Chapter 1 #5
"You think I drive like a championship racer?" Lorenzo side-eyes him, smiling. Daisy groans. "Oh my god. Shut up, both of you. Lorenzo, baby, I'll talk to you. I'm fine. Don't rely on Jin. He's useless. But yes, please, can we keep Antonio? Please?" She does the little prayer-hands thing.
Gio goes, "Okay. But if I see Lorenzo speeding, I'm pulling him out at a red light and beating his ass."
"Oooooooh," Lorenzo taunts. "Keep talking." Gio flicks his forehead hard. "OW."
We actually leave Antonio in their car, God help them, and head to ours with Lulu and Blu trailing behind us.
After fighting for our LIVES to stuff all the bags in the trunk, we finally collapse into our seats and blast the heat.
I turn to look at Gio with this stupid soft smile and he immediately squints at me.
"Where are your glasses?"
Oh. Right. "Aaaaa I left them on the table by the door! I'm sorry!"
He sighs like a tired dad and sprints out to get them. I didn't even notice. I was too busy trying not to forget half our stuff and also not lose Antonio in the process.
He comes back, shuts the door, and instead of handing me the glasses... he puts them on me himself. Then he leans in and kisses me softly. Then steals another one. And another. And another. I'm laughing into his mouth while he starts the engine.
Moments like this... I don't know. Sometimes I look at him totally out of nowhere and think about our first days together.
When I first came to Italy. How messy everything was. How confused I was. How angry I was at Sophia.
And then I remember, as pissed as I still am at her, I'm so damn glad she played me like that. Because of her, I fell straight into Gio's hands.
I went in with some stupid evil plan to make her jealous... and somehow walked out with a husband. "What do you wanna do on the drive?" Gio asks. I laugh. "What can we even do?"
"We can talk shit about someone," he says instantly. "It's been a while since we roasted people."
I snort. "A while?! Gio, yesterday while we were cooking we spent THIRTY minutes trash-talking that mom who kept kissing her son on the mouth and saying they're 'meant to get married.'"
Gio shouts, "Don't remind me, please. What was that. I'm traumatized."
"Anyway," I say, trying not to laugh, "I know what we can do." I reach into the bag on my thighs and pull out Gio's childhood diary. He freezes. "NO."
I laugh. "Why not? I brought it to read to Antonio before bed!"
"Rava—" he whines.
"Come on. Just a little."
He groans like I'm torturing him. "Fine. But you're reading the pages AFTER I left Italy. You're not reading only the pages where I bully you."
"Okay, okay," I say. "I like the Spain pages. You're sweet in those."
His ears go pink. I flip open the notebook. The pages crack a little. The handwriting is tiny, chaotic, pure Gio. Time to ruin his peace for the next three hours. I flip to a random page, and the first thing I see hits me right in the chest.
Hi.
I know I didn't write in this stupid thing for long. My dad died and we had to go all the time to court and police and hospital. Now I live in Spain. Everything is ugly here.
My stomach drops a little. I glance at Gio. "...Maybe I'll skip this one," I mumble. "Let's go to a different day? When you're older?"
He nods quickly.
I turn the page. "AHA. This one." I clear my throat like I'm about to read Shakespeare.
7 January 2018
Hi again. I have a problem. Which is weird because usually I am the one who makes problems for other people, not the one who has them.
Today... it's someone's birthday. Someone I've written about a lot before.
He's turning 15 today. Ha. Even in this he's behind me.
I turned 15 three months ago. My uncle said it would be a good idea to wish him happy birthday.
Because we were classmates. Which makes me VERY mad because what does that even mean?
! Just because we sat in the same classroom doesn't mean I liked him. Whatever.
They annoyed me so much that... fine. I said happy birthday.
But... from a fake account. I didn't want him to know it was me.
I just made a fake account and wrote 'happy birthday Rava.
' Nothing else. I hope he didn't know it was me.
If anyone asks, I'll show them the message.
I was nice. Too nice actually. I even sent him a funny picture of a dog.
It was actually funny and he BETTER have laughed.
Here in Spain, I have no one to mess with. I miss my friends. I'm kinda alone. I keep mixing up people and calling kids by my old friends' names, and one day I thought I saw Rava and I almost yelled 'RAVIOLI' like an idiot at school. I almost embarrassed myself so bad.
Also, I'm sick of people here. They talk weird Spanish and I don't understand half of it.
One boy tried to correct my accent today and I almost punched him.
He said I sound 'cute.' I am NOT cute. I want to look terrifying.
