Chapter 19 The Spill #3
She stared at the words. Her chest hurt.
Her hands shook. She wanted to answer yes so he would stop worrying.
She wanted to answer no because yes would be a lie.
She wanted to tell him she was embarrassed.
She wanted to tell him thank you. She wanted to ask why he had done it after she asked him not to.
She wanted too many things. Victoria stood slowly, giving her room.
Antonia said nothing. Brett looked away. Sophia typed one word.
Sophia: Home?
Then she deleted it. Not what she meant. She tried again.
Sophia: I’m fine.
Deleted that too. No. She locked the phone without answering. That hurt more than she expected. Antonia saw. So did Victoria. Sophia put the phone in her pocket.
“I need to go home,” she said.
Antonia nodded. “Brett can drive you.”
“I can walk.”
“No,” Victoria said immediately.
Sophia looked at her.
Victoria’s expression softened, but her voice stayed firm. “Not because you can’t. Because tonight was awful, and you don’t need to walk home alone.”
Sophia looked down. Sophia’s shoulders loosened a little. A little.
“I’ll take her,” Victoria said.
Antonia nodded. “Text me when you are home.”
Sophia stood. Her legs felt strange but worked.
Steady. Working mattered. She walked out of the office with Victoria beside her.
The dining room was almost normal again, almost. A few tables were still eating.
Nico watched from near the window, his face tight with concern.
Gia stood near the bar with a towel in both hands, eyes red like she was furious enough to cry and offended by the idea.
When Sophia passed, Gia didn’t make a joke.
She touched Sophia’s arm lightly. One second. Then let go.
“Text me later,” Gia said.
Sophia nodded.
“I will.”
At the front door, she looked toward the kitchen. Empty pass. No Vinny. His notebook sat on the shelf near the dessert station, half visible from where she stood. She couldn’t read the page from here, and there was no need.
Stay in kitchen unless asked.
He had tried. Until he hadn’t. Sophia stepped outside. The cold air hit her face hard enough to help. Victoria walked beside her without speaking for half a block.
Then she said, “I am not going to ask you to talk until you want to.”
Sophia nodded. They walked. At the corner, Sophia’s phone buzzed again. She knew without looking. Vinny. She kept walking. Victoria glanced at her pocket but said nothing. Victoria’s silence gave Sophia room. At Sophia’s building, Victoria stopped by the steps.
“Do you want me to come up?”
Sophia shook her head. “My mom is home.”
“All right.”
Victoria hugged her only after Sophia leaned first. The hug was tight. Short. Controlled.
“None of this means you are bad at your job,” Victoria said against her shoulder.
Sophia closed her eyes.
“I spilled it.”
“Yes. You made a mistake.” Victoria pulled back. “That doesn’t make you what he called you.”
Sophia nodded, but the words didn’t settle yet. Maybe later.
Victoria stepped back. “Text me.”
“I will.”
“And Sophia?”
Sophia looked at her.
“You get to be mad at Vinny even if he meant every word.”
Sophia’s throat closed. She nodded once and went inside.
Constance opened the apartment door before Sophia knocked.
She did. Her mother took one look at her and stepped aside.
No questions. Not at first. Sophia walked in, set her bag on the floor, and stood in the tiny entryway with her coat still on. Constance closed the door.
“What happened?” she asked.
Sophia’s face crumpled before she could stop it. Constance crossed the space and pulled her in. Sophia held on. Hard.
“I spilled dessert on a critic,” Sophia said into her mother’s shoulder.
Constance’s hand moved over her back. “All right.”
“And he yelled at me.”
“All right.”
“And Vinny came out.”
Constance went still. Sophia shut her eyes.
“He defended me.”
Her mother didn’t speak. Sophia swallowed around the ache in her throat.
“I asked him not to.”
Constance held her tighter, and Sophia finally started crying.
At Bella Luna, Antonia stood alone in the kitchen after everyone left.
The dessert station had been cleaned. The extra pastry was wrapped.
The cream had been covered. The plate from table seven had already been scraped, washed, and stacked with the others.
The kitchen looked almost normal again. Vinny’s notebook still sat on the shelf.
Antonia picked it up. She didn’t mean to read it. Then she saw the circled line.
Stay in kitchen unless asked.
Her face tightened. She closed the notebook and set it back exactly where it had been. In the dining room, Brett turned off the last of the front lights.
“Antonia,” he said.
She looked toward the pass.
“He wrote it down,” she said.
Brett didn’t ask what. He understood enough. Antonia rubbed one hand over her forehead.
“He knew the right thing.”
Brett came to stand beside her.
“That may be what scares him most tomorrow,” he said.
Antonia nodded once. Then she looked toward table seven.
Clean now. Reset. Ready for someone else.
But the room still felt wrong. Windy City Magazine would write.
Vinny would have to face her tomorrow. And Sophia would decide what she needed from him before anyone else decided for her.
Antonia turned off the kitchen light. The pass went dark.