Saturday, May 6
I wake up, roll over, and add to my things i never knew before lupus list:
disease is isolating. prepare to be alone. or get really good at lying.
“You’re still coming tonight, right?” Allie asks.
We’re bagging green beans on the front porch while a mid-spring shower cleans the pollen off our cars. It’s a hot, sweet rain that smells like wet sand and sulfur, wafting heavy off the bay at our backs. We live on the skinniest part of Evergreen, only two blocks from the bay and the beach in either direction. Locals love to remind us that we’ll be the first part of the island to go. But we know they’re just jealous.
It’s quiet down here, far away from the boardwalk and motels and bridges in and out of town. A bird sings through the storm. Today, my mind is tired, but my body is hanging in there. Lupus has brought me an acute awareness of the way my various parts work—or don’t work, really—together to make me a full human. The world is heavy around me, just like the muggy air, and I feel as if I’m moving through an odd but familiar dream. Before I knew I had lupus, I always thought I just had déjà vu. Now, I know that my mind, leaden with brain fog, was saving itself the energy of processing, leaving me in a stop-motion dream state.
“Is this the spring musical or the end-of-year concert?”
“Musical.”
“Oh, fuck yeah, I’m in.” Allie’s an English teacher at Malaga County High School and their one-woman theater department.
She twists her hair, as blond and fine as corn silk, away from her face and lifts another handful of green beans from the crate at her feet onto the scale between us. “Half a pound.”
I stick a handwritten label to the front of a plastic bag before scooping them up. “Is that redheaded kid still the lead in everything?”
“Charles Roberto Jenkins? No, unfortunately he couldn’t audition this semester.”
“Man, what a star. I hope he thanks you in his Tony acceptance speech.”
My phone dings. I know who it is before I even look. Or, I think I know who it is, because I know what I’ve done.
Marco: First date?
“It’s happening,” I announce, like a woman going into labor.
Allie looks up from her dirt-covered hands. “What?”
“Marco.” I clear my throat around his name, embarrassment churning in my stomach. “We’re dating. Tonight. We’re dating.”
“What?” She scoots to the edge of the porch swing with such force, she almost flings a Birkenstock at my forehead. “Again? So soon?”
“Don’t get excited. This man is absolutely up to no good. I don’t know what his end game is, but I’m highly suspicious.” I can’t believe what I’m about to tell her—what I’m probably going to repeatedly tell people all month. “Have you seen the movie Sweet November?”
Allie shakes her head, zipping her hoodie up under her chin. “We were a Veggie Tales–only family.”
“Right. Well, it’s this rom-dram I brought up to him where these two morons promise each other that they’ll date for one month and one month only. Then—surprise, surprise—they end up falling in love. Now he wants us to Sweet November but different, which—within the context of the movie—just means I don’t ghost him and die.”
For the first time I’ve met her, Allie is stunned into silence. Eventually, she stutters, “Well, that’s very, um, that’s kind of . . . romantic, right?”
“Soph whittled you a whistle for your one-week anniversary,” I remind her. “You know, he’s so hot that it’s actually like, a joke, seeing him walking around Evergreen in the middle of the day. Oh, and he definitely hates it here—”
“Poor guy, leave him alone! Someone could say the same thing about you.”
“I make sense here,” I fire back, holding up a handful of dirty green beans. “I’m not some douchebag fallen from grace trying to—Jesus Christ.” My phone starts buzzing in my lap and I almost keel over from the shock of it. “He’s calling me.” Of course, I immediately put him on speaker before shouting into the receiver, “You’re relentless!”
“You’ve given me no choice,” he replies calmly. “I only have twenty-five chances to hang out with you.”
“Why are you in Evergreen?” I demand.
“I’m house-sitting for my uncle.” He sounds totally unfazed—amused, even. “Why are you in Evergreen?”
“Irrelevant. Why do you need a fake girlfriend?”
“There’s nothing fake about this. I want to date you. I need to be outta Dodge in a month. You don’t seem to want something serious. Simple.”
Allie’s eyes have quadrupled. “Invite him,” she’s hissing over and over, “to Mamma Mia! junior. Invite him.”
I turn away from her and take Marco off speakerphone. “It is fake. And Sweet November is not my favorite movie.”
