"Ciao Olivia, how are you this morning?" Antonio worked at the bar with me. He'd just arrived and planted a friendly kiss on my cheek, I did the same back.
"Splendido, grazie." He smiled and nodded at my attempt at replying in Italian.
"Your Italiano is coming along great!" He replied in a strong accent.
"I can say more than that, I had a full conversation in Italian with my dad the other day." He beamed at me and gestured for me to take a bow, and I did.
Just then, we both noticed a figure skipping towards us and composed ourselves to greet our guest. But this was no guest.
"Maria! How is my favourite morning receptionist?" I smiled as Maria's hair bobbed about her ears. When I arrived at the hotel, I'd found out that Maria was only a few years older than me, and I quickly became closer to her than any other member of staff.
"The only morning receptionist you mean," she laughed. "Buongiorno, Antonio. Olivia!" She was out of breath when she reach us.
"Morning, buongiorno," we both replied.
"Did your father tell you Olivia." She was still recovering with deep breaths and her hands at her side before she continued. "A band is staying here, at the Centurion Palace!"
"No he didn't tell me anything about this. Am I supposed to be excited?"
"Olivia Marcello, you do realise this is no ordinary band. I almost fainted when your father told me." As if on queue, my dad walked briskly into the room. Maria was so overwhelmed that she just looked at my dad and then back at me.
"Great, Sir Marcello will tell you. It's all so exciting." I watched her skip out the room and then glanced back at my dad, dressed in another one of his pristine suits.
"Morning, Antonio," my dad nodded at him. Antonio greeting him back. My dad then turned to me and his smile widened. "And how is my little girl, all dressed smartly for another day of work I see?"
"Not as smart looking as you" I gave him a quick hug and looked back up at him.
"Well now, managing a hotel like this one, I must always look my best. Anyway, need to let you both know, a rather well known band from Britain will be staying here for a few weeks and so we must all work our best to maintain our outstanding services."
"Who are they, sir?" Antonio asked.
"One Direction. They actually arrived late last night, so they will be down for breakfast soon. Please do whatever you can to meet their needs. Go above and beyond if you must. Grazie." He nodded at us both and left the room.
"One Direction... they sound familiar, but you know me. I'm never up to date with these things. Have you heard of them?" Antonio looked confused.
"Yeah, I have. No wonder Maria was practically squealing. They're pretty big across the globe. Especially with the girls. I've not exactly given their music much of a listen so I couldn't say how good they are." Antonio nodded and went over to start cleaning some dishes.
"Olivia!" I heard Maria and saw her run back towards me at the bar. "He told you? Okay, but listen, I'm off work for the rest of this month and my morning shift finishes soon so I won't be able to see them! Please, oh please let me know what they're like if you see them. Would you get me an autograph? Please tell me you will." She barely took a breath between her sentences.
"Okay, I will try. Calm down, I'm sure they'll just like the ordinary boys back home." Maria shot me a look that read you have no idea who you're talking about.
"Promise me to keep in touch whilst I'm gone too. I better get ready to leave now. Ciao, both." Antonio waved to her from behind me and I gave her a quick hug over the counter.
"Of course. Ciao, Maria." What was all of the fuss about?
***
"Olivia, look sharp someone's coming this way." Antonio nudged me and I looked up, focusing on the two guys walking towards the bar. "If it is them people from the band, you serve them, my English isn't the best." I rolled my eyes at his comment. His English was much better than my attempt at Italian at least. I smiled at Antonio and gestured for him to carry on cleaning the wine glasses. If this was them, what was the harm in having a little fun?
"Good morning," the blonde boy on the left smiled with a little accent creeping into his words. Irish?
"No Niall, it's buongiorno," the brown haired one on the right butted in. He sounded proud of himself even though his attempt at Italian was much worse than mine. They both smiled at me and I smiled back with a nod. This could be them. They spoke English, were wearing designer clothes and had the sort of hairstyles that made girls squeal. "Could we order some drinks please?"
Now the fun could begin.
I let my friendly smile turn into a confused expression. "Scusa?" I replied in Italian, trying to come across as someone with no knowledge of the English language.
"Um, we would like to get some drinks?" The blonde one shot a confused glance back.
"Mi dispiace non parlano inglese." They both looked at me for a moment before the brown haired one gasped and took out his phone.
"I have this app, Niall. I can translate stuff into Italian." He fiddled with his phone for a few seconds and then spoke in Italian. "Do you have um... succo d'oliva?" The blonde one, Niall, looked up at him as I began to break out into a smile.
"Louis what did you ask for?" He looked at me and then back at the one called Louis.
"Grape juice," Louis replied nonchalantly.
But I couldn't hold it in. Did he even know what he'd asked for? I burst out laughing and they both looked at me.
"Olive juice? You asked for olive juice." I laughed but then quickly clasped my hands over my mouth.
