30. Alex
Alex awakens forehead to forehead with Antonio—mouth half-open, pants half-off, but all the way handsome. Though, it’s hard to forget the circumstances of him sleeping so peacefully beside her.
She puts on her glasses and swipes the tips of her fingers along his forearm, though he doesn’t stir. She turns her head towards the window, and her blink reflex activates as she eyes the bold, fluorescent 5:53 on her clock. She slithers out of bed and heads to the bathroom to assess her injuries. There’s still some minor bruising, but all things considered, she feels fine. Good, even. So, she bathes, dresses, and at seven-twenty-two, switches out the mug of tea in her hand for a spray bottle on her dresser. Then she hears a low groan.
“You’re a liar, gorgeous.” Antonio smiles coyly as she jerks to face him. “This is the second time you’ve been up at the ass-crack of dawn. I don’t think you know what it means to be a night owl.”
“First,” —Alex goes to sit in front of his knees— “I’m not a morning person. But if you heard that much, then you should’ve heard the rest of it as well. If I had my way, I wouldn’t even open my eyes until noon. But, unfortunately, that’s not the way my life is set up.”
“I don’t get it. Someone with the skills you have could be rich as hell by now. You could do whatever you want.”
“I don’t do what I do for money. I help people who need it like I wished someone would’ve helped me. Besides, when you get greedy, you draw attention to yourself. I’ve got everything I need to be comfortable. More than comfortable. And that’s more than some people can ever claim.”
“You’re right. Guess I should get used to that.” He laughs and closes his eyes.
Used to me being right? Hopefully that’s what he means. “There’s something else I guess you’re probably not used to. The first thing you usually say to someone when you wake up is ‘good morning’. Not ‘you’re a liar’.”
Antonio smiles again and sits up and rubs her thigh. “Good morning, gorgeous. How are you feeling?”
“Honestly? Pretty good. Nothing really hurts that much. That might be because of the drugs, though.”
That statement abruptly removes Antonio’s grin.
“It was just a joke, Leo. Sheesh.”
“You should stay home.”
“Oh. No. I need to do the opposite. If I sit here, I’ll do nothing but think about it all day.” Alex stands back up and resumes styling her hair.
“If you’re sure.” Antonio makes a production of getting out of the bed, nearly taking the sheets with him. He places a kiss on her collarbone. “Seriously, how do you get it to smell so good?”
“Aloe. Aloe everything. Shampoo, conditioner… Although this time I used a co-wash. And this oil is mint-based. All together I call it my crown cocktail.”
“You have to do all that every day?”
Alex blinks at him.
“What?”
“Do you really care?”
Antonio rubs his bottom lip. “What do you mean? Was it a weird question?”
“No. I just wasn’t expecting you to ask, so it’s nice. I don’t think I’ve ever had a guy ask me that. Especially not a—you know. You’re the first.”
“The first what? Or was I wrong about what hanging out with Nik meant?”
“If you think it ever involved hair care tips, then yes.”
She hears a soft growl before he plants his cheek next to hers, and the closeness warms her lower belly. “What I think is that I want to stop talking about him.”
“All I was saying is that I didn’t talk about my hair with him or anyone else. Although, I don’t have that many notches in my belt regardless: Black, white, whatever. I’m not as seasoned as you.” Alex giggles as she watches Antonio straighten up and roll his eyes. “But for the record, you can ask me pretty much anything you want. Except to touch my hair.” She gulps from her mug.
“It seemed to me like pulling was OK, though?” he asks with a straight face.
She unintentionally gasps, sending the tea down the wrong pipe. “Really? You almost killed me,” she coughs out. “But it was funny, I’ll give you that. See what being around me gets you?”
Antonio smirks, then his mouth twist. “Speaking of… I want—”
“Robin! You awake?!” Ben bustles into the bedroom.
Alex covers her ear. “If I weren’t, I’d definitely be, now. I didn’t even hear my door open, Benjamin.”
Ben tucks each hand under the opposite armpit, eyeing her and Antonio. “I’m sure you didn’t. Am I too early?”
