8. SQUALO #2
When I found out her mother used to bring her here to keep my mother distracted while she climbed into my father’s bed, I blamed Gabriella for it. Gianni had never been around, so somehow that made it different. Or at least, that’s what I’d been telling myself ever since 1993.
I slipped the letter into the back pocket of my linen shorts, gathered everything else back into the box, closed the lid, and returned it to the top shelf.
With a quiet exhale, I pulled a few shirts from the wardrobe.
As I turned, my eyes moved to the garden beyond the window.
Before my mother died, every flower out there had been blue. Afterward, my father had them all ripped out. He planted roses instead, with the pavilion overlooking the sea.
The deep blue sea.
My mind dragged me to 1993.
Gabriella had just started her first year of middle school, while I had just begun my third. A year ago, she had been at a completely different school, but now she was at the same one as Gianni and me. I tried to ignore her for as long as I could, but she kept finding her way back to me.
We weren’t little kids anymore. Other kids from school started gossiping that she had a crush on me. And me, the selfish asshole I was, I laughed right in her face when I heard it.
Middle school was different from elementary school.
Playing in the mud and running along the beach near our house had been replaced with conversations about girls and cars.
There had been a time when I’d thought of Gabriella as a friend, but after my mom died, and after Gianni became my best friend, she was only my best friend’s little sister. Nothing more. Nothing less.
I knew she liked me.
I never liked her.
The thought of her beside me made my stomach twist.
When she turned nine, her mother started cutting her hair into a strange bob that barely brushed her shoulders.
She always wore the denim bucket hat her father had left behind, and for some reason, she dressed in my old clothes.
The same clothes my father sent to Gianni after I’d outgrown them.
Somehow, they fit her now. Well, almost. It hung off her.
Oversized shirts, baggy jeans, sleeves that swallowed her hands.
In winter, her face was always pale. In summer, it turned so red that freckles showed across the bridge of her nose.
I counted them once while she rambled on about math.
Thirty-one.
Not counting the two hidden on her neck, just below her ear.
Thirty-three in total.
“Olly.”
There she was again, nearly tripping over her own feet as she hurried to my side.
The jeans she wore today made her even clumsier than usual.
They were at least two sizes too big. She’d tried to keep them up with a belt, but they still slipped low on her hips, forcing her to clutch the waistband with one hand as she walked.
“What?” I scoffed, rolling my eyes when I saw her.
“Can you walk me home after school today?” she asked quietly. “I have something to tell you.”
She looked up at me with deep blue eyes framed by thick black eyelashes.
“Why?” I asked.
“Because Gianni can’t,” she said. “Please. Please.”
“Fine.”
Her eyes smiled at me as I spoke, her lips curving just enough to reveal the small dimples in her cheeks. She lifted her hand, curling it into a fist and raising her pinky. “Promise?”
I rolled my eyes and gave her a light shove as I walked past. “Ugh, grow up.”
No more promises for us, Gabby.
As I made my way down the hallway, I heard her run into the bathroom to cry.
“What’s up with her?” Gianni asked as he walked over.
“No clue.” I chuckled.
“My mom needs me to leave school early today. Can you walk my sister home? It’s her first time walking back from this side of town.”
“Doesn’t she know the way home?” I asked, confused. My head tilted when I heard footsteps down the hallway. Lorenzo and Inno were walking toward us.
“She does, but this side of town has more cliffs, and she doesn’t like the deep sea,” he said. “Anyway, I have to go.”
I nodded and watched him walk away.
“Are we going to the cinema to watch Jurassic Park?“ Lorenzo asked. “My mom can get tickets for all of us.”
“I can’t,” I said, trying to look past him for Gabriella. “I promised Gianni I’d walk his sister home.”
“How about we all go?” he asked, slipping an arm around my neck as we walked down the hallway.
Soon after, Gabby came out of the bathroom with red, puffy eyes. I didn’t even ask what had happened because I already knew I was the reason she’d been crying. I just lifted my chin and motioned toward the road.
Neither of us spoke. We walked from school toward the hilly part of town.
She lived on the other side of the hill, about a fifteen-minute walk away.
The road wound along high cliffs overlooking the deep blue sea below.
Looking down without being able to see where the water ended left a hollow feeling in your stomach, so it wasn’t surprising she hated that route.
Lorenzo slowed his pace to match hers, while Inno and I walked ahead, talking about how excited we were to watch Jurassic Park. At one point, Lorenzo came running toward us, waving a notebook with Gabby & Oliver scribbled across it.
“Gabby and Oliver, sitting in a tree…” he sang. “K-I-S-S-I-N-G!” he finished with a laugh.
“Stop!” she shouted, chasing after the notebook.
I stepped into her path, nudging her aside, then ran after Lorenzo and snatched it from his hand. It was an old notebook with the initials V.D.L. on the cover, but I was so angry at her for embarrassing me in front of them that I hurled it over the cliffs.
“No,” she cried. “It was my dad’s.”
But it was too late. The notebook disappeared into the sea below, its pages fluttering open, filled with hearts, kisses, and letters with our names written across them.
Tears streamed down her cheeks. Her face burned red, and the muscles in her neck tightened as she screamed, “I hate you.”
I laughed.
“Go get it if you want.” Lorenzo grabbed her and dragged her toward the cliffs.
The color drained from her face. It turned ghostly pale. Her hands trembled, and her eyes squeezed shut.
“Lorenzo, stop!” I shouted, rushing toward them.
I shoved him away. The moment his hands left her, she crumpled to the ground.
I swallowed hard. Sweat beaded across my forehead as I stared at her lying there with her eyes closed.
A few adults passing by noticed the commotion. They rushed over, lifted her into their arms, and carried her back toward town, to the hospital.
And I just ran.
Like she meant nothing at all.
She hated me.
I got what I wanted.