knew the moment she asked the question that the issue would end in tears. That's women for you. Selene used to do that, too. She never asked that particular question, of course, mostly because she already knew the answer - it would be glaringly obvious to any woman in my time and quite unremarkable. But Selene used to get an idea in her head, too, and she would do the same. Dig and dig until she upset herself. And I would say nothing or nothing much, just as I had with Uma. So she would work it out herself and scream and shout and run off. Just as they always do. Just as Uma did. What good they think any of it will do, I really don't know.

Am I acting as if none of this is my responsibility? That is not my point. Of course, it is my fault. I merely observe that it would do them well to leave things alone and not raise issues such as these. As far as I am concerned there is nothing wrong with a man seeing another woman for sex as long as he keeps himself clean and is discreet.  Any woman who would offer herself to a man in that way has few morals- but her lack of morals does not make her less desirable in my eyes- just a woman that a man such as I would not marry. She would never be trustworthy and a man must be sure of the paternity of his own child. My notions are completely at odds with this modern world. Or are they? How many men do you know in the twenty first century who like to think of their woman opening her legs for another man? And yet, how many of the same men would really think it unacceptable to have a bit of fun when they were away from home? I rather find the duality of this age more hypocritical than mine.

Women are different. They feel different. They are different. Look at Uma. She has a past but she would not dream of taking another man into her bed now that we are together. It matters to her. I know this. And I have no intention of ever damaging her trust in me. I shall never sleep again with another woman but my wife out of respect for her beliefs. Even if I believe that notionally it is my right and that it would not feel to me like infidelity. But if she feels like this- then I will never subject her to that shame.

I would not ever do anything that would insult her cultural beliefs. I would not kill someone who offended me. I would not insist on her keeping to rituals of my religion pertaining to female behaviour. I would not drink myself to vomiting in public (a singularly normal facet of male behaviour in my time). I could go on...as I am sure you realize. And I would cut off my right hand if it would take back the hurt that the revelation of this morning brought to her. Will she ever forgive me? Would I in the same place? Not a chance. I know my own rigidity in the face of such moral issues. Will she even listen to my vows now? Would I in her place?

Don't they understand when they are beaten?

Would you, Quintus? Would I?

UMA

The bloody coach couldn't go fast enough. The interminable journey home along that winding road was like Groundhog Day- I could see Amalfi one minute but the next we were going in the opposite direction and it felt like we were back at square one. I chewed my nails. I twisted my hair. I just died of impatience. I wanted to get up and scream and shout, roll on the floor and tell them all to go fuck themselves and get me back to the hotel now before I burst. And finally, as dusk was falling, we stopped outside my hotel and I flew off like a bat out of hell. Through the foyer, up the elevator, along the corridor, fumbled with the key card...empty room. No Maximus.

I dashed downstairs and searched the hotel. Even went to the salon- why?- who knows what was going on in my head. Ran around the grounds. Crying now. Scared. Went to the edge of the terrace past La Cupola, the beautiful luncheon restaurant that seemed to cling to the mountainside with views of startling beauty, and there I saw him. He was sitting on a rocky outcrop facing out to sea, the drop falling away below him but his eyes on a far away horizon, lost in thought.

"Maximus?" My voice was scarcely audible, less than a whisper. He heard it and turned. He smiled sadly.

"Uma?"

I covered the ground in seconds and if he hadn't been so steady on his feet, I would probably have bowled him over to knock us both into the Bay of Naples beyond. Neither of us said anything but simply kissed, scared of words, preferring the thumping of our hearts and the tender sweet pressure of our lips to show us what this awful day had meant for both of us.

We broke from the kiss and stared at each other.

"I'm sorry..." We both spoke at the same time, smiled, started to speak again, smiled some more. Maximus indicated I should speak. I took a deep breath. He watched me, listening intently to my words.

"Maximus...I know that certain things carry different weight with you. I know that to a man of your time it was perfectly acceptable for you to take a woman for pleasure and still regard yourself as a faithful husband. But although I am a trained Classicist and have held lectures in the mores of the ancient world and have shaken my head in frustration at the ignorant inability of many students to stop judging the behaviour of historical people with a modern eye....Max - I am not married to you in a professionally capacity. Where you are concerned, all my academic abilities fly out of the window. I love you- not as a museum curator- but as a woman. And--- my twenty first century sensibilities make me unable to stand the thought of you in another woman's arms, just as I would not expect you to be able to accept me if I betrayed you. I have tried to bend for you but I cannot bend on this one. It is not acceptable to me. You have to make me this promise..."

Maximus nodded, his lips pursed in serious thought. His fingers trailed down my cheek. "I know. I knew it even before you spoke. I knew it when we were first together. I don't suppose this is any consolation- and it is not meant as an excuse- but I have not been continually whoring. It is not my way. In all the time I have known you, I have slept with three women. Three nights- two occasions when I was too weak to resist the craving of my flesh and once when I went to America. I was with two of my Brothers- it was a drunken male night and I followed the crowd. I'm still not sure why I did it. What men do when they are in their cups and full of bravado..." He held up his hands in acknowledgement of his error. "But Uma, I knew then that it would not do for you. I made myself a vow before we married that I would never do such a thing again. It does not belong in your world. Men and women are equal and I must never expect to live with rights that you do not have. I swear this. I would do nothing to hurt you. I would do anything you asked of me. If you asked me to leap off this cliff to my death to prove my love for you- I would do it. Do you believe that?"

Believe it? Would you? Could that man say anything that he did not mean? It was impossible; he does not understand how to lie. Lucilla was right.

"Oh, Maximus..." It was all I could say for weeping.

"Do you trust me?"

I hugged him and whispered. "With all my heart...yes!" He smiled as he placed a soft kiss on my cheek. "Good, then none of this nonsense in public. Dry your eyes and let's go back to our room..."

I squealed. "Max! You are too much! More sex?"

"I did not mean that!" he growled as we walked back through the hotel grounds. "I merely meant that we should return, shower, change into some evening wear and try to salvage this day. What say you to a fine dinner and perhaps I take you dancing?"

"DANCING?" I screamed. Maximus frowned- several people turned to stare at me. "You don't dance! You are lying, you just made that up to get out of trouble..."

He grinned. "Of course, I didn't. I don't have your facility for thinking on my feet..."

"What? You are the bloody Gladiator- he always thinks on his feet..."

"Not when it comes to dancing, he doesn't. That would never have occurred to me on the spur of the moment now, would it?" He had that smug face on like he always does when he thinks he has trounced me.

"You are lying through your teeth. And I know you are- 'cos you're crap at lying ...however...you are going to get hoisted with your own petard this time. You can take me dancing tonight. I shall have you thinking on your feet all night, sweetie pie. You will die of embarrassment and I shall love it. It has all been arranged..." I pulled out my tongue at him.

He groaned- but I noticed the sparkle in his eyes. "Tell me one thing..." he whispered as he pulled me closer when we stepped into the elevator. "...does this great sacrifice of mine guarantee that I get laid tonight...?"