Leonardo has dark chocolate eyes that melt in their expressive intensity, like a candle when it meets heat. As they fall on my naked body, I can feel the fire behind his stares, the lingering gratification as he takes pleasure in my form. I'm seventeen, still a youth but not far off a man, and I know the effect I have. I've always known it, and artisans are my favourite lures, for they deeply appreciate my flawless skin and golden hair. They know perfection when they see it, and I've been immortalized in many a way. From the goldsmith Bartholomeo di Pasquino and his finely crafted necklace, to the tailor Bacchino and his well cut hosiery. They all adore my proportions, admire my lack of restraint, idolize the way I am not morally repressed. Most Florentine men have affairs with each other, indeed though it's a crime it is hardly policed and only few convictions ever get upheld. Of those, most never had their fines collected in full, so I saw no need to be coy. If I saw something I liked, I too went after it.


"Jacopo," he says to me, "be still and turn your head a fraction more to the light." At twenty-three the artist is still learning in the workshops of Verrocchio. He has an air of confidence about him I like, he's expressive and demanding. I like that he sees beyond the average man, deeper than the skin. I've seen his sketches and they are alive, movement captured on canvas or paper. I feel he can immortalize me, as if I'm set in amber, an ochre paint trapping my beauty forever. I turn to gaze out, aware of my nakedness in the window of my little studio. Here I indulge rich men for their wealth, and poor...