Chapter 28
N ot what I hoped to hear from that delectable mouth, but it’s expected, I suppose. Giuliana’s had time to think and collect all her anger and pain into what will no doubt be a well-rehearsed speech. She is poised, deliberate, and not one for half measures. Despite her occasional anxiety around pulling things off, she’s steady and confident. Giuliana wouldn’t be here if she wasn’t ready to be.
Still, I want to stall for time and get as much out of this situation as possible before she dissipates. When she leaves back to Italy, she’ll take my heart with her.
“Do we have to do this here?” It’s stupid. We could talk anywhere. It doesn’t matter that we’re in my mother’s apartment.
The question stumps her—her shoulders deflating a little as if she’d been preparing to launch into the discussion. But she shrugs in agreement.
“I feel strange in my mom’s apartment. Plus, you’ve never been to New York before, right?”
Shaking her head, she looks over her shoulder at the city as if just remembering she’s here.
“So, let me take you out somewhere. It can be as private or public as you’d like, but you should get a feel for the city at least once.”
Let me show you my corner of the world. Or at least Central Park.
Pulling the strap of her purse closer to her body as if gathering courage, Giuliana nods and follows me out of the apartment. I’m going to burst out of my skin and lose my mind, or fizz into an effervescent haze in the autumn air. She’s here. Giuliana is here with me .
We don’t talk. This silence between us is delicate. One wrong move and it’ll all be over.
It’s already over.
While not as mean as some of the other things I’ve said to myself, it’s no less devastating. Waiting at the crosswalk, we listen for the beep and tick letting us know we can go. The symphony of New York is such a juxtaposition to what we had in Italy. There’s no summer night sounds of bugs and birds—no light breeze ruffling the olive branches and infusing the air with the scent of earth and fruit.
New York wafts the smell of car fumes and too many people. It’s hot and cold. The asphalt is warm from the sun but a sharp fall wind sucks between tall buildings and launches directly at us. It teases her aroma around my nose—her summer scent that I’ll relish until the day I die and search for in every warm day.
Giuliana looks out of place, not because of the loose strands of her hair dancing in the air or her clothing, which is fine. Jeans, sweater, boots. It’s her gaze—trained up and around trying to take in every inch of the city as we walk. Her brown eyes are wide and a sense of excitement vibrates through both of us. Trying to see it the way she might, I consider how it would come across for the first time.
The city is loud and famous, nowhere near the history of Italy but the stuff of legends regardless. When we make it to Central Park, the trees are lit up and glowing with golden sunset. I can’t help but find it beautiful. Giuliana must agree because she does a little twirl—a 360-degree view to absorb it all.
And it’s that excitement, that thirst for something new on her face that spurs me into action. A horse snickers nearby, drawing my attention to the carriage ride. It’s something that always felt stupid and touristy to me but has a certain charm now. Without thinking I grab her hand, tugging her toward the carriage, and hoist her into the seat as soon as the driver gives the okay.
“Teo… I don’t know about this.”
The nickname does me in. Things can’t be all bad if she’s still using it. It means something, right?
“This’ll give us a way to see a bit of the city and the privacy to talk. Unless you’d prefer to do it in a restaurant or on a park bench?”
The clop of the horse’s hooves starts against the road while she considers, and her lips thin into a little line. “Okay. This is fine.”
As the horses turn onto one of the paths off the main road, I gather the courage to look at her. I’ve stalled for long enough. Hopefully the scenery will soften the blow, or at least put her in a merciful mood.
“Now, although I put my foot in it earlier, I really do want to know what brought you here. You said you wanted to talk, but the way we left things…”
It was a fucking mess. Her ordering me away from her life will never leave my memory and it’s precisely why I’m confused. Why would she have come? The article was supposed to help. But I don’t imagine it’s enough to fix everything.
Reaching into the bag she’s got nestled on her lap, Giuliana pulls out my journal. That fucking journal I left in the desk drawer in my room. Her room, technically. It was only ever going to be mine temporarily.
“ Shit .” I don’t mean for it to slip out but I think of everything I’ve written in there. From the first day of deceit all the way through to the end, when I’d given everything up for her. I want to say something else, and promise that I can explain everything, but the journal does that for me.
Between the article and that book in her hand my heart is laid bare.
“Did you mean it?” Giuliana asks.
“Which part?” I’m not sure if I’m actually expecting a response but she flips to a page she’s got dog-eared and it does something to me, to know that she’s read it all.
It fucks me up a little to see Giuliana run her fingertips across the paper, caressing my words the same way I’d done to hers before. As if she’s trying to gather some kind of essence of me from pen put to paper.
She clears her throat and reads my words aloud: “ I’ve finally found something that makes the pain worth it. The one who makes me want to be a better person and who I’ll risk everything for. ”
Her breath shudders for a moment and she skips ahead slightly.
“ When I leave, I’ll carry this love home with me like a souvenir of hurt. Because I do love Giuliana. So, she comes first. Everything else is background noise.”
Past and present collide in the most potent of ways as my feelings are spoken aloud and yet, I don’t say a word. Lost in this moment, time slips away from us with the sun, darkness spreading. Soon, she won’t be able to see the words anymore. Soon, we’ll be wrapped in night, and it’ll be even harder to pretend I’m unaffected by how close we are.
