Chapter 6 #6
I hand him some wipes. "Okay, Antonio," I say softly.
"With these, we're going to erase the drawing from the wall, alright?
But then you're going to draw it again on paper.
So we can put it on the fridge and everyone can see it.
It was a nice drawing, it just went to the wrong place, okay?
We're not erasing it because it's ugly."
He nods and sniffs, wiping his nose on his sleeve.
I give him the cleaning wipes. "You're gonna scrub a little, I'm gonna scrub a little, and Daddy's gonna scrub a little. Okay? Do whatever you can."
He nods again, tiny "okay" under his breath. "I'll be back in one minute," I tell him, brushing his hair back. "Keep going." I step out of the room and close the door halfway.
Gio's with me in the hall, arms crossed, still upset. I look at him. "Seriously? What did you say to him before I came?"
"I just started asking him what he did in there," Gio says, defensive. "Okay, maybe I looked extra angry, but how am I not supposed to be? I freaked out."
I push my hair back, trying to keep my eye from twitching.
"Okay, listen. I get it. It's bad. I'm freaking out too right now.
But think about it logically. He's three.
No matter what you tell him, he's not going to store it as 'life lesson.
' He'll think, 'oh, Daddy shouts and I'm not allowed to make mistakes. ' You don't want that, believe me."
He exhales through his nose.
"You do not want Antonio to be scared of making mistakes," I repeat, softly. "And you definitely don't want the reason for that fear to be you."
He looks away, shoulders dropping a little. I touch his arm. "I get you completely, Gio, seriously. My eye twitched too when I saw the wall," I say. "But you're not winning anything right now by snapping. He'll take it the wrong way and it'll just hurt him. That's it."
He stares at the floor, thinking. Exhales. "You're right. Fuck. I'm sorry." I step closer and pull him into a hug. He squeezes me, tired and tense.
I rub the back of his neck. "Don't be sorry," I murmur. "We're still learning how to do this. All of it. I just happen to work with kids and know a tiny bit more about how their brains work. Trust me on this."
He nods against my shoulder and hugs me tighter. "I think it would be a good idea if you go help him," I say after a moment.
"I don't want him to have a bad image of you in his head." He groans quietly. "If he ever has a bad image of me, my life is over." I pull back and look at him. "Hey. What about us?"
His eyes go wide instantly.
"Right, right, I know, I didn't mean it like that," he says fast. "I swear. I'm just tired. Jesus, I need sleep."
I laugh. "Same. I need sleep too. Let's eat and then go lie down before one of us cries in front of the wall."
He snorts, finally cracking a real smile. "Fine," he says. "But first I'm going in there to show our son that his dad is not a dictator."
"Good plan," I say, kissing his lips. "Go help him scrub. I'll start the food. And later I'll text Noah that he's on wall-cleaning duty next time he steps foot in this house."
Gio grins a little too much at that. "Now that is the first good thing I've heard all day."
Yeah. So that happened.
And as if the mural incident wasn't enough, now we have the drums. He hasn't stopped hitting them. I'm not exaggerating. I think Gio is one good cymbal away from crying.
I'm used to screaming, it's basically the soundtrack of my job. Kids yell before class, they yell at recess, they yell in the corridor because someone took their sticker.
For Gio, this is all new. Unfiltered, constant three-year-old chaos. With percussion. His hands are on his face, mourning his own peace.
Antonio is giving that drum set everything he's got. At first they tried to play together, father-son band moment, big bonding. Gio almost didn't let him touch the sticks.
And now Antonio is getting his payback. I have never seen him this happy in my life. But at what cost? Gio's mental health. That's the cost. It's hilarious.
We're on the couch right next to Antonio, who literally woke up from his nap, blinked twice, and walked straight to the drums like he was late for his shift.
Eyes half-closed. No words. Just "bam bam bam". Gio is lying on top of me, head on my chest, trying to fuse into my body and hide from the sound.
I stroke his hair and, very discreetly, cover his ears a little with my palms, pretending I'm just playing.
He lets out this tiny, relieved breath. Then I feel him move. He grabs his phone from the coffee table without even looking, unlocks it blindly, and presses call. He puts it on speaker and rests it on my stomach.
Lorenzo. The call connects. "Hey, baby," Lorenzo answers, way too happy. "Lorenzo," Gio says, voice calm, "Antonio wants to thank you for your gift and he said he wants you to hear his whole show. Right now. He's been practising ALL DAY. Don't hang up. He'll cry."
Lorenzo goes dead silent. Absolute silence.
