6. Chapter Six #2
He doesn’t budge. With a sigh, I turn around and head back inside. The moment I’m alone, I let out a piercing scream that helps get rid of only a little bit of my anger. It’s impossible to get rid of all of it.
I refuse to just sit around and wait all day for Matteo to return home. Yes, it’s what a perfect wife would do but so far, I have been nothing but perfect. So what even is the point?
I want to get my nails done and I’m going to get them done.
Despite having been driven around all my life, I do have my license. My father made sure I had it in case of an emergency. Tom would sometimes let me drive the car instead of him just so I could practice.
When Matteo gave me a tour of the house, I saw he had multiple cars in the garage. All I need to do is take one and go to my nail appointment.
Fortunately, he keeps the keys on a ring by the front door. It’s surprisingly easy to find which key goes to which car and then pick one – a white Ferrari. The garage door opens achingly slowly. By the time it does, I notice Enzo standing in the way with his arms crossed.
“You can’t leave Mrs. Marani,” he says.
But I ignore him.
I pull the car out of the garage and he jumps out of the way to avoid getting hit and then I take off. I will not be held prisoner in my own home.
I make it to my nail appointment right on time.
“You look flushed,” Josie, my nail stylist, says to me as I sit down in the chair across from her. “You’re always early. It’s a surprise to see you cutting it so close.”
“Traffic,” I lie. “But I’m here now.” I press my fingers into the bowl of water and Josie gets to work like she always does.
I spend the next hour letting her do my nails – file and paint them – while I lie through my teeth when it comes to every question she asks me. I don’t tell her how I’m married now. I don’t tell her about how I’m failing as a wife. I don’t mention Matteo’s name once.
Given how much he has occupied my thoughts for the past month, it’s nice to not have him be a part of the conversation. I feel like I’m in my old life again.
Once I’m done getting my nails perfected, I head back out to the car. Only to find a man trying to break in through the driver’s door.
“What are you doing?” I ask.
The man looks at me and back to the car and knows he got busted. But instead of running away, he runs right at me. Before I know what’s happening, he punches me in the face and I fall to the ground. I can only watch in pain as he goes back to the car and continues to try and break into it.
My head is on fire. My face is throbbing. My entire body aches from the hard fall I took.
Two falls in two days cannot be good for a person.
I try sitting up but my head is woozy so all I can do is slump back down.
It’s then that I see a car pull up to the street. A man gets out. One I am very familiar with by now.
My husband.
He looks angry but then he sees me on the ground and rushes to my side. “Luciana? What happened?” There’s worry in his voice. Worry for me, I realize.
I point at the man still trying to break into the car. Matteo’s face is consumed by fury as he stands up and runs at the man. I watch as he tackles the man to the ground and punches him over and over and over again until the man doesn’t get back up.
All the commotion causes a scene and people finally come running over.
“What’s going on?” one woman asks.
“I’m calling the police,” a man says.
Matteo leaves the thief on the ground and returns to me. “Luciana.” He picks me up, bridal-style, and carries me over to his car. “What happened? Are you ok?”
“No,” I say before a sob hits me. My face hurts. My head hurts. Everything hurts. Even my soul.
Without hesitation, he gets me into the car and drives away from the crime scene, not even worrying about his other car. I don’t know where we’re going until we come upon a hospital.
Matteo picks me up again and brings me inside. “My wife was hurt. Punched, I believe.”
A female doctor immediately gets me into a wheelchair and takes me to a private room. Matteo tries explaining what happened but even he doesn’t know.
“What happened?” the doctor asks me. “Can you tell me?”
“I was punched in the face,” I mumble. “And I fell. A man was trying to break into my car.”
“All right. Let’s get you looked over.”
As the doctor checks on me, I can’t help but look at Matteo. My eyes flick down to his knuckles which are covered in blood from when he punched the thief. He didn’t hesitate to help save me.
“You took a hard fall to the ground,” the doctor says. “We should order you a CT scan to get your head looked at. It’s always good in cases like this. You could have a concussion. But we won’t know. Just stay put for now. I’ll be back later.”
She leaves me and Matteo alone in the room. Neither one of us speaks.
But I know I have to. “Thank –,” I start to say when Matteo cuts me off.
“What were you thinking?” he asks.
“What?”
“Why did you leave? I had Enzo there to keep you from leaving. You said you wouldn’t run.”
“I didn’t run. I was just going to my nail appointment.”
He blinks, clearly not expecting my answer. “Your nail appointment?”
“I had a life before you,” I snap. “I wanted to do the things I’ve always done. I didn’t want to stay cooped up in your house all day. If you’re allowed to work on our honeymoon, then I’m allowed to go to my nail appointment. I tried explaining this to Enzo but he wouldn’t listen.”
“Your nail appointment.” He huffs. “Who would have thought? I thought you were running from me.”
“I know better than to do that.”
“Well… fine then. I overreacted. But you should only go somewhere with a guard. If you had, you wouldn’t have been hurt. I’ll tell Enzo.”
“All right.” The moment to tell him ‘thank you’ for saving me is gone.