Chapter 13 Mia
Mia
It’s New Year’s Eve, and for the first time in years, I’m not pretending to enjoy myself at a party where everyone talks money, mergers, and whose skin looks the best after the latest laser facial or whose tits look like they had work done.
There’s no couture dress hugging my body or designer heels punishing my feet. I’m in leggings, fuzzy socks, and an oversized hoodie, on the couch at Katya’s place, sipping damn decent champagne with two people I’m incredibly fond of.
Cristiano brought pizza. Two kinds. Indulgent.
Katya baked a cake that collapsed in the middle, but it tastes like heaven.
Cristiano grins at me over a slice of pepperoni. “How are you feeling now?”
He saw me at my worst at the farmhouse where I stayed for six nights, most of them crying and watching terrible television. Cristiano wiped my tears, poured me endless glasses of wine and water, cooked for me, and let me sleep.
We’re two wounded people giving each other comfort. I’ve never had a close friend who is a man before, and I have to say, Billy Crystal is wrong in Harry Met Sally when he says a man and a woman cannot be friends because there will always be that sex thing.
Cristiano is handsome and easygoing, even if he’s quite somber—but I am not attracted to him.
In any case, I don’t need a lover right now, I need companionship with someone who will help me get through what is turning out to be one of the most devastating events of my life, bar when my parents passed away.
“I’m not sure how I’m feeling,” I tell him honestly.
Katya came back the day before, so Cristiano brought me to her place. When I suggested that he spend New Year’s Eve with us, he was game. Since his fiancée passed, he hasn’t been much for the holidays—but pizza with wine sounded promising to him.
“She’s feeling like shit,” Katya interjects.
Cristiano nods and then smiles at me. “It’ll hurt less as time passes.”
“I hope so, because I feel like a walking wound.”
Katya wraps an arm around me. I lean into her, resting my head on her shoulder.
“Why does this hurt so much?” I whimper.
She kisses my forehead. “Because you love him.”
We both look at Cristiano, and he shrugs. “Love doesn’t die, even if the person does—or the relationship, in your case.”
“That’s not helping her,” Katya rebukes.
He gives us a laconic smile. “Just telling the truth, babe.”
I sniffle and straighten. “But we have to move on…keep on living our best lives.”
Katya snorts. “That sounds like a self-help meme.” She gives me a mischievous wink. “The last time we did this, drinking and crying over a man, it was me breaking my heart over Ethan Peck.”
Cristiano frowns. “When was this?”
“Sophomore year of college.” I chuckle, remembering. “He broke her heart.”
“He did.” Katya reminisces. “He recently reached out to me on Facebook.”
I raise an eyebrow. She hadn’t mentioned that.
“He’s single and ready to mingle, and wanted to know if I wanted to get it on.”
“Ugh!” Men!
Cristiano stretches out on the floor. He’s resting against the loveseat across from the sofa where Katya and I are snuggled up. “I thought you were ready to mingle,” he teases.
She lifts her shoulders in frustration.. “I am. But it’s so damn hard to meet decent men in Burlington. They’re either married, or, if they’re not, they’re still attached to an ex.” She gestures toward him, and he gives an exaggerated bow.
“And the ones who are truly single? There’s usually a good reason. One guy I went on a date with kept meowing the whole time. He said it was his sexy schtick. It was…weird and disconcerting.”
We laugh. We’ve heard this story.
She continues. “Half the men I meet are manwhores who only care about what’s between my legs, but have no idea where the clitoris is. The rest get intimidated because I’m a divorce lawyer with my own firm, which they assume means I make more money than they do. And, in most cases, they’re right.”
“We have fragile egos,” Cristiano agrees somberly.
“You know what’s better now than when you were crying over Ethan Peck?” I take a sip of my champagne. “Those days we drowned our sorrows in boxed wine.”
“This is the good stuff.” Cristiano raises his glass. It was a Dom P. The best of champagne!
Katya does the same. “To the New Year, when we only cry for good reasons.”
We clink glasses.
When the ball drops, we drink some more, and blow into paper horns like overgrown kids. We laugh as confetti rains down from a dollar-store popper Cristiano sets off.
“This is the best New Year’s Eve party I’ve been to in years,” I exclaim.
The wine and the company were soothing me in the best way possible. It’s just what I need right now.
“That’s because you went to those horrendous Winter family parties.” Katya picks up a slice of cold Hawaiian pizza and takes a bite.
“What was wrong with them?” Cristiano refills all our glasses.
