“You have, to Marissa.”
“No, I don’t.”
“Please? Everyone’s worried. We just want to see you up and moving around.”
“No.”
Lori sighs and gets up and leaves. A few minutes later, Mia comes into my room holding the money she won from Gio. “Marissa?” Her voice is small and scared. “I’ll give you this if you get out of bed and eat dinner with us.”
I push her hand away. “No, baby. That’s your money.”
She shakes it in front of my face. “I want you to take it. Come and eat with us.”
Fuck.
I sigh and throw my legs out of bed. “That was a low blow,” I mutter to myself. Everyone knows I’d do anything for Mia.
I take a shower but my aunt was wrong. I don’t feel any better for it. In fact, I’d still like to curl up in my bed and die.
“There she is!” Nonna sings when I show up for dinner. She comes over and kisses both my cheeks. “You look better.”
“I seriously doubt that,” I mutter.
“So, Marissa really cared about Gio Tacone,” Lori says.
For fuck’s sake. I get out of bed for this? To have my horrible love life discussed at the dinner table? I turn and pin her with a glare.
Fortunately, my grandparents both ignore Lori.
“I love Gio,” Mia pipes up, which further destroys me.
“This feels like another abandonment for Marissa. You know, like Luisa leaving her? And now she’s swearing off relationships forever.”
If I weren’t in such a state of fuzz-brain, I might pick up on the accusation in Lori’s tone. As it is, I barely hear her words, I’m trying so hard to block them out.
“If you’re going to talk about me like I’m not here, I’ll just go back to bed,” I mumble and start to head out.
“No, no, no, no.” Lori blocks the doorway. “I’m sorry. I won’t say another word. Sit down. Eat some food. It will do you good.”
“Food doesn’t fix everything,” I mutter.
And I’m right. It fixes nothing at all.
Gio
I knock an empty bottle of Jack over when I startle awake to the sound of pounding at my door.
I’m awake, but I’m not fucking getting up. I’m lying on the couch in the same boxer briefs and t-shirt I’ve been in for days. Maybe weeks. I don’t know how long it’s been.
I ignore the knocking.
“Gio! Open the fucking door before I break the motherfucker down!”
It’s Paolo. Acting like the stronzo he is.
“Vaffanculo,” I call half-heartedly. Fuck you.
Growing up, we Tacone brothers made a habit of cursing in Italian so the nuns and non-Italian adults wouldn’t know we were saying bad words. Or at least, how bad the words were.
More pounding. If my door wasn’t solid wood, it probably would’ve cracked by now. Is he using his foot? “I said, open the fucking door. Now!”
Porco cane. It takes a huge effort to get to my feet, but I do. When I open the door, fucking Paolo punches me in the gut. “That’s for missing Sunday brunch and not calling Ma back about it, stronzo.”
I double over, wheezing. Cristo, I’m out of shape after not moving from the sofa for a week. Or maybe it’s all the liquor I’ve been drinking.
The door swings shut behind Paolo as he takes a casual glance around the place. With bloodshot eyes, I take a look myself. The place is trashed. Empty bottles of liquor everywhere. Takeout boxes.
“Jesus Christ. This place smells like ass. What happened to your cleaning girl?”
“I didn’t let her in when she came.”
Paolo makes a scoffing sound. “So, what in the hell happened to you?”
“Nothing,” I mutter, scratching my belly.
“Bullshit.” He peers at me. “Is that about the girl? She dump you or something?”
“Something. Yeah.”
“Well, what the fuck happened?”
That’s the thing about Italian family. They’re always up in your business. Have to know every fucking detail.
“It was Luigi. He showed up here with a box of cassette tapes.”
Paolo instantly understands. “No fucking way.”
“Yeah. And the one he played implicated both you and Junior. Nothing big, but who knows what else he has. Twenty years of them, he says. Says if anything happens to him, the lawyer will release them.”
“Wait, wait, wait. Back up. What did the testa di cazzo want?”
I blink my bleary eyes and look around for something else to drink.
Paolo hits my arm with the back of his hand. “To leave the girl alone?”
“Yeah. Exactly.”
“Why? You were good to her. Right? You didn’t fuck around on her?”
“Of course not.” I scrub a hand across my face and pad into the kitchen in my bare feet, looking for something alcoholic.
“Then why?” Paolo demands, trailing me into the kitchen.
I pick up an empty wine bottle and shake it. There’s only a swallow left. I tip it up to my mouth. Make that half a swallow.
Paolo grabs the bottle from my hand and gives me an expectant look.
“What? Oh.” I turn to look out the window at Lake Michigan. “Do you believe in fate, Paolo?”
My brother gives me a shove. “Shut the fuck up about fate. Just tell me what the hell happened.”
Okay. Skip the fate part. The recurring nightmare that warned me my girl was in danger before she was even my girl.
“I beat the shit out of a guy in Milano’s.”
Paolo whistles. “That’s too bad. What happened?”
“See, he had a gun to my girl’s head.”
Paolo nods like that was definitely enough said. “Surprised you didn’t kill him.”
I shrug. “I’ve changed. But not enough, I guess.”
“That’s bullshit. Seriously, man, that’s total bullshit.”
I look back out over the water of the lake, the waves as gray as the sky today. “Do you think my life was spared just so I would save hers, Paolo?”
“What?”
“And like, now I’ve served my purpose?”
Paolo, being the loving, supportive brother he’s always been, punches me in the gut again. When I straighten from being doubled over, he slaps my face. “Get in the fucking shower before I beat the shit out of you.”
“Nice,” I mutter, but I drag my ass to the bathroom. There’s no way I’d win a fight against my big brother right now. Even if I had any fight left in me, which I don’t. “Real fucking nice.”
I stand under the spray of water until it turns cold. Even then, I keep standing under it. I don’t wash my hair. I don’t soap up. I just stand there and let it drench me.
Hoping it will wash away all the shit I’ve done and said in my life. Every bad deed. Every act of violence. Everything it means to be a Tacone.
Too bad such a thing isn’t possible.