Chapter 3 – POSY #2
I have to leave now, and two hundred thirty bucks isn’t going to get me far. The last discount bus has left for the day, so I’ve got to ride in style on Greyhound. A one-way ticket to New York City is ninety bucks. Chicago is ninety-five.
I’ve never been outside of Pyle. All my family is— was —here. I didn’t go to college. That was never on my radar.
I imagine a city would be a great place to hide, but wouldn’t that be what Renelli expects? Everyone runs off to the Big Apple. And the more people around, the more folks who could rat me out.
You know what no one ever does?
Run off to the country. Except for that movie where they send a woman in witness protection to an Amish farm. Or something like that.
I’d stick out like a sore thumb on a farm, obviously, but what about a small town out in the middle of nowhere?
I’d need a good story. Something simple.
Why do strangers end up in bumfuck? Maybe I’m heading for California or Florida, and I ran out of cash.
I’m only in town until I can save enough to move on.
This is good. I wander over to the map hanging beside the vending machines. There are too many possibilities. I check the list of rates. It’s thirty-seven bucks one way to Stonecut County. The last bus of the day leaves in fifteen minutes. Kismet.
I hustle over to the ticket counter, hand over Nevaeh’s crumpled cash, and jog to the terminal.
The bus is not even half full. I get a row to myself in the back, and although the cloying sweet smell of air freshener wafts from the toilet, the heat’s blasting, warming my chilled fingers and nose, and the upholstery is clean.
I hunch down in the seat and stare out the window.
The sun is going down, and the sky is a deep blue-black.
In the high rises around the terminal, lights blaze in offices being cleaned.
I love this city at night. Ever since I was a little girl, if I happened to be driving through after dark, excitement would swirl in my belly.
It was so mysterious. Buildings busy during the day were abandoned, and sidewalks empty during daylight teemed with laughing men and women at night, chatting and smoking in sparkly dresses and sharp suits.
Growing up a Santoro, I didn’t make it to adulthood with many dreams intact, but one persisted well past the time I should have known better.
I’d meet a mysterious man, and he’d ask me out.
He’d pick me up in a shiny black limousine and show me the town.
We’d dance in the clubs, surrounded by laughing people under glittering chandeliers, and he’d tuck my hand in the crook of his arm and walk me down the darkened streets, the stars smattered above the tall buildings, and he’d kiss me, enchanted, swept away by the special thing inside me that only he can see.
As the bus pulls away from the curb, I squeeze my eyes to hold back the tears.
Damned if I didn’t try to shove Dario Volpe into that mystery man’s shoes.
I can’t be too hard on myself. Dario had the car.
He took me dancing when I asked enough times.
He never went so far as to shake me off when I held his elbow as we walked.
He’d only pick up his pace so I’d have no choice but to drop his arm.
And he was very comfortable in the dark.
I think he likes being in the shadows. He likes watching people without them noticing. Gauging, measuring. Like a venomous snake considering a strike. Not invested. Just doing calculations in his cold, serpentine brain.
I saw. I knew this. But I was different. Special. He moved me into his house. He treated me like a princess.
Until he decided to strike.
Dirty, lying whore.
I don’t want to hear another word from your whore mouth.
If I see you again, you’re not walking away. Capisce?
Shame floods my body, and suddenly it’s too hot on the bus, the smell from the toilets too floral. I break into a sweat.
I have no reason to be ashamed. It was stupid to let myself be videotaped, yes, and humiliating. But if I hadn’t been knocked so off-kilter by Dad’s passing followed so suddenly by Mom’s, I wouldn’t have ever been suckered by a sweet-talking piece of shit like Giorgio Fusco.
The series of guys after? Honest mistakes. Long shots that didn’t pan out. Good times gone bad.
And then there was Frankie Bianco. He was handsome, charming, on his way up.
All the girls at L’Alba were hot for him.
I knew what he was, but I was twenty-one, working at the hottest club in Pyle, living the dream.
I took the good with the bad until he did me a favor and cut me loose.
I cried, doused my sorrows in ice cream, and fell in love with the next pretty face to notice me.
Dario Volpe.
What’s my excuse for him?
A rebound? Youth? I can’t claim inexperience.
I knew better. A face like a dark angel, and none of the girls crushed on him. That first night at Il Destino when he asked me to dance for him, and I did while he assessed me with that icy stare, his bodyguards impassive at his sides, gazes averted.
I thought it was hot.
He was auditioning me, testing whether I valued myself cheaply enough to go along with whatever he wanted.
And I did. With a smile.
That’s why the shame is eating me up.
All of this did not come out of left field. He’s a bad man. It was only a matter of time before he did something bad to me.
The further we get from the lights of the city, the sharper the image becomes in my mind, the clear line from getting on my hands and knees in Giorgio’s dank basement bedroom to caking on the makeup after Frankie made a point with the back of his hand.
It leads straight to the back of this Greyhound bus.
If my father were here, he wouldn’t be surprised in the least. Wherever she is, though, I know I’m breaking my mom’s heart.
She never did better for herself, but she wanted so much more for me.
Nothing material. Only love. Happiness. Kindness.
Peace. She had no idea how to get it for herself, and I have to face facts—neither do I.
I slump against the highbacked seat, drained. Despite the lingering adrenaline, the whooshing of the wheels on the asphalt is lulling me to sleep. I’m hurting, but there’s a part of me that’s springing to life, a tendril of strength, buffeted and trampled but alive.
Maybe Dario did me a favor, ripping the veil from my eyes now.
I would have quite happily tripped down the aisle to him. Carried his babies. Settled into life as Mrs. Volpe, blessing my good fortune every day.
Sleeping blithely next to a bastard, growing more dependent year after year until a single blow would break me.
Despite all her prayers, all her whispered affirmations, I was on my way to becoming my mother, stuck forever with a man who—deep down—thinks she’s garbage.
Fuck that.
I’m going to Stonecut County. I’m starting over, and I’m never going to ache like this again.
Never.