My eyes settle on the Bracken house across the street.
It’s the only beach cottage left on a block of totally gentrified beach house behemoths.
For all of the summers of my childhood, the Bracken house had been inhabited by the elderly widow Eleanor Bracken.
Even in my earliest memories of Evergreen, Mrs.
Bracken was ancient—a frail, sweet-voiced woman with long gray hair she clipped away from her face with a mother-of-pearl claw clip.
Back then the other houses on our street had also been petite Cape Cods, though none of them had dreamy lilac shutters and a screened-in porch like the Brackens’.
Now, the cottage stood alone in its sun-faded, dilapidated charm.
Even my parents had made a series of slow but significant improvements to the duplex, like painting the wood-shingled fa?ade a rich, trendy navy blue and replacing the old cement lawn ornaments with WASPy little pinwheels.
Last month, Dad had the carport freshly paved.
Eleanor passed away two years ago, finally joining her beloved Victor on the other side.
In my funky lava-lamp brain, this realization hits me anew.
I can still picture Eleanor pruning her rosebush by the buttercream-colored front door, waving to us as she smiled up from under her sun hat.
She’d been missing Victor the entire time, hadn’t she? Distracting herself with the task of keeping their family home in tip-top shape.
It had been a beautiful, meaningful task.
But still, a distraction.
“Too late.
You said it was.” Marco’s voice, lilting with sarcasm, snaps me out of my sudden plunge into sentimentality.
Man, I really am lonely.
“It’s not, though, I lied. It’s a fucked-up movie about . . . about people making weird, selfish decisions instead of just being normal. Poor Nelson’s probably still in therapy. And the little boy with no dad? No way he made it out unscathed.”
Marco’s laughing at everything I say, and I’m also losing a slow battle against my own smile. “Well, I watched the movie and I liked it. I thought it was very romantic.”
“What if we did separate movies? You can Sweet November me, and I’ll 50 First Dates you.”
Marco sighs. “Feels like that’s already what’s happening. You texted me, remember? You agreed.” Years in California haven’t taken any edge off his accent, and every vowel rolls around the entirety of his mouth before finding its way out of his mouth.
“We were . . . very naughty the other night. This . . . this is rightfully earned skepticism.”
“Naughty, huh?”
“Very naughty.”
A low laugh rumbles from him.
I wonder if Marco would care about the Bracken house—about Eleanor and Victor. I think he would; I think the way I’d tell it, he’d even cry. “Did you mean what you said? About keeping our lives separate?”
“I did. I’m not looking for anything serious,” he replies softly. “But I had fun with you. Real fun. And I want to do it again.”
I used to agree to tons of harebrained ideas, sometimes just for the story of it. Just so I had something interesting or funny to talk about at dinner parties or for the inspiration it might bring me down the road. This would have made a great premise for a commercial. Maybe something for a psoriasis cream. Moderate to severe plaque psoriasis doesn’t have to rule you. Take back your life. Take back spontaneity. “Okay,” I relent. “Meet me at the Daniel G. Hopper Convention Center at six-thirty.”
“Ooooh,” he mews. “Dinner and a show?”
“Yeah, yeah. Make sure you bring cash. And don’t wear a hat.”
We hang up, and when I turn back around, Allie is watching me, rapt.
“I can’t tell if he hates you or wants to marry you.”
I know exactly what I need in order to feel sort of okay.
Three liters of water.
Hydroxychloroquine.
Meloxicam.
Anti-itch lotion.
A double espresso, every three hours.
Multivitamin.
And today, the first pill of a particularly hairy set of steroids, necessitated by my night out with Mr. Antoniou.
This is what it takes to make me feel vaguely human, to keep my brain from lava-lamping and my kidneys from failing and my body from crumbling into a pile of ash. Some of these drugs work daily to make me feel significantly better; others will work over my entire lifetime as a sort of organ insurance.
I need all of them. I can miss one day—max. Anything more and I feel it. My joints will ache and swell. I’ll become exhausted, fatigued, rash-ridden, irritable. And depressed.
Then, who knows what else? I’ve learned I can’t predict what my body will do next.