People need to understand that. I went to check Rava's profile today.
Not because I care, but... I was just bored and the Wi-Fi here is trash and his name was the only one I remembered fast.
Cause it's... easy. Ravaravaravaravaravaravaravarava. He posted a birthday picture. He looked happy. Whatever. Good for him I guess. He had friends in the comments. Like... actual people talking to him. And he looks taller.
You're literally doing it on purpose. What are you trying to be?
A lamppost? I could comment something too but no.
I'm not desperate. I already sent the dog photo.
That was enough kindness for the whole year.
Okay... I'm done writing because this pencil fucking sucks and my hand hurts and I'm hungry. Bye.
–Gio
I'm crying laughing at this point. "I swear, I will never get tired of these. You were so funny. You were also an idiot." Gio groans. "Thanks."
"No, seriously," I say, wiping my eyes. "Your fake profile, the one you used to message me, had a MOTORCYCLE as the profile picture. A motorcycle, Gio. Very smooth. Super subtle. No way I'd guess it was you."
He slams his hand on the steering wheel. "Oh my god, leave me alone. Did you actually know? Just from that?"
"Yes?! You were such a little dumbass."
"Rava, stop," he mutters. "It doesn't matter anymore." He glances at me, pretending to be annoyed, but his ears are red. "You have my last name now anyway."
I lift my head and grin at him, warm and stupidly in love. "And I'm proud of it," I say, still laughing.
13) Christmas Trip pt. 2
Rava
I think we're here. Gio slows the car down and I blink awake. There's just... snow. Everywhere.
Poor guy, I don't even know what he's been doing this whole time. I've been knocked out for like two hours. I rub my eyes. "My glasses... where—"
"Oh, yeah," he says, reaching back. "Here. I took them off at the red light so you wouldn't break them. I know, I know, I'm a very sweet husband, tell me something new."
I drop my head. "I'm never complimenting you again. You need to become humble again." I reach for the handle. "I'm gonna go get our son—"
Click. My door locks. I turn my head slowly and look at him. He's staring straight ahead. He looks super serious. "If you want a divorce, you can just tell me."
"WHAT?" I answer way too fast.
"You didn't give me a kiss before trying to leave," he says in this tiny voice.
I smack his arm hard. He starts laughing. "YOU IDIOT. I ALMOST SHIT MYSELF," I yell, shoving him again. He shoves me back and now we're just pushing each other like two toddlers. The door on my side opens and we both freeze mid-wrestle.
It's Valentina. She's standing there, looking at us. "Did I come too early or...?" Gio immediately bursts out laughing. I let go of him and fix his hair like he's some misbehaving dog. "Sorry about that, Valentina... He deserved it."
"I believe you, king. Put him in his place," she says.
We finally step out of the car. ...Wow.
There's snow everywhere, and I'm pretty sure it's lightly snowing right now too. My nose starts burning from the cold immediately, but I don't care.
I walk over to Lorenzo's car and immediately steal Antonio out of his seat. I'm holding him tight against my chest as I head back toward our car. My boots are sinking deep into the snow. He tucks his little face into my neck so it doesn't get cold.
I'm so excited I could actually cry. He's going to walk in snow for the first time in his life. He's going to play in it. He's going to remember this. I stop in front of Gio.
"Bean, look how much snow there is here!! Isn't it perfect? Do you wanna play?"
Antonio just stares at it, looking... kinda scared. Like he doesn't trust it. His face basically says, are we SURE this thing is safe?!
Gio opens the car door and Blu immediately launches himself out, diving straight into the snow and disappearing for a second before popping back out. Antonio bursts out laughing. Hysterical giggles. Gio and I just stare at him.
We've both completely frozen. Gio's cheeks are bright red from the cold, and maybe a little from the way he's looking at our son, I'm not sure. He crouches down, scoops up a bit of snow, and lifts it up to Antonio. "Look, baby. Hold it."
Antonio frowns and shakes his head. "No, Daddy."
I laugh. He's so sweet, I can't stand it.
Gio slides a hand to my back and gently steers us toward a cleaner patch of snow by the side. "Antonio," he says softly, "this thing you see here is just frozen water! Little raindrops that got so cold they froze before they touched the ground. It can't hurt you at all."
Antonio just stares at the snow, thinking way too hard for someone that tiny. Gio chuckles. "Antonio, you like water, right?" Antonio nods against my shoulder. "Well, this is water too! Just super, super cold water. I promise it can't hurt you. If it tried, I'd punch it."
Antonio cracks up. "Punch snow?"