"LOLEZO!" Antonio screams, still hitting the drums. We both jump a little at the volume. "Hiiiii, little man," Lorenzo says, sounding suddenly very awake. "What do you have for me?"
Antonio, motivated, slams every single piece of that drum kit with his whole soul. It's so loud through the phone that it almost causes feedback.
"That was evil," I tell Gio quietly. He laughs into my shirt. "Giving drums to a three-year-old is evil. So now we're even."
30) The Tattoo
Rava
We're at Noah's studio. We're all on the same couch. Me, Gio, Marco in the middle.
Me and Gio have him in a double side-hug, both of us playing with his hair as we stare at the closed door across from us. Noah's private tattoo room. Door shut.
Lorenzo has his ear literally glued to the door like a nosy aunt. "I swear they're having sex," he whispers.
Marco's eye twitches. "I hope your child grows up to be a criminal and I'm the lawyer of his victim. I'll make you and your criminal child suffer the way I'm suffering right now."
I choke on a laugh.
Noah is currently inside that room because today's tattoo happens to be on a guy's asscheek. Full cheek. And he couldn't say no because he's alone in the shop today.
So now Marco is spiraling, and honestly, completely fair. "My man is probably palming another man's ass right now," he says, leaning his full weight on me. "I'm gonna cry, I'm actually gonna cry."
He drops his head on my shoulder. I keep stroking his hair, biting back a grin. "Marco," I murmur, "I'm 100% sure Noah only has your ass in his head. Besides, between us?" I lower my voice. "The guy didn't even look like he had a nice ass."
Gio sits up. "What the fuck?? Why were you looking at his ass at all?" I stare at him. "I didn't do it on purpose, Jesus. My eyes just landed there. The same way they land on everything when I people-watch."
Gio crosses his arms, squints. "Yeah and apparently stayed there long enough to judge if it's a good ass or not—"
"Gio, shut up. You literally have a tattoo right above your dick," I snap. "Should I start getting mad that someone else touched there too??"
He points at himself. "It was a woman, doesn't count—"
"Both of you, shut the fuck up," Marco cuts in, totally done. "My man is in there right now spreading a stranger's asscheek and slapping it with a needle, not yours. So you two can stop arguing about who's more violated."
Fair point.
Lorenzo pulls away from the door and spins around. "I heard a moan," he hisses. "From who," I ask, deadpan. "Noah or the client?"
"Didn't sound like work moan," Lorenzo says. "Sounded like 'this is nice' moan." Marco covers his face with both hands. "I'm gonna vomit."
I squeeze his shoulder. "Hey. Breathe. It's literally his job."
"I know it's his job!" Marco whines. "I just didn't prepare my soul for the phrase 'my boyfriend is elbow-deep in another man's ass crack' today."
Gio snorts into my other shoulder. "Think of it this way," he says. "If he's willing to tattoo someone's ass for money, imagine what he'll do to your ass for free."
Marco groans. "That does not help. That makes it worse. Shut up. Both of you are banned from comforting me."
"Don't worry, Marco," Lorenzo says. "If Noah decides to leave you for the client, you know where to find me." Gio's head snaps toward Lorenzo.
His jaw drops. "Dude."
Lorenzo lifts both hands. "What, Giovanni? I'm just saying… I'm available."
"I thought what we had was serious," Gio says, offended. "You're moving on that fast?"
Lorenzo stares at him like a betrayed telenovela wife. "Yeah, okay, as if I'm gonna beg for you while you're sitting here with the teacher thing."
I am the teacher thing. "Sorry, guys, for standing in the way of your tragic love story."
"You're forgiven," Lorenzo says to me immediately.
"Anyway, as I was saying, we have Marco here, who almost just got released back into the boy market—" Marco launches up from the couch, going straight for him.
Lorenzo squeals and sprints to the other side of the room, laughing. "Hey, don't hit me, I'm fragile! I was supporting you emotionally!"
I'm laughing into my hand when the private room door finally creaks open. We all freeze. Noah steps out with his tattoo machine still in his hand, gloves on. He looks at us and blinks. "Everything okay out here?" he asks.
Marco instantly straightens. "Yeah. Yes. How's the tattoo?"
"It's good," Noah says. "We're taking a ten-minute break now so he doesn't die."
"Yeah, his ass needed a break from all the in-and-out," Marco mutters under his breath. I choke and force it into a cough.
The client comes out right after, moving a little stiff, jogging pants low on his hips, clearly trying not to show how sore he is. He stands next to us, stretching carefully like an old man.
"Hurts?" Noah asks him.
"Nah, it's fine," the guy lies, wincing. "Just didn't know my butt had this many nerve endings."
"Surprise," Noah says. "You're full of them."