“ She’s like a drug, in my bloodstream and on my mind, every second of every day. I love her. I’ve finally fallen and I understand. You want them to be happy above all else. Their needs supersede your own. And Giuliana doesn’t need me. No matter how desperately I need and want and love her .”
Voice shaking by the end, I could swear Giuliana’s getting choked up. Dusk gives way to twilight and the shadows lengthen, robbing me of every detail of her expression.
“ Teo …” she sighs.
“I’m so sorry. I’m so , so sorry. I will regret it until the day I die.”
Her gaze whips up from the journal to my face and I see pain etched there.
“ She’s better off .” Giuliana reads off that line and my chest cracks wide open. All my self-doubt and hatred are out in the open. “Is that really what you think? That I’m better off without you?”
“What place do I have at your side? I’ve brought you and your family nothing but trouble, and lies, and hurt. I want to say I wish I’d never come but I’m too selfish for that. I don’t want to give that up. Those memories are some of the best in my life. So, I’m sorry I fucked up but I’m not sorry I met you.” The words are harsh, hoarse coming out around the tightness of my throat and the emotion packing down onto my vocal cords.
“I’m not sorry I love you,” I whisper.
Love. Present tense. Because it’s not going to change and I need to say it out loud at least once before we part again.
“You hurt me, Matteo. You betrayed me.”
“I know.”
“Your article and these words can’t change that.”
“No.”
The sky is a wash of blues. From the darkest purple above, to a periwinkle dipped in gold where the sun’s surrendered to the horizon, stars peek out from their daytime slumber. Giuliana’s face is nothing but dark lines and curves in the evening around us. Her expression is lost to me and so I pay attention to the catch in her breathing and the feel of her body trembling next to mine.
Why are you here? If it changes nothing—if it doesn’t matter—why did you come?
I can’t ask. I don’t want to push her… away.
“But—” she starts, and I swear to god I suck in a breath like I’ve been submerged far too long and I’ve no idea if I’m about to be plunged back under. “It’s a start. You hurt me, in so many ways, but reading this…”
She holds up the journal and waves it to and fro before tucking it under her hands in her lap. “How could you possibly think I’d be better off without you? Teo, you make me brave. I’m tenacious, sure, but it’s from necessity, not belief. Spite kept me going but you gave me a chance to see myself as you saw me. You make me want to believe that I can do it all and deserve it, too, without the need to prove myself.”
“Giuliana—” I start but she lifts her hand to stop me, and I wait.
“I’m not good with words. I’m not a writer or a poet; I’m just a farmer. I’m better with actions than words, and my hands are what I use to show the earth love and respect. My hands are how I express myself. Time and strength, passion and pain, all of it shows on my palms and the callouses beneath my fingers, but I realize that you can’t see how empty my hands are without yours to hold. So, I’m here. To say the words.” Her voice wobbles as she speaks, as it rushes out of her, and she gesticulates with those beautiful hands before they knot together in a worried clutch.
“I”—this time she’s the one to stumble and struggle with the words—“I love you too.”
Hand shaking, I bring it up to her jaw, spanning the side of her face. I rub my thumb against the soft, hot skin of her cheek. We’re suspended in this second of time before we both surge forward.
Lips meet, needy and not enough. Salt against her mouth, I tug her closer to my body and feel the press of her softness and the hard ridges of that fucking journal between us. It’s the kind of kiss that stops time. A connection restored. A love acknowledged bursting between us from embers we’ve harbored all summer to an inferno that rivals the hues of autumn.
I touch every inch of her I can, reverently. Adoration brushed against the edge of her jaw, my fingers trail over the slope of her shoulder and the soft dip at her waist—the one I’ve been stupidly in love with since that first touch on the Vespa. Sound fades and I’m caught up in the feel of her heat, driving away the rapidly dropping temperature. Her heartbeat thunders, or maybe that’s mine, and eventually we realize the carriage has come to a stop.
The driver—bless him—has had the grace not to stop us, just staring out into the street and minding his own damn business. I would too, considering he gets paid based on time and not distance.
Honking cars and music pouring out of a venue nearby filter back into my senses. The light from a nearby streetlamp spills across Giuliana’s face, highlighting kiss-swollen lips and the pink tip of her nose. She stares up at me with her heart in her eyes and I would do anything for this woman.
I’d go down on my knees and kiss the ground at her feet if she asked. Even though it’s New York so it’s fucking filthy.
How do I ask where to go from here? What does this mean?
Sensing my hesitation, Giuliana lifts her hand to my cheek and traces her thumb against my lips. I plant a little kiss against the swirls and ridges there.
“Teo…” Turning my face into her hand, I lean into that touch as if it’s going to fortify every corner of my aching heart.
“Yes, love.” I whisper, afraid of what comes next and worried this is goodbye. This will be the part of the night where punishment comes to greet me.
But as usual she knocks me off my guard, the same way she’s always done.
“ Ti perdono .” Her voice is sweet, the words of amnesty sweeter because I don’t need to speak Italian to understand. Written all over her face, it’s in the touch of her hand against my cheek like a boon.
“Come home, please.” She’s the light guiding me, and her words are ones I didn’t know how desperate I was to hear until this moment. Everything I’ve wished for is in the back of a carriage, on a corner of the city that’s never truly felt like mine.
“Yes.”