“Early for what?” Alex asks.
Ben and Antonio glance at each other.
“Nah, you’re fine,” Antonio says. “I need to go home and clean up myself, anyway.”
“Hold on, no!”
“Gorgeous, if you wait just a little longer, it’ll be worth it. Promise.” Antonio motions as if to kiss Alex on the lips but goes for her forehead.
She stares at her bedroom door until she hears a distant whack. Then she snatches the spray bottle of water from her dresser and aggressively tugs at her coils to saturate them.
“Woah! What’s wrong?” Ben asks.
“What’s wrong, he asks after running in here like the fucking Kool-Aid man. But whatever. What’s a few more hours after waiting months?”
Alex finishes getting ready, and then Ben takes her to get her car. He apologizes a couple more times for his intrusion, even though Alex forgave him while they were still in her condo. Her brain doesn’t have space to be annoyed, anyway.
She’s trying to fill in the blank of Antonio’s sentence. He wants…something, and it’ll be worth it to hear later.
Alex’s glass half-full side thinks it’s, “I want to be with you. I want to make this work.” Then there’s the piece of her who knows it’s half empty because they spilled some of it getting to this point. That side of Alex thinks Antonio wants more time to figure things out. But there’s also that sliver of Alex that couldn’t care less how much is in the glass because it’s filled with wheatgrass. Ben was obsessed with it during their college years, to the point that he often replaced actual food with smoothies of the gunk. No added fruit or anything, just blended blades of grass. Alex got sick of seeing Ben gag with every sip and helped wean him off the stuff. Suffice to say, a cup of wheatgrass doesn’t contain high hopes.
A summer sprinkle leaves the ground damp as they pull up to her car. Ben barely shifts to park when Alex springs from the passenger side and spins around.
“I love when it rains like this,” she cheers. “It was so muggy!”
“Agreed, but keep your shirt on, Dufresne,” he hollers out the window. “I’ll follow you to the store.”
Alex promptly gets into her car and decides to make an important call. “Hey, Ki.”
“Hey, sis. How are you?”
“Umm…”
“Uh-oh.”
“No, I’m OK. I do have something to tell you. I know we should probably talk about it in person, but you were on my mind, and you know sometimes I just have to get it out.”
“Please do.”
One of Kiara’s best strengths is how she listens. That’s her job, but not with Alex. Even so, not all mental health professionals are created equal. Alex would often feel as if her therapists were taking in what she said in order to respond, to…diagnose, to rectify. Their advice felt so standardized and rehearsed, as if they could say it verbatim to Mary at four o’clock, and Tom at six. Whereas Kiara always made Alex feel as if her guidance came from what she heard and not what she read in a textbook.
“Alex. I am so sorry you had to experience that. And you’re right, I do want to see you—if for nothing other than to hug you for an hour.”
“That sounds nice.”
“You said something about you should still be crying? Can you recall when you stopped?”
“Uh…” Alex taps her fingertips on the steering wheel. Her body tingles as she remembers. “Well, like I said, Antonio spent the night with me. I did cry, but it wasn’t just because of the assault. I ended up telling him about James. So, that was part of it, too. Afterwards, we ate, talked…not about that, though. And then I didn’t feel like I needed to talk about it anymore.”
“So what does that mean for you all?”
“Oh, gosh, Ki. Why’d you have to go and ask some shit like that?”
“Ma’am.”
Ugh. “We’re going to talk, okay?” Alex turns the air higher, even though she’s around the corner.
“Okay.”
“I hear you judging me.”
“You know perfectly well you don’t.
“Fine. I’m judging myself.”
Kiara doesn’t say anything, but she doesn’t need to.
“I—I’m scared.” Alex makes her last right turn. “And I don’t know how not to be. I know I’ve said this so many times to you. Somewhere along the line, my mother decided she didn’t want me. Or…whatever she felt, was more compelling than keeping us together. Regardless, she was my mother, and she left me behind. James…he did the same thing. I know now what we had wasn’t love, but it felt that way at the time, and it hurt when he disappeared. And with Antonio, I think that he wants to stick around now, but with all we just went through, how do I know for sure? Why would I give him all of me if he doesn’t want it?”
