Monday, May 22
“Dinner with the family,” Marco jokes, pulling into the carport behind Soph’s truck. “I should have brought flowers.”
I roll my eyes until they land on his. “Save that stunning sense of humor for inside. We’re gonna need it.”
“Should I be more nervous? I’ve met Soph and Allie. They’re great—”
“Yeah, but you didn’t meet them when you were my . . . you know, an actual boyfriend that I spent time with.” I shrug, reapplying a slick coat of lip gloss in the orange light of the car mirror. “You were just some guy with a mullet.”
This gives Marco pause. He crosses his arms over his chest. “They’re gonna be different?”
“Maybe.” I shrug and flip the mirror closed. “They’re very protective of me.”
“So am I! I’m an alpha.”
“Mmmm.” I tilt my head from side to side. “But are you misandrist-oceanside-gays level of protective over me?”
“I can be,” he defends himself. “Just let me google a few things.”
As we make our way around the car and up the front porch steps, Marco laces his fingers with mine and says, “We should stay at your place tonight.”
Without thinking, I scoff. “You do not want that, believe me. The whole place smells like middle-class ennui and gardenia potpourri.”
“Oh, c’mon.” He pulls his hand out of mine. “It can’t be that bad. You’re being dramatic.”
I poke a finger into his chest. “One night in my bed and you’ll be crying for your uncle’s two-thousand-thread-count organic sheets.”
“Hold on.” Marco laughs, rubbing a hand over the spot I poked as he leans back against the old creaky railing. His expression changes, the angles of his face softening. “You don’t really think I’m some shitty satin-slipper-prince type, do you?”
“Satin slipper?” I laugh. “I would love to see you in a pair of satin slippers. Oh, and a leotard.”
“Be serious, Nadia. I know we’re from different backgrounds, but—”
“But what? Marco, you own property on the island of Manhattan. You wear cologne and use a leave-in conditioner. I have an hourly wage job and sports asthma. It’s not a big deal.” I shrug, leaning forward to place my hands on his shoulders. He’s wearing a horribly fashionable bomber jacket; I looked the brand up, contemplating snatching the jacket from his closet for myself, and almost puked when I saw how much it cost. “We sleep at your uncle’s. I love your uncle’s! I love organic sheets!”
He sets his jaw hard, hooking a finger on one of my belt loops and tugging me close. “We’re staying at your place tonight.”
“Why do I have to suffer in order for you to prove a point?”
“Because I want to see where you live.”
I sigh, giving his cheek a swipe before turning back toward the door, but secretly, I feel a rush of new, sparkling emotion in my chest. We’d just had a disagreement that was terrifyingly, thrillingly normal.
I pause before knocking on Soph and Allie’s front door. I can’t stand the idea of going into Soph and Allie’s without seeing Marco one last time—getting in a final word or maybe just pressing my mouth to his and sucking all the good faith out of his soul like a Dementor—so I spin around. To my surprise, Marco is extremely close behind me, mouth hanging open as he, apparently, also had one more thing he needed to say.
But when our eyes connect we both break out into laughter. I lean forward into his arms, letting my forehead fall against his shoulder as his hands slide around my lower back.
“You’re not a satin-slipper prince-bitch,” I murmur against his skin. He smells delicious and familiar, like bar soap and warm skin. I want to spend the entire night making out with him on this porch.
“Thank you.” He presses his lips into the crown of my head, pulsing his hands around me. “I needed to hear that.”
Allie answers the door so quickly, I have no choice but to believe she’d been standing there with her ear pressed against the oiled oak, listening to our entire conversation.
“Soph made Cornish hens!” she announces, flinging a long, lissome arm into the air, nearly launching her empty wineglass into the ceiling.
“Oh, wow.” I raise my brows. “And you?”
She waves us into the apartment, giving me a devilish look before holding an empty glass up to one of her icy-blue eyes. “I taste-tested all the wines.”
We shed our jackets before following close behind. I’m reminded why I’ve always preferred to spend time here rather than upstairs; Allie and Soph’s apartment is identical to my family’s unit, except it’s extremely well-decorated and contains exactly zero humiliating photos of me. An eclectic mix of relics from Soph and Allie’s separate and shared lives covers the walls, bringing the small, beige space to life. Art from Allie’s days traveling across South America; pennant flags from Soph’s time on the Jersey City intramural rugby team; an overstuffed couch and a long, wooden table covered in candle wax and water rings. Soph’s behind the island in the kitchen area, basting their hens while bossa nova drifts on the fragrant air.
“Yo, yo,” they call out to us. Marco and Soph shake hands, exchanging strong and dignified looks of approval, and suddenly it really does feel like Marco’s meeting my parents. I blush and twirl my hair while they appraise each other.
“Your home is beautiful,” Marco says, handing over the bottle of Sicilian Merlot we chose entirely based on the design merits of the label. “Thank you so much for having us.”
“Great choice.” Soph palms the bottle. “This will go perfectly with the squash blossom risotto.”