By six, the rain had eased from a heavy pour into a soothing drizzle and we pile into Soph’s truck, wet shoes and raincoats slipping and squeaking against the leather seats and plastic floor mats.
“Nadia has a boyfriend,” Allie sings as soon as she slams the passenger side door behind her. I’m in the back seat—their large, pouting daughter.
I heckle Allie. “Traitor! I hope Donna eats shit during ‘Chiquitita.’”
“Why would you say that?! Donna has a full ride to Penn State!”
Soph’s jaw is locked into a frightening clench. “Ladies, please. I just spent five hours at a soil convention.”
The boardwalk is quiet and dark, except for the buzzing street lamps, and underneath our feet the planks exhale moisture with every step we take. The ocean makes itself known on the air but otherwise, she sleeps.
We walk in comfortable silence, our faces turned toward the misting sky. A rain as fine as glitter covers my face. To our left, the shops and stores are still closed for the offseason. In the distance, on our right, the convention center marquee glows blue. It’s a grand building, an architectural throwback to when Evergreen was a bustling resort town over a hundred years ago. Patinated buttresses cap redbrick columns, arched windows wink in the night sky, speckled keystones and cornices outfit the roof like icing on the edge of a birthday cake. It’s shockingly grand for a place like Evergreen and yet—it’s an extraordinarily comforting sight.
Marco’s already here, leaning against the front double doors, an Eagles hat pulled down low over his eyes, shielding him from the soft rain.
“You wore a hat,” I call out across the planks. Anxiety thrums in my ears, and I can’t think of anything to say that’s more charming or interesting.
He looks up from his phone and a smile breaks across his mouth, traveling to his eyes with the speed of a shooting star. “Hey.”
“You wore a hat,” I say again so he won’t hug me. I cannot be chest to chest with this man. Not right now. Not when he’s pressing his lips together to keep from grinning. He takes a few lazy steps toward me, hands stuffed in his pockets. His gait is languid but swift, like a baseball player’s.
“I had to. I tried to make the mullet work, but it’s beyond help.”
“You need a haircut,” I say. “That can be our date tomorrow.”
“Tomorrow, huh?” Marco smirks. He pulls a hand out of his pocket and I actually flinch, terrified he might pull the whole eyelash thing again. I’m back to my normal, Chihuahua-like self. He’s looking at me with complete amusement.
“Don’t do that with your face. We’re Sweet Novembering. We go on dates.”
“I thought we were also Groundhog Daying and every morning we’d have to have the same fifteen-minute argument before you agreed to see me,” Marco teases. We start to make our way inside, taking refuge under the convention center’s overhang.
“Don’t punish me for being amenable to your terms and conditions,” I warn him, but it’s also a reminder to myself. You will probably be punished for this.
Marco said he was a user, a vampire. But rather than simply believe him, I did my own research.
Is he a cheater? Yes. Allegedly he cheated on a longtime girlfriend named Alix Marie while filming the Dude’s Ranch season-seven holiday special, “Dude’s Ranch: A Very Hawaii Hanukkah,” on location in Maui.
Is he a gambler? Unclear, but his net worth is apparently only six million (gulp), which doesn’t make total sense when one factors in that, at their peak, each principal cast member of Dude’s Ranch was making three hundred thousand dollars per episode (scream).
Is he a drug addict, criminal, general ne’er-do-well? Insert knuckle crack here.
On March 15, 2019, Marco Felix Antoniou was arrested after arriving at LAX intoxicated, carrying enough of the good stuff to make TSA go you’re under arrest and also uhhh, you okay, buddy?
The former sitcom star and once-heartthrob was swiftly cuffed and booked—which, apparently, he took very well. The arresting officer noted that Antoniou was incredibly respectful and even autographed a coffee cup for his thirteen-year-old daughter. He promptly attended a thirty-day in-patient rehabilitation facility in Barbados, went on probation, endured a ghoulish fortnight in the meme circuit, and then mostly disappeared.
Leading up to the whole LAX thing, there were telltale signs that maybe things weren’t going particularly well for the man who played America’s favorite roguish city slicker trying to save his father’s ranch while having every teen girl in a sexual headlock. Marco was a TV actor on a lowly, cringe-worthy sitcom meant for stay-at-home moms and teenyboppers, and his character, Vinny Baldacco, was getting less and less screen time. When Marco crashed his motorcycle into a stop sign in Venice Beach and fled on foot, no one wondered what was really going on with the once-promising young actor.