“It was all performance,” I tell him. “Every conversation is an audition. The women only look at your outfit and whether you have a ring on your finger. And the men are either judging your husband or ignoring you altogether.”
“Exactly.” Katya waves a slice of half-eaten pizza. “And God help you if you wore the wrong designer, which she did. Or didn’t Botox the week before, which she didn’t.”
I suck in a breath.
I didn’t do Botox and refused to wear designer dresses. I couldn’t afford them on my salary, and no way was I going to let Aiden buy them for me.
“You don’t think I look good in what I’m wearing?” I ask Aiden as he looks me up and down before we leave for a party at his parents’ home.
“I think you always look beautiful, but Mom is going to say something about you buying this at Macy’s and not—”
“It’s not about the store, Aiden. I just don’t belong in some designer gown that costs more than what my dad made in a month. That’s not me.”
He frowns. “Mia, this has to stop. My money is yours.” He puts his hands on my shoulders, his face earnest.
He means it.
I shake my head. “It’s not about the money. It’s about who I am. I grew up working-class, and I’m never going to feel right wrapped up in something dripping with labels and price tags. I’m more comfortable in clothes that feel like me, not a costume.”
He sighs, his hands dropping to his sides. “Then you’re going to have to deal with Mom and Gianna and Betty giving you a hard time about it.”
“Fine.”
Even then, I wondered why he didn’t protect me and instead just let me catch the brunt of his family’s disapproval. Now I know why. We were not suited. He needed to be with someone like Diana, who is always appropriately dressed.
Givenchy. Versace. Chanel. Christian Dior.
The image of their kiss, now etched in my memory, fills my mind again.
I close my eyes but open them when Katya squeezes my hand.
“It hits you hard once in a while.” Cristiano studies me with affection and compassion. “It becomes less and less as the days go by.”
“A part of me is so happy to not be there—because that whole family sucks.”
“Big time!” Katya smirks. “I remember how they treated the kids. They were dressed like tiny fashion dolls. And no one actually talked to them. I think the dog got more attention.”
That makes me laugh, even as something in my chest aches. “They don’t have a dog. Edith is allergic.”
“Which makes my point!” Katya announces. “The kids love you, though.”
“They clung to me. Probably because I’m the only one who gets down on the floor and colors with them.”
“You were always the soft place in that house.” Katya’s voice is gentle. “And it’s their loss that they never appreciated it.”
Cristiano glances between us, and shakes his head with a smile. “Rich people are exhausting.”
“You’re rich,” Katya points out.
“Which is how I know.” He winks at me.
We all laugh again, the kind of laugh that comes from deep in your gut. The sound fills Katya’s cottage with something better than music.
I curl my legs under me, and sink deeper into the couch. I need to head to bed before I fall asleep on the couch—and then I giggle.
“What?” Katya asks.
“I can fall asleep on the couch after a party and no one will say anything.”
“Hell, I insist we sleep on the couch.”
“I’m going to need a bed. I’m not tiny like both of you to be able to sleep on any of these couches,” Cristiano mutters, but he doesn’t move as he sits on the carpet, warmed by the heated floors.
“You can sleep in the guestroom,” I offer.
“It’s your room and not a guestroom,” Katya snaps.
Tears fill my eyes as my emotions, once again, run away from me. Katya’s generosity, her support, and her friendship come at no cost. She expects nothing in return.
Why couldn’t I marry someone like her?
We all freeze when the doorbell goes off.
Cristiano rolls up from lounging to sitting, and looks at his watch. “I’ll see who it is.”
He stands and goes to the door, and looks through the window. He turns to face us. “It’s your soon-to-be ex-husband, Mia.”
The bell rings again.
Incensed, Katya walks to the door, past Cristiano, and opens it, blocking my view of the man standing on her doorstep. “Fuck off.”
"Please.” Aiden’s voice is rough. "I just want to talk to her."
Cristiano manages to get an incensed Katya behind him. “Look, man, it’s late, how about—”
“Who the fuck are you?” I hear the snap in Aiden’s voice.
I close my eyes, knowing I have to get up and deal with him, be an adult.
But I don’t wanna! Even to myself, I sound like one of my school kids.
“He’s the gigolo we hired to pleasure us tonight,” Katya retorts with such sincerity that I can’t help but grin.
Even Aiden doesn’t buy that. “Look—”
“I'm the man your wife stayed with after she left your dumb ass.” Cristiano is standing tall, his arms folded, right in front of Katya. My two sentinels.
“Mia,” Aiden calls out.
“Let him in, K.” I sit up on the couch, and tie my hair, which has come loose, back into a rough ponytail.