“Oh my God, yum.” Allie sneaks up behind Soph and snags the bottle from their hands. Little wine thief. “It took us way too long to do this. It’s so nice to have another couple to hang out with.”
“Uh, ouch, hello. I’m the not-couple you’re usually hanging out with.” I grab a grape off the expansive charcuterie board laid out on the island and pop it into my mouth. “And you’re serving produce we didn’t even grow. So much betrayal.”
“You should feel honored I hand-selected fruit all the way from Chile, just for you,” Soph teases, heading back to their workstation. Marco follows behind, doing the man thing where he needs to feel useful. If Soph doesn’t give him a potato to peel, he’s going to start jimmying loose handles and analyzing all the caulking.
After Allie has another glass and a half of wine, we move to the table and dig in to a meal so well prepared, Marco is stunned into an awe-filled silence. Every few bites of risotto, he looks at Soph like he wants to kiss them directly on the mouth.
“I’m sure you’ve heard all about Nadia’s illustrious career in Super Bowl–commercial writing,” Allie says, tossing a wink at me between the stemware and taper candles.
“Her specialty,” Soph adds dryly.
“Alright, you two. Don’t make me separate you.” Thank God the lights are dimmed, because there’s a swatch of pink growing up from the neckline of my shirt.
“No, actually.” Marco eyes me from across the table, the corner of his mouth twitching. Since we’ve gotten home from Rome, he hasn’t shaved his face bare and there’s a dark shadow over his cheeks and jaw that makes my stomach clench pleasantly. “I haven’t.”
“I wrote like, five spots. Only two of them went. It’s not a big deal.”
“That’s two more than most people! My favorite was the one for the laundry detergent brand. I sobbed.”
“And there was the one about travel, right?” Soph says, then catches themselves, immediately turning as red as the capicola drying on the charcuterie board between us.
“That one doesn’t count,” I quip, trying to sound casual. As long as Marco doesn’t notice the way the air has changed around us, I tell myself. That’s all that matters.
“What else should I know about Nadia?” Marco directs this question at Allie, the weaker of the two.
“Careful, now,” I warn Allie and Soph. “Remember, we share plumbing. I can make your life really miserable.”
“I don’t know. What’s there to know?” Allie is looking at me with drunken, glassy-eyed wonder. “She looks like a sexy mermaid and Shakira had a baby. She’s funny and thoughtful and snores. Her favorite color is pink.”
“Favorite cake is carrot,” Soph chimes in. “Or anything with cream cheese frosting.”
I feel Marco’s legs shift closer to mine under the table. He bumps his knee against mine, but I can’t look up from my plate. I’m absolutely burning up with the humiliation that usually accompanies genuine praise. “Marco knows plenty now. Thank you all so much.”
“What about you?” Allie demands, wagging a fork heavy with salad at Marco. Tiny little droplets of oil fling toward his white T-shirt. “Now it’s your turn to talk.”
We finish out the meal talking about our favorite viral videos and swapping stories about where we were on 9/11. There’s never a moment of silence, and as we clear the table—Marco pulling on a pair of yellow gloves and filling the sink with sudsy, hot water—I’m struck down to my core with how much fun I’m having. It’s a warm, safe fun that nestles into my chest like nostalgia. I already miss this moment—Marco laughing while Allie throws herself around, telling a story about one of her students, Soph looking on and chuckling in their nervous way. As it happens, I feel myself pulling away, unable to silence the voice in my head that whispers that soon this will all be gone.
Marco’s phone rings and he excuses himself, and I take over at the sink, pulling on the rubber gloves and submerging my arms into the water.
“God, how cute is he? And he’s obsessed with you. You two are practically married,” Allie swoons, pressing a hand to her heart. “It’s fucking adorable.”
Soph catches my eye, and I look away as fast as I can. “No, not at all. We just click, you know? It’s really easy. We’re having fun.”
“I don’t know, Nadia. He’s giving long-term-partner vibes—”
“Allison, enough,” Soph cuts in calmly.
“Jeeeeeez, full name. What’d I do?”
“Nothing.” I shrug, trying to sound unshaken. “Let’s just talk about something else.”
“But what happens next?” Allie whines, hopping up onto the counter. “We can’t just act like everything goes back to normal—”
“This is the last thing I want to talk about right now, ma’am. You’re drunk.”
Soph pushes off the island and slips between Allie’s legs, wrapping their arms around her waist. “She’ll give herself another mental-breakdown haircut, and we’ll all move on.”
I laugh, even though that joke kind of stings. “See? There you go. Soph always has a solution.”
“Ugh, I love the short hair—why do we have to call it a mental-breakdown haircut—?”
The balcony door slides open and Marco steps back inside. “Sorry about that. My brother called and then my stepmom got ahold of the phone.”
“You better be.” I snap off the rubber gloves. “I haven’t worked this hard in years.”
“Leave the dishes,” Soph says, corralling us back toward the table. “I made us a tiramisu.”
