Julia #2
The freedom of that is alarming.
I eat toast over the sink because I do not feel like making a proper meal and refuse to feel guilty about that too. Then I shower, change into jeans and a black sweater, and make myself put on actual socks, which feels like a concession to civilization.
By 11:30, the apartment is cleaner than before, yet somehow more unsettled.
The boxes are open now, which seems to be a mild problem. Before, they were possibilities stacked against the wall. Now they’re front and center.
I have one pile for things to keep, one pile for things to shred, one pile for donations, and one pile I label emotionally radioactive and put near the door because I have not yet decided its fate.
My phone buzzes on the kitchen counter with a text message.
I grab it too quickly.
Dante: You alive?
Relief hits so hard I have to close my eyes.
I hate that.
I hate it, and I am grateful, and both feelings sit together in my chest, sharing the space.
Me: Physically, yes. Spiritually, I am being bullied by cardboard boxes.
Dante: Tragic. Do you need rescue or moral support?
Me: Define rescue.
Dante: Lunch. I’m starving and you’re probably eating crackers over the sink like a gremlin.
I look at the crumbs near the sink.
Me: First of all, toast.
Dante: So yes.
I smile down at the phone.
Me: Yes.
Dante: Twenty minutes. Usual place?
Usual place. Such simple words should not mean so much, but they do.
Me: Twenty minutes.
The restaurant is not elegant, which is exactly why I love it.
It is a narrow Italian place tucked between a dry cleaner and a bookstore, with red awning fabric faded by weather and a front window crowded with basil plants.
The tables are too close together. The chairs wobble.
The owner acts personally offended when anyone orders a salad without pasta, and the bread comes out warm in a basket lined with a towel that has probably seen more family arguments than most therapists.
Dante and I found it years ago when he came to Chicago to visit me, and we were both avoiding our families in different ways. He declared it the best place in Chicago because no one here cared who our fathers were.
When I arrive, he is already at a table near the back, wearing dark jeans, a gray sweater, and the kind of careless smile that has earned him forgiveness for things since he was old enough to talk.
He stands when he sees me.
For a second, I am twenty again and in Naples, sunburned and overconfident, following him down a narrow street while he promises he knows a place with the best sfogliatelle in the city. He did not know. We got lost for an hour. It remains one of my favorite afternoons.
Then he pulls me into a hug, and the memory breaks into the present.
“You look terrible,” he says against my hair.
I laugh, muffled against his shoulder. “Gee, thanks. I missed you, too.”
He lets me go but keeps his hands on my shoulders long enough to study my face. “No, seriously. Are we talking regular terrible, or I-should-be-concerned terrible?”
“Regular terrible.”
“Your regular terrible has range.”
“So I’ve been told.”
His eyes narrow slightly. “By who?”
I slide into the chair across from him. “Do not start.”
“I haven’t started. You would know if I started.”
“I’m aware.”
He sits, still watching me too closely. That is Dante’s problem. He jokes so people forget how much he notices. I used to think that was just charm. Now I understand it is an inheritance.
A server appears with water and says, “The usual?”
Dante points at me. “For her too. She needs carbs and possibly an exorcism.”
“Dante.”
“What? You do.”
The server laughs and leaves before I can defend myself.
I take a drink of water. “You are very comfortable ordering for me.”
“I have known you since you thought boxed wine was sophisticated because you drank it in Europe.”
“I was a student.”
“You were a menace.”
“You encouraged me.”
“I encourage many bad decisions. It’s one of my gifts.”
I smile despite myself.
Dante leans back, satisfied. “There she is.”
The words are light, but they do something to my insides.
He sees it. He sees everything. His expression softens, but he does not apologize. He does not rush to cover the moment with noise.
That is one of the reasons I called him.
Dante can be loud, careless, reckless, and infuriating. But when it matters, he knows when to be still.
“I opened boxes today,” I say.
His brows rise. “Ah. Casualties?”
“Physically or emotionally?”
“Either?”
“Some picture of us at some event. Several programs. Our sample wedding invitation.”
The humor leaves his face.
“Or rather, his sample wedding invitation,” I correct.
“How are you doing?” he asks.
I look down at the table.
There is already bread there, because Dante must have arrived hungry enough to flirt with the kitchen.
“I don’t know,” I admit.
He does not say anything.
I pick at the corner of my napkin. “Better than I expected. Worse than I wanted.”
“That tracks.”
“I tore everything up.”
“Good.”
“Very mature response.”
“You or me?”
I laugh. “Both.”