“You don’t have to. What’s so special about Antonio, anyway?”
Alex’s eyebrows knock together. “What? Why would you ask that?”
“Alex. I want you to say why this man has been worth sixty percent of our time for the past four months. Can you?”
“Wh—haven’t I been saying it? What do you mean? Am I literally supposed to tell you all the ways the man is making me fa—” Alex pauses to breathe.
“You don’t have to tell me anything. In fact, I think it’s time you stopped talking to me about Antonio for a second. Me, Ben, Yuna, hell—your parents. I don’t know what you expect us to do with this information.”
“Okay. God. I get it now. Did you have to be so mean? I was about to curse you out.”
“So be it.”
After Alex parks, she sees Ben come up to the passenger side window. She holds up a finger and then gestures to her phone.
“Everything else is for tomorrow until you tell that man exactly how you feel,” Kiara continues. “But honestly, Alex…and I mean this in the most compassionate way possible, we both know none of this is revelatory for you. Everything I’ve said up to this moment, you were capable of cogitating yourself. I’m happy to keep schlepping through it with you, though, because I care about you, and that might be what you need from me right now.”
“Okay, Dr. Bell. Cogitating? Did I accidentally walk into a symposium?”
Kiara’s laugh makes Alex’s eardrum vibrate. “I have an eleven-thirty coming in shortly, but I want to see you next week, hear me?”
“Yes ma’am.”
“Love you.”
“Love you, too.”
Kiara’s half-lecture, half-motivational speech does exactly what she probably intended, as once Alex enters Tech Me Out, she sits in her office and outlines her impending conversation with Antonio.
Ben comes in and suggests they get something to eat, and they proceed to go to brunch. It’s…effective, in its basic function, but it falls flat otherwise. Something seems to be distracting him, even though they took the time to travel to the restaurant of his choice, closer up Alex’s way.
“Ugh. I have to pee, can we go to yours really quick?” he asks, pouting. It might be his longest string of words in the last forty-five minutes.
“What? How does that make sense? We have to get back to Patrick.”
“It’ll literally take five minutes to get there. You know I hate using public bathrooms when I don’t have to.”
“Fine. You can go, but I’m heading back.”
“No!”
“What’s your problem, Benjamin?”
“I just feel like now that we’re up here, it’d be a waste of time to take both cars. I know you’re not about to turn down a free ride?”
Alex ogles Ben and sifts through his body language for whatever secret he’s hiding. He’s learned how to endure certain levels of her scrutiny and won’t break immediately, but it’s not worth further effort. She pats at her neck and retches at the moisture forming. Pair that with the dark plots of sweat on the pits of her shirt, Alex and Ben both have business to take care of. So much for that rain. “Fine. Fine. Let’s go.”
They tend to their respective needs, but when they step off the elevator, Ben veers opposite the parking garage.
“Benjamin!” Alex mutters obscenities but submits to being ragdolled past the lobby and to the valet roundabout. “What. The hell. Is going. On?”
This girl loves a limo, doesn’t she?
There’s Yuna, holding a blue-labeled bottle. “Surprise! Welcome to your girls’ trip!”
“My wh—? I can’t take a trip. I have—”
Ben keeps moving her forward. “No, Robin. No, you don’t. I promise we took care of everything. Philly will survive without us for a few days. Your bag is packed, your flight is booked, and your friends are ready! I’m sorry I had to get on your nerves. Now get your beautiful ass in there.”
“Flights? Where are we going?” she asks, climbing into the limousine.
“Did you miss the part when I said it’s a surprise?!” Yuna yells. She makes air horn noises while pouring sparkling wine into three glasses and then passes one to Alex and Ben.
Suspicious isn’t the most accurate word to describe Alex’s state of mind, especially when her friends have gone through so much to put whatever this all is in place. That doesn’t stop her from attempting to divine the location of the last-minute trip.
If it were possible, Ben and Yuna probably would have kept it to themselves until they arrived, but they had to give Alex her boarding pass before the security checkpoint.