I’m not some J-list celebrity apologist, but looking at his mug shot—eyes glassy, hairline drenched, lips chapped, skin sallow—I couldn’t ignore flashes of the Marco I now knew, the kind, thoughtful man with eyes like honey and dimples deep enough to swim in.
The man who had agreed to see the junior version of Mamma Mia! The man who now holds the door open for me, even though I spent an entire afternoon cyber-stalking him well beyond what could be considered ethical or necessary.
Warm light and cool air pours out from the lobby, but I’m still standing there in the chilly, wet night, staring at Marco with my hands tucked into my armpits like a moron.
Marco frowns gently. “What’s wrong? Are you mad I made a Groundhog Day joke? Is that your actual favorite movie?”
I gesture at my body. My half-zipped raincoat is so big it covers the entirety of my outfit. I look like I’m wearing a men’s rain slick, Chelsea boots, hoop earrings, and nothing else. “I wore a dress. For you. For the show. I wanted to look nice.”
“Oh.” He tilts his head to the side. “You look great. Very hip-hop. Gwen Stefani.”
“That’s a generous interpretation.” I step inside and pull the rain jacket over my head, smoothing out the ruffled chiffon fabric of my dress. When I look up, Marco’s heavy-lidded gaze is fixed on me. When our eyes connect, he snaps his gaze away.
“You’re beautiful, Nadia. Don’t worry.”
But I have been worrying—and once he calls me beautiful, I worry even more.
Marco doesn’t know it, but his level of enthusiasm as an audience member is a test. I’ve got one iguana eye on the chorus line, high-kicking to “Lay All Your Love On Me,” and the other on Marco, whose bouncing knee keeps coming dangerously close to grazing mine. If I sense anything less than sheer, unbridled joy, he’s done for. Over. Kaput.
But, to my surprise, Marco spends the entire run of the musical pinned to his chair, eyes wide. He laughs loudly, claps graciously, and even leans forward, elbows pressed into his thighs and hands clasped under his chin, when Donna and Sophie finally reconcile. During the thirty-minute intermission he immediately turns to me in his seat and asks, “What about that Rosie?”
Afterward, he personally congratulates Donna on her performance—then, he takes a picture with her mother, who recognizes him almost immediately.
“Elder millennial moms. That’s your demo,” I tell him. I’ve been waiting for him by the trash cans near the back of the theater, raincoat draped over my arm, while a group of red-cheeked women fawned over him.
“Oh, yeah. Big-time.” Marco trashes his second—third?—can of Diet Coke. “Walking home? Or did you bring your hot wheels? I’m guessing no.” His gaze skates over my dress again—short, flowy, slightly too feminine to be sophisticated, and in no way built for bike riding.
“If you’re talking about my bike—no, I did not bring my hot wheels. Soph gave me a ride.”
His eyebrows jump. “Well, then, can I give you a ride home?”
“Of course you can.”
Shockingly, this consent does not come from me. I turn toward the voice—Allie’s over my shoulder in her black show blazer and pointy flats, looking sweaty and professional. “So nice to finally meet you, Marco.”
I glare at her. Finally?
“Hey, sure. Likewise.” His brow quirks for a moment and his eyes briefly connect with mine—Finally?
“Alison, I thought we were going to get dinner—”
“Well, then Marco can join us.” She shrugs and grins, because she’s so proud of herself, but she also flinches because she knows I’m mentally throwing knives at her. “Marco, do you like dinner?”
He’s standing there with his hands in his pockets, mouth pulled into a flat, observant line. His eyelashes are so long that under the dim theater lights, they cast long shadows over his cheeks that look like the delicate, angular legs of a spider. “I love dinner,” he says earnestly. His voice is deep but sweet. Suddenly, I want to kiss him again. I want to hug him and feel his chest muscles tense underneath me and then bite into his tan skin. I believe this is what they call cute aggression.
“No one loves dinner.” The words leave my mouth before I can stop them.
