The Weekend That Changed Everything: Our First Luxury Getaway Together

The version of this story that I tell my friends and family is: my sugar took me on a trip to Portugal. We had an incredible time. I got a little sunburned. That’s it, end of story.

The longer, truer version of the story includes hospitalization, a lost passport, sharks, crying (both of us), almost getting engaged, our first fight, and seriously considering just staying forever and never coming home.

I assume you’re going to want the second version, so let’s get to it:

First of all, I don’t travel with sugar daddies, as a rule. I just feel like it kind of takes the mystery and the romance out of things when you have to share a bathroom. But I’ve literally always wanted to go to Portugal, and my sugar daddy, Pierre, was insistent that we do a luxury vacation for our one-year anniversary. Okay, fine, twist my rubber arm, why don't you? How could I possibly say no?

So, we get to the southern coast of Portugal, and things go amazingly well at the beginning. We’re in a luxury hotel with a suite that looks out over the ocean. The hotel room has two bathrooms (excellent) and a balcony. I’m like, amazing, how great that I went against my instinct of traveling with my sugar daddy.

Well, 24 hours later, we’re both making full use of the separate toilets as we go through the worst food poisoning of our lives. I guess that’s a risk you take when you eat fresh oysters as an appetizer for every meal, breakfast, lunch, and dinner.

Now, I’m a young, healthy, and athletic gal, so I thought if one of the two of us were going to ever need medical attention, it would be Pierre (he’s plenty active, but he’s got his own list of health concerns, ya know?) But no. Turns out, if you’re a skinny thing like me and you have to be reminded by an app that you should be drinking more water, the risk of food poisoning-related dehydration becomes more of an issue for you. Cool.

At first, it seemed like maybe we would be able to have a medic bring an IV drip to the hotel room, but apparently, I was in a worse state than that. So, to the hospital it was. Romantic.

While we were there, the only channel in English on the hospital room television was showing reruns of shark documentaries (Ha ha, I got you with that one. We didn’t actually have any shark encounters on the trip.) The other problem with the hospital room is that, you guessed it, it only had one bathroom. And I was still going through the worst of the food poisoning, as was Pierre, even though he didn’t need the IV drip.

And this was where our first fight came into play. I told him in no uncertain terms that if he didn’t get back to the hotel and out of my personal space, I was going to end the trip early. Who wants to be in that kind of state in front of someone who literally sees them as a female goddess? I wasn’t ready for the veil to slip.

He was livid, but I’m a stubborn gal (grew up with 5 brothers, what do you expect?) and I had the nursing staff on my side. I basically had him removed from the premises and told him that I would have the hospital call the hotel when it was time for me to be released.

In the verbal kerfuffle, he dropped his passport in the room, and I should have called after him to come back to get it, but remember, that I was in a fever state. I almost passed out leaning over to pick up the passport from the floor, and I barely remember putting it in my purse to give to him later.

Anyway, after 24 hours of glorious IV and even more glorious sleep, I felt brand new by the morning. Okay, maybe not brand new: my body felt like it had just run a marathon. But I wasn’t sick anymore, and I was ready to try turning this luxury vacation around.

Another thing that was being turned around was the hotel room as Pierre looked high and low for his passport. I ended up being able to walk out of the hospital myself and calling an Uber back to the hotel. I was shocked at the state of things when I walked in.

“What, are you covering up a crime in here?” I joked, but Pierre wasn’t in a joking mood.

“We have to go to the embassy immediately. I lost my passport.”

Damn. I felt bad, immediately, and remembered that I had been meaning to call him last night to let him know I had his passport. And, maybe it was because of my fragile state, or maybe it was because I get super uncomfortable when it’s time for me to own up to a mistake, but my eyes started to fill with tears as I pulled the passport out of my bag.

Pierra was relieved and not at all mad and pulled me into a hug.

“You know what we desperately need?” He said, “What is it that you call that…bed rot?” “Bed rot!” I cheered with what little energy I had.

I took a much-needed shower and got into my bathrobe, and we settled into bed for the entire day, watching movies and ordering room service.

Apparently, Pierre was feeling better because he started to order bottles of champagne for the room. I was taking it easy because my stomach still felt like I had done the most intense ab workout of my life, but I made sure that Pierre was able to drink to his heart’s desire. And just as the romantic movie we were watching was coming to the most dramatic part, I looked over because I could hear him sniffling. He was full-on crying!

And, I don’t know. Maybe for another sugar baby, this would have been totally unappealing or whatever, but I found it so endearing. He was clearly drunk, and started talking about how much this last year had meant to him and how he was looking forward to everything we had planned in the future (nothing, yet. We had nothing planned, yet.) Then, in a flourish of bed sheets and bathrobe, he swung his leg around so that he was kneeling on one knee on the bed next to me.

“Let’s get married,” he said, wiping the tears out of his eyes.

Men have said some wild things to me when they were drunk, but even so, I was surprised. I laughed and told him I would think about it when I wasn’t still recovering from fever-inducing food poisoning, and he took that as a “maybe” and raised a toast.

The next morning, we both realized we had reached a turning point. We were feeling much better (other than Pierre’s hangover), and we had that connectedness feeling that comes with going through something really awful together. Plus, the drunken proposal really lightened the mood and put us back on equal footing after I had accidentally withheld the passport.

In other words, we started to get that wonderfully comfortable feeling of being a couple on vacation. No more trying to impress the other one. No more worrying about looking stupid. Just two people who were ready to try everything else on the menu except oysters.

We ended up extending our trip an extra week because Pierre felt bad about how rough things had started, and many times over the rest of the vacation, we joked about never going back home. I mean, it really became a running bit that we just couldn’t let go of.

Even on the plane, when they closed the doors, Pierre leaned over to the flight attendant and asked what the chances were that they could reopen them so that we could actually just stay in Portugal forever. She didn’t think it was that funny, but it made us giggle.

When we went back into our normal life back home, it was clear that the connection between us had deepened. I put together a memory book of the trip with photos and little mementos that Pierre hadn’t even realized I was storing away. I put my hospital bracelet in there for a good laugh.

After that, I kept my rule of never going on a trip with a sugar daddy. And just as for every rule, there is an exception, I knew that if Pierre ever asked me again, I would say yes in a heartbeat.