She scans it in a frenzy. “Miami?!”
“Yep,” Yuna says. “Gosh, you really haven’t been anywhere, have you? Poor babe.”
Ben bows his head. “It’s been eighty-four years.”
Alex snorts, and now that the mystery is no more, she can fully immerse herself in excitement. But there’s still at least forty minutes before boarding begins, even after passing through the conveyor belts and scanners. It’s uneventful until Yuna’s phone rings.
“Hey, babe. Yeah. Yeah, should be boarding soon. Did the kids notice I was gone? Oh. No, you can wait. ‘Kay. Love you.”
Alex teases her, “I wuv you, babe.”
“Yuna and Frankie sitting in a tree, k-i-s—”
“Sheesh, what are you two? Middle schoolers? And if you’re gonna sing the song, make sure you do it right. First comes sex, then comes the baby.” Yuna folds her arms and leans further against her chair. “Well, I guess before the baby came out of me, love came. So, in between me getting pregnant and having Luca, there was love. And then next, Yuri. And then a three-year engagement with marriage somewhere in the future. I guess.”
“Wait…” Alex tries to shake herself into sobriety. “Did you say, you guess? What does that mean?”
“No, no. It’s fine. This trip is about you.”
“It’s about me having fun with you. Which I won’t if you’re not.”
Ben nods his agreement.
Yuna frowns. “When Frankie first proposed, I wasn’t in a hurry to get married. I was happy how we were. I still am. But recently I brought up picking a date, and it feels like he’s been brushing me off. What if it’s not about the date?”
Alex’s lips curl into a snarl. “What would it be about?”
“What if he just decided he doesn’t wanna marry me anymore, but also doesn’t wanna break up, so he’s just keeping us in this limbo? I mean, maybe that’s just what Morettis do?” Yuna’s bracelet clinks against the arm of the seat. “Oh, my gosh. Maybe you guys were right! I was dick—”
“No, Yu. I’m sorry I even brought that up,” Ben interrupts. “What did he say when you asked him about it?”
“He’s busy, let’s table it, we’ll talk later… I know he is busy. But—”
“That’s not a good enough excuse not to make time for you!” Alex’s response is so quick she wonders how much of it is actually towards the younger Moretti brother. “Sheesh. If he can’t find the time, then we’ll find it for him.”
“Er, I don’t know if I like the sound of that, babe.”
“Tch. Ease your boobs. I’m not a schemer. Unlike you or Benjamin.”
Ben thrusts his neck back. “Rude…ly true. Rudely true.”
Things fall flat again as it seems none of them know what to say. Alex doesn’t believe Frankie has cold feet, but she empathizes with her friend’s uncertainty.
A voice over the intercom announces that boarding for their flight will begin shortly, and in a little over three hours, the friends touch down in Miami, Florida.
After navigating the crowds of other travelers, they make their way to the taxi area and load into a vehicle. Alex rolls down the window, and her coils shimmy with the salty breeze as they drive to a beautiful, secluded cottage. “Yo…is this us?!”
When the car comes to a stop, Alex dashes up the steps and removes her shoes. She runs to the back, where sand garnishes the wooden planks of the patio. Ben grabs their bags, and Yuna opens the door. Alex bolts past, continuing her maniacal exploration of the house. She sprints up the stairs, babbling about the luxurious bedrooms and bathrooms. Then she returns to the first floor and flies to the kitchen, exiting through a door to the upper level of the back, where a private pool, jacuzzi, and bar sit upon a terrace overlooking the beach.
Alex leans over the banister and her nose stings.
Yuna comes beside her. “Oh my God! Oh my God, Ben! She’s crying!”
“What?!”
“No,” Alex says with a choppy laugh. “I just… Just look,” she whispers.
There are no birds, no yachts or adventurous divers. Just white foam sprinkling a trail to the horizon. Clouds travel in front of a blue, pink, and orange sky. If this is what it looks like in the daytime, Alex can’t wait to see what it’s like when the stars take over.
It”s hard to believe she”s not dreaming anymore.