Marco lifts his chin at me, bemused, and crosses his arms over his chest. “Excuse me? I absolutely love dinner. Meatloaf? Mashed potatoes? These are top-tier foods.”
Now I’m angry—unthinkably angry. “Breakfast is the only meal that is even worth making an argument for. You’d take meatloaf over waffles? Over an omelet?”
“Yes,” Marco says plainly.
I throw my hands up in the air and announce loud enough to turn some heads: “Well, then, I guess I’ll just go fuck myself.”
Allie grimaces, tossing an apologetic look Marco’s way. “Sorry, she doesn’t get out much.”
Marco, Soph, and I wait patiently while Allie collects her well-earned congratulations from proud parents and grocery store bouquets from giddy, glassy-eyed teens before we all decide on dinner at the Pier Point Diner situated at the very end of the boardwalk. The diner’s brightly lit interior is mostly empty, save for what appears to be a very chaste double date and a few waitresses in cobalt blue polo shirts, swiping crumbs off the breakfast counter and clearing out the cake display case. We all slide into a booth, Soph and Allie shoulder to shoulder, looking pink and eager in their humid coats. Marco climbs in next to me, struggling to pull off his jacket without elbowing me in the throat.
“We didn’t even get a chance to tell you how amazing tonight was.” I reach across the table and give Allie’s wrist a squeeze. “Another impeccably directed masterpiece.”
“Your best work yet,” Soph joins in, giving her a hug around the waist. “Incredible job, babe.”
“Really? Y’all don’t have to lie, you know that. I felt like the chorus was a little low energy in the first half. I kept telling them—if you’re not having fun, the audience won’t be either!”
“They were perfect. Everyone was,” Marco chimes in. He folds his hands on the table and his elbow grazes mine. “Consider me an unbiased third party. Best performance I’ve seen this year, maybe.”
“Oh jeez.” Allie smooths a hand over her cheek, strategically hiding the sudden flush blooming there. “Well, I guess I have to believe you, then.”
Oh, no, even Allie, gay as they come, is charmed. Is no one immune to this man? Soph and I swap a quick, bemused look before our waitress drops off a stack of sticky plastic menus and four ice waters.
“So, how’d you all meet?” Marco asks, skimming past the section dedicated to regional tragedies like creamed chipped beef and disco fries. Thank God.
“We’re neighbors,” I say casually, eyeing Allie and Soph over my menu. I’m sending them paragraphs of data with just my irises. “We share a duplex.” He doesn’t know I have lupus or that I lost my job or that I’m living at my parents’. Well, he kind of knows that part but anyway, please don’t say anything too—
“We moved into the downstairs apartment like, two summers ago?” Allie says. “Back then Nadia was too cosmopolitan to be our friend. She’d show up Saturday morning, run ten miles, then she’d be gone. She was way too important for little old Evergreen.”
“I did not run ten miles. I’d run like, seven and a half.”
“Seven and a half miles?” Marco lets out a low whistle. “What was your split?”
“I don’t know, eight minutes?”
“Damn, you are fast.”
Heat springs up from my neckline.
“But we all need a change of pace sometimes.” Soph jumps in and saves me, a preternatural empath despite their best efforts. “Nadia makes all my chalkboard signs.”
I’m actually, fully blushing now—a good sign that the conversation needs to move on. I bury my nose in my menu and announce, “You know, Marco grew up in Evergreen.”
Allie perks up immediately. “Did you go to Malaga County? Are you in our hall of fame? Do you want to come talk to my first-period freshmen? They desperately need a mentor.”
“No, unfortunately,” Marco responds, weariness edging into his voice. “We moved to LA when I was fourteen—my mom and me?”
“Did you always want to be an actor?”
“I really wanted to play professional baseball. But I wasn’t good enough. And my mom was big into . . . ” He pauses for a moment, carefully selecting his next word. “Hollywood. It worked out.”
Sensing we may have accidentally wandered into unpleasant territory, the table falls quiet as we turn our attention back to our menus. Soph and Allie slip into their own private world, giggling and arguing under their breath, so I lean close to Marco and say, “You’re going to order the meatloaf, aren’t you?”