After dinner, I lead Marco up to the second story of the beach house, making a show of our arrival. I Vanna White in front of the pale blue front door with the faded Welcome wreath my mom bought from a yard sale approximately fifteen years ago.
“Three bedrooms. Two baths. One skylight. Innumerable bugs. One lazy piece of shit. Three doors that don’t work—”
“Okay, I get it.” He laughs. “Let me in.”
“I’m not done! Three doors that don’t work, and tonight? One celebrity.” I press my hands to Marco’s chest as he rolls his eyes and gently pushes my hands away.
“You’re hilarious.”
“Aren’t I?” I turn the key in the door and, with a shaky breath, push it open. “Ta-daaaaa.”
The apartment is exactly as it always has been, exactly as it always will be. The furniture is all slightly too small with faded fabric and scuffed corners from years of use. Our kitchen table is wicker and glass, a real 1980s coke-den special. But moonlight pours in from the skylight, drenching our island—smaller than Soph’s—and the countertops, and the space feels clean, pristine, compared to downstairs. There’s no art on our walls, just family pictures in heavy frames.
Soph sent us away with an armful of leftovers that I put away while Marco walks around the room. He’s moving slowly, almost with reverence. He runs his fingertips over the afghan draped over the back of the couch. He pauses to look at every picture of us on the walls.
My mom’s favorite photo is one of me, Liv, and Nicky on the beach in Calabria one summer when we went to visit her family, taken on a Kodak camera and now hanging next to our TV.
We’re all standing in the shallow sea tide, deeply tanned and hair unkempt. Nicky’s grinning with all his might, Liv’s arms tucked protectively around his neck. I’m squatting at their feet, my chin against my knees, eyebrows furrowed in contemplation. We all look so much like ourselves.
Marco squints at our little, dusty faces. “Look at you. Adorable little moppet.”
“See, I’ve always been a mystery.”
He lets out a deep laugh. “Your home—your life—it’s nice, Nadia. It’s really nice.”
“Is it?” I ask quietly, crossing my arms over my chest.
He nods. “It feels full, saturated with—I don’t know, good things. Your friends, your parents—” He jabs his thumb toward the photo. “I’ve never had anything like this.”
Saturated with good things. I shift awkwardly at his words. I bite at my lower lip and ask, “Does that . . . bother you?”
“No. I mean, yes. But not actively.” He furrows his brow, shoving his hands down into his pockets. “You have a lot to be grateful for.”
“I know,” I say softly. “I’ve never brought a guy home to meet anyone before. They can be a lot. It’s not like a white picket fence type of situation. It’s all very messy and loud and someone is always in crisis. I always sort of . . . kept people away, because I was embarrassed. And it can be hard to explain . . .” I gesture around the room. It can be hard to explain something so simple, so traditional, so pretense-less when it always seemed like everyone around me was reaching out for more. When I had always been reaching out for more. How many times had I pushed my mom to replace the brocade couch? How many times had I made fun of the swollen, squeaky doors that wouldn’t shut? How many questions had I evaded from Kai—and all the guys like Kai—over the years?
Saturated with good things.
Marco keeps his eyes trained on the photo of me and my siblings as he speaks. “I had the white picket fence situation for fourteen years. And it was dark. A lot of fucked-up things happen behind white picket fences in big beige houses.”
His sudden confession stuns me; I stay planted with my back against the island, holding my arms around myself.
Marco felt at home in a world of self-harm masquerading as hedonism and glamour. In a crowded room full of people trying to feel something, Marco could finally shut off the part of him that felt too much. The little boy, scared and lonely on the boardwalk.
The man who stepped behind the camera and wanted to disappear.
How idiotic am I? It’d never occurred to me that Marco’s struggles with substances came from something deeper than the vicious speed run through Hollywood he’d endured. I feel stripped down, embarrassed. It’s not just that Marco doesn’t know I have lupus. Do I really even know him enough to say I love you?
Or are we just fucking kidding ourselves?
In the moonlight, he looks older. The boyishness in his eyes is tucked behind a self-affixed blankness, that distance he can so easily create creeping back in. His mouth is settled into a tight, humorless smile, and he looks very, very tired. I want to kiss every part of him, make him feel good and loved. I don’t need to know everything about him in order to know I want to love him.
I round the island and cross the room.
“Hey.” I push his hair back from his face, letting my fingers glance along the heavy pull of his brow. I want to massage away his frown. “You’re okay now. I’m here.”
His mouth twitches as he shakes his head, as if he’s clearing his mind like an Etch A Sketch. “Sorry. I don’t know what my problem is.”
“No.” I want him to reach out and pull me to his chest, but he’s already turning away, toward the hallway.
“I’m exhausted,” he says, voice flat. “Show me those sheets you’ve been talking about.”
That distance. It’s been weeks since I’ve felt it. And even though Marco waits for me to lead him down the hall, his hands eventually coming down to rest on my hips, there is a heavy, leaden weight dragging through my chest as I realize I’m not the only one who can run away.