Chapter 2 – Three Days Later
CHIARA
THREE DAYS LATER
“Mom! Mom!” I shout, running into the living room where she’s wiping the coffee table while Dad watches TV. “Dominic is on the phone, and—”
“Are you fucking kidding me with that stupid boy again?” my dad hollers, running his hand through his black hair, not noticing the tears streaming down my face. Or maybe he notices, but doesn’t care.
“But, Dad, he—” I try to explain but he stops me with a sharp rise of his palm.
“I fucking told you about that family! How many damn times? Huh?” His cheeks grow red from the way he shouts. “They’re trash! You hear me?” His eyes grow wide, his cheeks getting redder. “And you tarnish our name by associating with them? My own fucking daughter?”
They’re not trash! I scream inside my head. They’re better than you! I hate you!
“Faro! She’s crying. Don’t you see something’s wrong?”
“Was I talkin’ to you?” He lifts a hand like he’s about to hit her, and I gasp. “Finish cleaning and shut your damn mouth when I’m talkin’ to my daughter.”
“His mom died, Dad. Can’t you be nice for a minute?!” I half-shout, half-sob with a pant. “He can hear everything you’re saying.” I lift the phone in the air. “Don’t you care?”
Mom’s body stills. The rag stops moving on the table.
“Wha-what did you say?” She turns to me, straightening up, her brows tightening.
“He said it was a car accident. He said she—”
My chin trembles, tears sting my nose, and my throat grows achy.
“Oh, Mom,” I cry, running toward her, phone still in my hand as she holds me tight.
She then takes the phone from me. “Dom, baby, I’m so sorry.”
She’s crying now, her tears falling faster than mine. There’s a brief pause.
“Oh, God. We’re coming by the house. Okay? You stay put. We’ll be there soon.”
She hangs up, holding me with both arms again.
“Go put on your shoes,” she tells me.
“You better not think about going there,” my dad spits out. “Send some goddamn flowers, but that’s it.”
She glares at him.
“We’re going. Those boys just lost their mother. I don’t care what you do to me,” she says with her chin high. “But I’m going, because I’m a fucking human being.”
My father’s face grows madder by the second, his thick brows dipping and his thin lips bending like an evil scientist. “One of my guys will take you. You’ll have one hour.”
Then he storms out, his footsteps heavy.
Mom exhales out a sigh of relief, wrapping the warmth of her arms around me, her hands gliding up and down my back.
“Why couldn’t it be him?” I ask, speaking so low into her ear, I don’t know if she even heard me.
“Don’t say that, baby,” she whispers. “I know he’s awful, but I don’t want you to think that way.”
“Well, I am.” I pull back, peering at her glazed eyes. “Why couldn’t he die?!” I whisper-shout. “Why do good people like Dom’s mom have to die?”
Oh, Dom.
New tears fill my eyes, the hurt building.
“I don’t have the answers to that, baby. I wish I knew.” She wipes her own tears away as she sniffles. “But right now, we have to focus on your friend and his family. They need us.”
DOMINIC
THREE DAYS LATER
I keep punching my arm, thinking this is a dream and Mom isn’t dead. That the officers never came to the house three days ago to tell us she is gone forever. A car accident, they said. That’s all anyone will tell me.
“I just saw her,” Dad had cried while I hugged him. “She told me she was going to go and pick up Matteo from kindergarten so he didn’t have to take a school bus. She can’t be dead.”
He wasn’t really talking to me. It was like he was talking to himself or something and I was just there to hear it.
My belly wobbles as I remember the two officers showing up at our house after my brothers and I got home from school. They didn’t want to tell me anything, asking for my dad. They came inside while I called him.
After Dad got home, I called Chiara because I needed her. I’m glad she stopped by with her mom. They stayed with us until after the cops left. Her mom helped put Enzo and Matteo to bed while Dante and I stayed up to take care of Dad.
Tears drip down my eyes and I hate them. I practically knock them away. How can she be gone?
“Mommy. Please come back. Please.” I cover my face with my hands, sobbing into them. My entire body shakes with all the hurt.
Once my father got home, he knew something awful happened to Mom. He yelled at the cops for answers, and then he got them, wishing he hadn’t.
How can she be gone? How is it possible we buried her today? Why my mom? What did she ever do to anyone? She was the best.
My heart races while I hold on to my chest. I can’t breathe. My throat hurts from all the crying.
I miss you.
The tears continue, and I don’t stop them. I don’t think they’d go anywhere even if I asked nicely. I grab a pillow from my bed and put it over my face, screaming and crying all at once.
There’s a small knock on my door before the handle turns. I quickly put the pillow back and swipe under my eyes.
“Dom?” Chiara’s voice calls out from the crack in the door.
I clear my throat. “Yeah, I’m in here.”
Everyone is downstairs at the house after Mom’s funeral, and I couldn’t take being there with them all. They’re crying like she was their mother.
She was ours. We lost her, not them.
I escaped to my room, wanting to be alone. But not from Chiara. She’s the only person I’d never want to run from.
The door swings open a little at a time until I see her face.
“Is it okay if I’m here?” she asks, sounding unsure.
“Yeah, of course. I just couldn’t be down there.”
She nods, clasping her hands in front of her as she walks toward my bed.
“I got you something.” She opens her hand, revealing a silver necklace with a heart.
I stare curiously at it, peeking up to find her biting her lip as she takes a seat beside me.
“It’s a friendship necklace,” she explains, cracking it in half and handing me one half of her heart. “That way, no matter where we are, we’re always together.”
I glance down at my half, then up at her.
“Is it stupid?” she asks, crinkling her nose. “Yeah, it’s stupid.”
She waves her hand in the air, answering her own question.
But it’s not stupid at all.
I like it. A lot.
I grip her hand, keeping it steady. “I love it, Chiara.”
“Really?” She smiles a little, her face slanting to the side. “You mean that?”
She’s so pretty.
“Yeah.” I nod, lifting it up and placing it around my neck. “It’s kind of cool.” I grin for the first time in days.
“It has our names on the back.” She turns her half and shows me her name on it, while I glance down at mine.
“Wow, that’s neat.”
“Yeah.” She scoots closer. “It kind of is.”
“I’ll never take it off,” I promise.
She smiles, then both of us stare at the wall in front. I scoot even closer, and when I do, her hand slowly creeps toward mine, her fingers slicing in between my clammy ones.
I lay my head over hers, and we stay that way for a long time. I let her hold my hand tighter, hoping it makes me feel just a little bit better, just a little bit safer.
But it doesn’t.
My mom’s gone, and I’ll always be broken.