Giovanna’s first sexual experience with Rosario

Giovanna’s first sexual experience with Rosario is a turning point immediately before her journey to Venice with Ida. Rather than presenting sexual initiation as a straightforward passage into adulthood, the episode exposes the distance between Giovanna’s uncertainty and Rosario’s desire, and between the careful preparation she remembers receiving and what unfolds in practice. Its immediate aftermath is deliberately unresolved: she is delighted when he drives her home, yet the next day she leaves for Venice with Ida and frames their journey as a shared entrance into adulthood.

Circumstances and Decision

In the hours after an earlier encounter, Giovanna recognizes that she has no urgent need to lose her virginity. Rosario attracts her for reasons she cannot fully explain, but she does not call him. Instead, she contacts Ida about the planned trip to Venice; Ida is ready to go and has already told her mother, Costanza, who is glad to have her away for a while and gives her money. Giovanna also calls Tonino at the restaurant where he works. He initially welcomes the plan, then hesitates when he learns Ida is coming, explaining that his small room in Mestre cannot accommodate three people. Giovanna insists that they will come to see him regardless, and he agrees to expect them.

With the money her mother gives her for the trip, Giovanna and Ida are ready to leave. Rosario calls at nine one morning, apparently having heard from Corrado that Giovanna may have changed her mind. His call brings the possibility of sex back into the foreground just as her journey is about to begin. Rosario tells her that he has wanted her since he first saw her but cannot tell whether she wants him. Giovanna answers that she does, while asking him not to hurt her. The exchange establishes attraction, but not certainty about what she wants or how the encounter will proceed.

Negotiating Limits

At Rosario’s home, Giovanna asks whether kissing is necessary. When he implies that girls generally like it, she tells him she does not and would prefer that he not touch her breasts, though she adds that he may do so if he needs to. Rosario stops touching her and says he does not need to. The brief negotiation makes clear that Giovanna is trying to set terms, while Rosario is left to respond to boundaries she articulates rather than to an assumed script.

Rosario then asks what she wants to do and says he does not want to make her unhappy. Giovanna asks whether she can remain dressed. He replies that girls take their clothes off, and she eventually removes them. The episode thus presents her participation alongside substantial hesitation: she is willing to continue, but repeatedly tries to limit the form the encounter takes. Her later recollection of having been carefully prepared by her parents to approach sex without fear sharpens the contrast between that preparation and her present uncertainty.

The Encounter and Its Immediate Aftermath

Giovanna is tempted to accept Rosario’s offer of further touching, thinking he has more experience, but she is afraid of his hands and declines. She lies down with her legs held together. Rosario proceeds, and the encounter is painful. The narrative reports that he persists until the two have had intercourse; Giovanna experiences the moment not as the assured, fear-free beginning her parents had hoped to prepare her for, but as an event marked by apprehension and discomfort.

Afterward, Rosario says they could have done better. Giovanna replies that this was how she wanted it and kisses him. She then goes to wash and gets dressed. When Rosario enters the bathroom, she unhooks the bracelet and places it on the floor beside the bed, treating it as a bad-luck charm. The gesture gives the object a sharply local meaning: beside the bed, it marks the encounter as something she wants to leave behind, even as she offers Rosario a more affirmative account of what has just happened. He drives her home dissatisfied; she is delighted.

Venice and the Event’s Significance

The next day Giovanna leaves for Venice with Ida. On the train, the two promise each other that they will become adults in a way no one before them has. The sequence sets private sexual initiation beside female friendship and a shared journey: Rosario’s encounter does not define Giovanna’s departure, and her earlier recognition that she has no urgent need to have sex remains part of the context. The train promise gives the episode a forward-looking close, but does not establish that the experience itself has made Giovanna an adult.

The event’s significance lies in this unresolved difference between action and interpretation. Giovanna sets limits, hesitates, and experiences pain, yet afterward insists that the encounter happened as she wanted and leaves delighted rather than distressed. The bracelet’s placement beside the bed, her recollection of her parents’ preparation, and the next day’s promise with Ida keep the episode from becoming a simple story of romantic fulfillment or uncomplicated maturation. It is a threshold scene whose meaning remains divided between bodily uncertainty, Giovanna’s effort to claim her own account, and the friendship that carries her onward.