Chapter 13 Annetta #2
It’s only after an hour of lying in bed in the most relaxed bliss I’ve ever experienced in my life that I search for my panties on the floor, in the sheets, and finally realize he took them with him.
I’m making a mess.
The flowers Valeria delivered this morning litter the dining room table, scraps of petals and stems. The few that made it into the stone vase are all quietly rebelling.
Stems that should be rigid are drooping nearly to the table, and a few of the rose heads are so overplucked that they look like half-bald Barbie dolls.
I pause the video that promises a “Simple, Beautiful Winter Floral Arrangement” and groan, dropping my face into my hands.
Once I’d gotten out of bed, the easy bliss from this morning burned away as quickly as a fog in the morning sun.
Mom and Carlo had sent me texts saying Carlo would be stopping by to “check up on me”, and I’d come downstairs to find that my least-favorite Eduardo was my new bodyguard—the one whose sense of humor is firmly stuck in the third grade.
Thankfully, he seems mostly content to raid the fridge every hour and splay out on the couch as he watches videos of women in bikinis bouncing around in front of cars.
The elevator door dings, and I look up through my fingers to see Carlo slinking in, wearing a ridiculous orange beanie. He waves at me, tossing his coat and a brown lunch sack on the kitchen counter—leaving his sunglasses on—as he walks to the fridge.
A moment later, with a new bottle of lager hissing open in his hands, he joins me at the dining room table. “Nice flowers.”
“Nice beanie.”
“I paid Cousin Steffie twenty bucks for this.” He flicks the bright yellow pom-pom on top of his orange beanie. “You don’t support women-owned businesses?”
My mouth twitches. I lean back in my dining room chair, stretching long until my back pops. I didn’t realize how much I’ve been hunching over these flowers all afternoon. Mom would kill me if she saw me in that posture.
You’ll get a hump if you keep doing that.
I glance over at Carlo, slumping into the chair next to me, posture-be-damned as he drags the bottle to his mouth.
“You really think they look that bad?” I ask.
“They look drunk.” Grinning, he takes a swig of beer to punctuate his point. He glances at Eduardo in the living room and leans toward me. “Don’t sweat it. Mom said she can hire someone to make the design if you can’t hack it.”
I fume. “Well, you can tell Mom—”
“Whoa, whoa.” Carlo throws his hands up in a “don’t shoot” pose. “I’m just the messenger. Take it up with Mom. You bringing this attitude to Dom? Because that would explain a lot.”
I try not to look too interested as I focus on tidying up the flower petals on the table. Even hearing his name sends a pulse through me. “What’s that supposed to mean?”
“It means he was in a weird mood today. Barely gave me any shit about last night and could hardly pay attention to Dad.”
I bite back a smile. “Oh.”
Carlo leans forward, squinting at me like I have something on my face.
“What?” I ask innocently.
He jerks back in his chair. “Oh! Ew! Fucking gross!”
“What?”
“You know what, you sicko. That’s nasty. I don’t need to know about my sister like that.”
“Oh!” I throw my hands up. “Like I didn’t have to sit in the same fucking living room while Alexis Harris gave you a handy under the blankets. Newsflash—you guys were not subtle about it. I had to burn that blanket after!”
Carlo slams a fist on the table. “That was Alexis. Fucking. Harris. She could’ve offered me a handy while I lay bare-assed on the front driveway, and I would’ve accepted!”
I snatch a rose off the table and whack him with it, and we both burst into laughter. When we finally catch our breaths, Carlo stands, tosses his bottle, and picks up his coat.
“Just stopping by to traumatize me, then?” I tease, following him into the kitchen.
“Yeah.” His smile drops a little. “About that… about last night. I just wanted to say, I didn’t think things were gonna go off the rails like that.”
Listening to Carlo dance around an apology is about as fun as pulling teeth.
“Don’t sweat it.” I wave him off and glance toward Eduardo to make sure he’s not listening. I lean in, muttering to Carlo, “Speaking of last night, were Russell and Serafina ever, you know, a thing?”
Carlo bursts out laughing. “Fuck no. He wishes, but she never gave him the time of day.”
I want you to think about who loves the real you.
I smile despite the lingering doubt in the back of my mind.
Carlo pulls me in for a side hug. “Thanks, sis.” He shuffles his coat from hand to hand. “The, uh, other reason I’m here is because I’m going to see her later today. I wanted to know if there’s anything you wanted me to bring.”
We don’t need to say her name. We already had this conversation several times in the past month while I stayed at Mom and Dad’s house.
Carlo thinks he’ll find closure by visiting Serafina’s grave, but there’s nothing there besides a bunch of rotting bones.
She’s gone—in every sense of the word—completely smudged out of existence like she was never here in the first place, all at the hands of a careless man.
Maybe Carlo will find closure there, but there’s nothing there for me to visit.
“I’m good.”
“I think it’ll be good for you—”
“No.” I smile. “Thank you, though. Seriously.”
“Alright.” He nods toward the lunch sack he left on the kitchen counter. “Mom told me to bring that to you. She said it was real important.” At my expression, he laughs. “Just think, it probably can’t be worse than anything you dealt with last night. Take care, sis.”
He says his goodbyes to Eduardo and leaves through the elevator.
Frowning, I pull the brown lunch sack toward me and unfurl it to peek inside. There are several boxes with the words “ovulation” and “pregnancy” printed over the top next to pictures of smiling babies.
I crumple the bag like I found a nest of black widows inside and drop it into the trash, my heart beating loudly in my chest—from fear or anger, I’m not sure.
I shove it to the bottom of the trash can under dirty towels and old food.
My breathing is deep and intentional as I lean over the kitchen counter.
I always thought it’d be Frederico who would grow disappointed with my mysterious inability to have kids.
But it was his mom.
Frederico was perfectly content to let me offer any of my holes before he’d disappear for the night with his brother or his colleagues. So, it was his mom who sat me down at the dinner table one morning while he slept in.
“How long have you been with my son now?” Giulia Chiarelli asked in Italian.
She was a short, round woman with a kind face and soft hands. After her husband went to jail, Frederico had become the de facto don for the Tampa mob, but Giulia raised two good boys who listened to their mama, so she always had her say.
“Two years, Mamma,” I answered in the same language.
We all called her that.
“Two years and six months, sweetheart.” She took my hands in hers. “And I couldn’t be happier. You are the daughter I never had.”
She tucked a strand of hair behind my ear, the only part of me she never criticized. “Just between you and me, are you trying your absolute hardest to get pregnant?”
I held her gaze without blinking. “Yes, Mamma.”
Giulia smiled warmly, the edges of her eyes crinkling. She patted my cheek. “That’s good to hear, sweet girl. We’re going to the doctor’s tomorrow to see if there’s anything we can do to help you and my son. If you’re not able to have a baby… well. Let’s go to the doctor first.”
That night, I tore out my IUD myself and buried it in the garden.