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Gianna’s POV
The apartment felt too quiet. Usually, I enjoyed the stillness after a long day, but now it felt suffocating. My fingers itched to grab my phone, to type out the message I’d been holding back, but I stopped myself before the thought could gain momentum.
I slumped onto the couch, hugging a throw pillow as I stared at the blank TV screen. Matteo’s face lingered in my mind. It refused to go away no matter how much I willed it to. The way his eyes lit up when he talked about something he was passionate about. The way he always found ways to make me laugh, even when I didn’t want to. And the way he looked at me-like I was the only person in the world that mattered.
My heart ached at the memory. It would have been so easy to pick up my phone and call him, to hear his voice, to tell him I missed him. But I couldn’t.
I wouldn’t.
Loving Matteo was the most natural thing I’d ever done, but it has also become the hardest. There was no denying how deeply I felt for him. Every part of me was still in love with him, and maybe that was the problem. Loving him had started to feel like trying to hold onto a handful of sand. The tighter I gripped, the more it slipped through my fingers.
I wasn’t naive. I knew this was hurting both of us. But I’d convinced myself it was necessary.
“It’s for the best,” I whispered aloud, as if saying it would make it true.
The truth was, I wasn’t sure I believed it. Matteo has been nothing but patient and understanding, but there were things I couldn’t ignore. Emilia’s disapproval, his already deep involvement in the mafia…it all lingered like a shadow over us. And even if he didn’t care much about it, I did.
How could I stand by Matteo’s side knowing I wasn’t fully accepted by the people who mattered most to him? I didn’t want to be the reason for tension in his life. I didn’t want to be the wedge that drove him away from his family.
And then there was me.
Deep down, I knew I was pulling away not just because of his family, but because of my own fears. What if I wasn’t enough for him? What if I couldn’t live up to the expectations of being with someone like Matteo?
I let out a shaky breath and pulled the blanket tighter around myself.
My phone buzzed on the coffee table, startling me out of my thoughts. My heart leapt before I even looked at the screen, already knowing it would be him.
Matteo.
The notification was a simple text: “I hope you’re okay. I miss you.”
My fingers hovered over the screen, torn between responding and letting it sit unread. He’d sent me similar messages over the past week, each one tugging at my resolve.
I wanted to reply, to tell him that I missed him too, that this silence was tearing me apart. But I didn’t. I was the one who initiated the silence and stood on it. So instead, I locked the phone and tossed it onto the other side of the couch, as if putting physical distance between us would somehow make this easier.
I stared at myself in the mirror and sighed, running my hands through my hair and tying it into a bun without caring how pale I looked. I cried myself to sleep last night again. I threw my mirror into my bag, put on shades and stepped out of my car, going straight to the lobby.
The moment I got to my office, I buried myself in back-to-back meetings and project deadlines. Matteo wasn’t in the office today but it didn’t mean that he was out of my mind. Every time my phone buzzed, my heart skipped a beat, only to sink when it was a work email or a reminder about an upcoming meeting.
By the time I got home, I was emotionally drained. I kicked off my shoes and collapsed onto the couch, staring up at the ceiling.
How long could I keep this up?
The silence between us was suffocating. I knew Matteo was probably blaming himself, wondering what he could’ve done differently. That was just who he was-always taking on the weight of the world, even when it wasn’t his burden to carry.
I grabbed my phone again, scrolling through our old messages. There were so many-late-night texts, playful banter, and the kind of inside jokes that only made sense to us. I found myself smiling at a thread where he’d sent me a series of terrible puns, each one worse than the last.
“Why do bees have sticky hair? Because they use honeycombs.”
I had replied with a string of eye-roll emojis, but I remembered laughing out loud at the time.
It all felt so far away now.
The worst part was that I knew he’d forgive me in a heartbeat if I reached out. Matteo wasn’t the kind of person to hold grudges, especially not against someone he cared about. And that only made it harder to stay away.
I hated the idea of hurting him, but I also hated the idea of dragging him into a relationship that felt doomed to fail.
But was that really fair?
Matteo had never once doubted us. He had stood by me when I wasn’t sure if I could handle the complexities of our relationship. He had fought for us when I wasn’t strong enough to do it myself.
So why couldn’t I do the same for him?
The tears came before I could stop them, hot and choking. I buried my face in my hands, letting the weight of my emotions crash over me.
“I’m sorry,” I whispered, though there was no one there to hear it.
I wasn’t sure who I was apologizing to-Matteo, myself, or both.
When I was calm and composed enough, I decided to take a walk, hoping the fresh air would clear my head and make me feel much more better. The park near my condo was quiet, the kind of peaceful that made you forget, even for a moment, that the rest of the world existed.
I sat on a bench, watching the ducks glide across the pond.
For the first time in days, I allowed myself to imagine a future with Matteo-a future where we figured things out, where his family came around, where we didn’t let our fears and insecurities win.
It was a beautiful thought.
But it was also terrifying.
I wasn’t sure I could take that leap of faith. With a sigh, I got up and walked back to my condo. My phone buzzed again. This time, it wasn’t a text from Matteo. It was a calendar reminder for a meeting we had scheduled later in the week.
The thought of seeing him again made my heart race.
I wasn’t ready to face him yet. But maybe, just maybe, I was starting to realize that pushing him away wasn’t the solution either. But the thing was, I didn’t have another option but to do that.