“Well,” he whispers back, nudging the corner of his menu into mine. “It comes with green beans and mashed potatoes. Not a bad deal.”
“It’s almost ten p.m.”
He snaps his menu shut. “I love a digestive challenge. What about you?”
“I don’t know . . .” I chew at my bottom lip. I don’t have much of an appetite these days. “Maybe I’ll just have a coffee.”
“C’mon,” he says gently. “You have to eat. Let’s split the meatloaf.”
“Mmm. Pure romance.”
“You seem like you have a hard time committing,” he ribs me.
“Oh?” I arch a brow at him. “So, you’ll just help me out, then?”
“Mmm-hmm.” He nods. “I’m a nice guy, aren’t I?”
“According to who?”
We place our orders and receive only a moderate amount of horror when Marco tells the waitress, “One meatloaf, two straws.”
Our food arrives and everyone falls quiet, until Allie has half a milkshake in her.
“So, you’re just back for thirty days, huh?” she barbs, Midwesternly.
Marco quirks a brow at this. The specificity, the intent of the comment, it’s not lost on him—or me. I try to kick Allie under the table, but instead Soph lets out a little yelp and my ears turn pink.
He nods, pushing a spoonful of mashed potatoes toward my half of the oblong, trough-sized dinner plate. “More or less, yeah. I’m looking after my uncle’s place while he’s in Greece, but I’m back and forth to New York every few days, working on some big projects. Just living in the moment.”
I make a conscious effort not to roll my eyes.
“And your mom?”
“Allie,” I hiss.
“It’s okay.” Marco laughs. “She’s in Florida now. Retired.”
“Is your dad still in Evergreen?”
This question hits my stomach like lead. Dad territory can be risky.
“Uh, kinda.” Marco directs this comment toward his meatloaf, which he saws into sixteenths. “He’s a real character, but I think old age has slowed him down. He called me from Montreal last month.”
Sometimes I want to punt the woman into the sun. She has this naivete about how complicated and painful simple things like family can be. It’s obvious, painfully so, that talking about his parents is making Marco itch. I almost want to reach under the booth and take his hand in mine, give him a squeeze. A little hand Morse code: sorry-she-sucks.
Instead, I reach over to take another forkful of buttered green beans from our shared plate. “Dinner food was a good call,” I say. “Hey, why don’t we ever sell any vegetables to the diner?”
Soph furrows their brow at their apple pie. “I don’t think we could keep up with demand. They probably move the same volume of potatoes in one day that we sell in a month.”
“No way,” Allie says. “Even in the offseason?”
Soph nods emphatically. “The people of New Jersey love potatoes. Think about how many french fries a diner serves in a day.”
Marco’s gaze floats to mine, and a soft smile plays at the corners of his mouth.
After settling the check, we all wander out onto the desolate boardwalk, where an icy breeze is coming in off the ocean. If no one else was here, I’d take off my shoes and walk out onto the cold, wet sand. Get close enough to the tide to feel the freezing water whispering against my feet and walk all the way back to the bottom of the island, back home. We only have a few more weeks of cold nights before the season really starts to change, and I want to soak in every moment.
Soph wraps their arm around Allie’s shoulders and they meander away, heads close together, cheek to firecracker-red cheek. I know that, theoretically, they get plenty of time alone together, but I can’t help feeling bad for how much I’ve made myself a part of their life. I hang back, pulling my jacket tighter around me as I face the ocean, cold air stinging my eyes.
Before I can decide how I feel about it, Marco strides into my periphery, setting his elbows down onto the railing that separates us from a substantial fall down onto the sand.
“I think I’m gonna head out,” he says softly. “But I’ll see you tomorrow, right?”
I rake my teeth over my bottom lip. Yes, tomorrow. And the day after. And the day after that.
“Sure.” I nod, letting my eyes meet his. “Thanks for coming tonight.”
“Of course. Thank you for having me.” Marco lingers, shoulders hunched against the wind. His lips open then close, until finally he says, “Let me give you a ride home.” His eyes are so dark, I can almost see the shimmer of my earrings in their reflection.
“You’re not sick of me?”
“Not at all.”