"No no, I meant grape juice. This little picture here looked like grapes. I thought-," He was pointing at his phone where a photo of olives was next to the Italian word for "olive juice". But then he looked up at me. "Hey, you're speaking in English."
"I've been compromised." I dramatically put my hand over my mouth and watched their confused expressions. I had to explain, and well, apologise to them. "Good morning guys. I'm so sorry. I do understand and speak English. Please accept my apology." I gave them a smile.
"Well that was a pretty good one!" Louis said smiling and Niall grinned too. "But hang on, your English is perfect, there's no Italian accent?"
"I'm actually British. And Italian. My dad is Italian, my mum is English. I've been living here for a few months and honestly, my Italian is not better than yours."
"Wait, why are you living here?" Louis asked.
I scratched the back of my neck. "Well, my parents divorced around seven months ago. My dad moved back here to look after the family business. I stayed with my mum but wanted a change of scenery. So I came here to be with my dad for a bit."
"Oh ok, so personal family reasons sorry. That's pretty cool though. So you're from England then. Whereabouts?" Did this Louis even want his drinks?
"I was born in London but we moved up to a small town, it's not well known but it's near Doncaster, if you know where that is?" The both exchanged a glance and smiled at me.
"Sure, we know Doncaster," Niall spoke out excitedly.
"Great. So, how about these drinks? Oh and I'm sorry but we are fresh out of olive juice." I started to laugh and then cut back to a smile.
"Oh yes, sorry. I figured there wouldn't be any olive juice, but how about grape?."
"I'll have a lemonade." Said Niall.
As I got their glasses ready with ice, three more figures started walking towards us. Louis turned and waved at them rather enthusiastically. Then he quickly turned back to me as I poured their drinks out.
"Hey," he glanced at my name badge attached to my blouse, "Olivia, do you think you could pull the same prank on the rest of the guys?" He pleaded and I couldn't refuse, I nodded and passed Louis and Niall their drinks. "Guys, come order your drinks." Louis shouted at them eyeing me really quickly, giving me the signal.
"Sure," a guy with the curliest hair I've ever seen was first at the bar and asked immediately for a coke, the other two behind him asked for the same. Repeating what I had done earlier, I let my smile fall slack as I gave them my confused expression. I saw Louis and Niall behind them drinking their drinks quietly trying to hold in their laughter.
"Scusa? Mi dispiace non parlano inglese." The three of them looked at me then at each other. This had to be the band. These guys were just as well dressed, with the air of celebrities and incredibly sculpted hairstyles. A sandy brown mop of hair caught my eye in particular. One of the guys standing furthest from me stood in silence, his brown eyes searching my face. I could hear Niall sniggering in the background and they all looked at him.
"Could we have three cokes please." The curly haired guy asked again. This was priceless.
I shrugged my shoulders and just repeated the same sentence, "mi dispiace non parlano inglese." Louis had finished his drink and pushed his way through and cleared his throat.
"Signorina, per favore potevano avere tre coke." He'd obviously been on his mobile app again and had decided to show off to the others. I just went along with it and laughed when he winked at me. Niall sounded as if he'd choked on his drink in the background and was almost hysterical with laughter. The other three were utterly confused.
I replied to Louis, "sure, why didn't they just ask, three cokes coming up." I looked up at the three boys and as soon as Louis burst into laughter, I did the same. He put his hand up for a high five and I returned it.
"What the hell?" The curly haired one mumbled as he started to smile. I looked at the other two who had also started to smile, but still not quite sure what was going on.
"Guys. Oh man, your faces!" Louis was still trying to calm down and Niall had gone to sit down on one of the sofas opposite us. "Hey, meet Olivia. She tricked me and Niall with the same 'I don't speak English joke' earlier and I asked her to get you guys the same way-," he went off laughing again and joined Niall on the sofa who was almost in tears. Louis left me there to say sorry for the second time today.
"Well, I guess I should apologise. Sorry for playing you for fools," I smiled slightly at them all and felt relief when they returned the smile.
"Ah well, that's alright." The curly haired one smirked at me and put out a hand, I reached out and shook it. "I'm Harry." He flashed a dazzling grin.
Then the next one with dark hair came up and did the same, shaking my hand as he said, "hey I'm Zayn." I smiled at him and then the one I'd noticed earlier walked up with his hand out.
"Hey, Olivia. I'm Liam." His smile was warm and his dark eyes even warmer. I couldn't look away.
I shook his hand and managed to let out a shaky, almost breathless, "hi". I felt my cheeks warming and hoped that no one had noticed before I quickly dropped his hand and turned to get their drinks. I knew I had to stay focused. Stay composed. I was as work and these incredibly charming, attractive guys were guests at my family's hotel. I reminded myself that I had to stay professional.