“Well, I'm always mature,” he says indignantly. “And I think tearing up a wedding invitation for a wedding that's not happening is a very appropriate response.”
“When you say it like that, it sounds obvious.”
“It is obvious.”
I give him a look.
He lifts both hands. “Fine. It is obvious to me. I did not find the thing in my apartment this morning.”
I smile, but it fades quickly. “I think I kept it because some part of me wanted proof.”
“Proof of what?”
“That I got close enough to become that version of myself.” I look down at my water glass. “The woman on the invitation. The woman in the photograph. The one who smiled like she had agreed to all of it.”
“You didn't agree to that, Jules,” he says, suddenly serious. “You agreed to marry a man, not become an accessory.”
My throat tightens. “That’s what it felt like, though.”
“I know.”
I look at him.
He reaches for the bread basket, tears off a piece, then sets it on my plate without comment. “I’m not saying you should have seen it sooner. I’m saying he was very good at making it look normal, appropriate.”
I stare at the bread because looking at him is harder.
“He was,” I say. “Everyone was.”
Dante’s jaw tightens.
“I should have pushed harder,” he says.
“No.”
His eyes come back to mine.
I pick up the piece of bread, mostly to have something to do with my hands. “You tried. You called. You texted. You invited me places. I made excuses.”
“Because he made excuses easier than honesty.”
I breathe out slowly. “Yes.”
Dante sits with that for a second, then nods once. “I hated him.”
A laugh slips out of me, small and tired. “You met him once.”
“Once was plenty.”
“You decided that quickly?”
“I decided on sight.”
“And yet I stayed with him two years,” I say quietly. “It took until he…”
A lump forms in my throat, and I can’t continue.
But I don’t need to. Dante understands.
His jaw tightens.
“You should never have let him get away with that, Jules,” he says, voice low now. “You still shouldn’t.”
The words hit harder than I expect.
For one terrible second, shame rises before anger can get there.
“I know,” I say.
Dante’s face changes.
“No.” His voice gentles immediately. “I didn’t mean it like that. I’m not blaming you.”
“I know what you meant.”
“I mean he should pay for it.” His hand curls around his water glass. “It’s not too late.”
I look at him sharply.
“Dante.”
“I’m serious.”
“I know you are. That’s why I said your name like that.”
His mouth tightens, but he does not look away.
For a moment, I see the Conti in him so clearly that it steals my breath a little. The charm is gone. The easy smile. The boy who got us lost in Naples and bought me pastries afterward as if sugar could make up for it.
In his place is a man raised by dangerous people in a dangerous world, with dangerous instincts of his own.
“No,” I say firmly.
“Julia—”
“No.” I keep my voice quiet. “I didn’t call you then because I wanted revenge. I called because he’s powerful, and I needed to leave quickly.”
“And you did.”
“Yes. I did.” I fold my napkin once, then unfold it again. “I don’t want my life to keep orbiting what he did. I don’t want him punished if punishing him means I have to keep standing in the middle of it.”
Around us, the restaurant continues as if nothing has happened. Plates clatter. Someone near the front laughs loudly. The owner argues with a delivery driver in Italian at the register.
Dante says something under his breath that I am fairly sure his grandmother would not approve of.
“I ordered a lemon print for my kitchen,” I say suddenly.
That makes him blink. “I’m sorry. Did we skip a step?”
“I’m redecorating.”
“With lemons.”
“Yes.”
“Is there a theme, or are we just emotionally processing through citrus?”
“Probably the second one.”
He nods solemnly. “Healthy. Mediterranean.”
I laugh, and this time it comes easier.
He sobers again. “I’m serious, Jules. Say the word.”
“I know you are,” I say quietly. “It helps, knowing that. Really.”
I reach over and place my hand over his.
Just then, the food arrives. Pasta for him, pasta for me, bread between us, grated cheese that Dante accepts with the seriousness of a sacrament. For a few minutes, we eat without making the conversation work too hard.
It is nice. Painfully nice.
I had forgotten how easy friendship could feel when I was not constantly filtering myself. It's one of the reasons I’ve always gotten along with Dante so well.
After a lifetime of living my life and being in my perfectly perfect family, meeting Dante way back when was like a revelation. Conversation with him was freeing, being in his presence was enjoyable, not stifling and suffocating. Just being regular ol’ me was allowed and encouraged.
I think of how much easier my life would have been if we had fallen in love. But we'd become such good friends before that could ever happen, and he became more like a brother to me than anything else.
I guess easy just isn’t in the cards for me.
“I’m sorry,” I say.
Dante looks up with pasta halfway to his mouth. “For what?”
“For disappearing.”