I drop my eyes, smiling softly. “I’m sorry about Allie. I wanna blame it on all the homeschooling, but—”
“I’m a big boy, Nadia,” Marco says, quiet laughter shaking his shoulders. “I can handle a few questions about my family. No feelings hurt, I promise.”
“Good.” A breath of relaxation falls from my lips. “I’d love a ride home.” I tilt my head toward Soph and Allie, locked together in a kiss one streetlight over, their bodies having dissolved into a single shadow. “I think the lovebirds are busy.”
Marco drives me home, carbs and chilly weather lulling us both into an easy, contented silence. We keep our eyes trained on the wide, empty streets of downtown Evergreen, even though the air in the car feels choked and charged with the giddy energy of what next? We’d see each other tomorrow, of course. And then the day after. And the day after that one, and so on and so on. After months of continuously feeling nothing, on a good day, I now couldn’t stop wondering: What would this month bring? Would it always be like this—soft and easy? Would it hurt when we said goodbye?
When he pulls up to my parents’ house, we say good night and he assures me he’ll call. All of this makes my head spin, but I somehow find myself saying okay, see ya.
After brushing my teeth and taking my meds, I settle between my clean, cold sheets, a ball of unspent energy and fiery nerves.
“Fucking Marco,” I say out loud, to my ceiling.
You wish, I think immediately.
I toss and turn, making a good, solid effort to fall asleep. But my mind won’t still, I just know it won’t, until I do it.
With a groan, I roll toward my phone and poke the screen to life. Twice in one day? In a matter of days, this man’s turned me into a pervert of the highest order—a fan.
Nevertheless, I tap open Google and my fingers find the letters of his name. I’d told myself I’d never do this again. And somehow that makes it feel all the more delicious. I can’t believe I’m doing—
A new article. There it is, at the top of the list, a blue link unsullied by my feverish clicking.
Marco Antoniou Is Done with Acting
Years in the limelight—and away—have taught Marco a lesson he’ll never forget: Som . . .
The preview pane cleaves the sentence mercilessly. What had it taught him? What had he learned? Above the headline is a thumbnail photo.
I can tell the photo was taken recently because he has the mullet and he’s on the beach. An Evergreen beach. I would recognize the dunes—which Marco lounges against, his weight shifted backward onto an elbow so that his linen shirt dips open perfectly, revealing a triangle of tan chest—anywhere. His hair is expertly styled, smoothed away from his face in careful waves. The party part of his mullet, the worst part, is brushed back and cast over his shoulder. Marco’s gaze holds mine from the photo, eyelashes framing his chocolate-brown eyes like kohl. He’s not smiling; instead, his full lips are pushed together and parted ever so slightly, like he’s been caught mid-sentence.
God, he’s perfect, I think.
The thought comes to me so fast, I can’t even stop myself.
Marco Antoniou Is Done with Acting
Years in the limelight—and away—have taught Marco a lesson he’ll never forget: Some bad days will haunt you forever.
By Sage Liu
When Marco Antoniou agreed to do an interview, I didn’t think I’d have to take two trains and a bus to reach him. But these days, the former Dude’s Ranch star spends his time hiding out on the tiny island of Evergreen, a lesser-known Jersey Shore point fifty-five minutes east of Philadelphia and two hours south of Manhattan, where Marco usually lives. My trip down is organized directly with Marco, who prefers to manage his own schedule. He buys me a first-class Amtrak ticket to Atlantic City, and apologizes profusely for being unable to pick me up. Marco assures me that the bus ride to Evergreen will, at best, leave me feeling inspired—or, at worst, give me some time to catch up on emails. And like that, I agree.
Marco’s charm has long been noted—by critics, who mostly panned Dude’s Ranch as low-brow junk to fill the airwaves before Thursday Night Football, with the exception of Antoniou’s performance as the winsome Vinny Baldacco; by business managers on both sides of the negotiation table, who describe him as humble and hardworking; and best of all, by his friends, who have stuck with Marco through thick and thin.
I take the train to Atlantic City and then a bus to the little shore-point island Marco refers to as his “sort of hometown”: Evergreen, New Jersey.
Evergreen is a juggernaut; a tiny town of 10,000 residents that balloons to a cultural hot spot of nearly 200,000 during the summer season. Comedians and musicians travel from all over to play to a boisterous, sold-out crowd at The Billiards Backroom, and there are rumors that even pro ballers and A-listers have looked into purchasing bayside property on the hyper-secluded micro-islands that freckle the southernmost tip of Evergreen. This is to say, it’s not weird that Marco is here. But it is certainly a choice.
“New York gave me my livelihood back, but when I’m here I reconnect with who I really am,” he remarks while giving me a tour of his family’s sleek, European villa, which includes a private dock on Malaga Bay and a row of perfectly pruned fig trees.
Marco has a tendency to do this—to sort of speak in greeting card phrases. I can’t tell if he’s the sweetest man on Earth or messing with me, sending off one-liners he knows will click into place perfectly for a cover story. It’s this tension that keeps me on my toes.
Having grown up in the PNW, I wasn’t familiar with the cultish fervor tristate locals feel for the Jersey Shore. Like many Americans, I associated the phrase with a reality TV show and the ensuing mid-aughts hedonism. But Marco assures me I am in fact in the greatest place on Earth. Evergreen is a place of paradox, he says while thumbing a ripe fig. “That’s why I fit in perfectly.”
From the balcony off the back of Antoniou’s temporary home, you can see exactly where the bay meets the Atlantic. “This is my favorite view,” he tells me, passing me a mug of what looks to be perfectly brewed black tea. Marco has been living a sober lifestyle since 2019, but he still feels awful for only being able to offer guests sparkling water or some form of caffeine. “I try to remove all temptation and then I look like a total asshole.” His accent crests on the word asshole.
The mention of temptation feels like a natural segue into talking about the notorious, albeit very private, heartthrob’s love life. Strangely, unexpectedly, when I mention the idea of love, Marco is incredibly forthcoming.
“I’m a romantic. It’s the only core belief I have that I haven’t managed to destroy.” This is delivered with a soft laugh. “People are falling in love all over the place, all the time. Even in their darkest, most fucked-up hours. That was the most consistent part of rehab, actually. Illicit romances.
“I just don’t think it’s in the cards for me,” he adds. This feels like a profoundly vulnerable revelation, delivered with a cigarette hanging from the center of his lips—his only remaining vice. “I think different people have different energy. For a long time, my energy was not attractive. And now, I’m old.” He laughs.
“Too old for love?” I ask.
“Too old for heartbreak.”
What a correction.
These days Marco stays busy with a number of investments in small businesses, most of which are run by the dear friends he made in the wake of sobriety. He’s part owner of an olive grove in southern Lazio that produces award-winning oil; he’s an investor in a woman-run healthcare app; he provided start-up capital for a tattoo shop in Bed-Stuy. He’s liable to show up at any of these places, at any time, to lend a hand wherever needed. Marco is a jack of all trades, and by his own judgment, a master of none.
“I was a fine TV actor. I can deliver a line, hit my mark, have a positive attitude. But really, I think what I’m good at is just being there for people. It’s a skill, and I’m always working at it. I like the idea of being a reliable guy. You need a ride? A plus one? Someone to sit with you when things suck?”
“So, I take it this is your way of saying you won’t be making a comeback to TV?”
Marco scoffs playfully. “A comeback? Are you kidding me?”
We settle into matching rocking chairs on the back deck and talk for what feels like both fifteen minutes and five hours. When the sun starts to set, Marco tells me he’ll take me to his favorite barbecue place. He drives a ten-year-old Cadillac that’s in near-pristine condition.
“I feel like an old-school mobster in this thing,” he says with a rakish grin. Behind the wheel, Marco looks like he could easily star in a glossy remake of The Godfather. He’s a testament to the existence of star power. Even in a navy-blue T-shirt he claims came in a pack of three, Marco looks like someone worth watching.
And he is. Marco Antoniou may never cross our screens again, but I have a feeling we haven’t seen the last of him. When I ask him what’s next, he details a project that is equal parts glamour and sophistication.
“This is my second act, for sure. This is my part two. Everything’s different. I’m ready for everything to be different.”
“So, you’ll quit smoking?” I tease.
He looks at me over the top of his sunglasses and flashes a heart-stopping smile. “For the right woman, absolutely.”
I throw my phone across the room.