by A. Constanza
Ignacio looked at me with guilt in his eyes. “I listened in on your conversation with Sebastian earlier today. It’s an automatic thing, really; I have amazing hearing.”
“Oh great, bionic ears.”
“Something like that.” He sighed. “I’m sorry.”
“It’s okay,” I assured him.
“Estella, did he hurt you?”
My teeth started to clatter, and I leaned into Ignacio, wanting him to envelope me in his warmth. Ignacio lifted up the comforter and slid underneath it, lying down on his back and extending an arm out to invite me into his arms. I shuffled into his embrace and placed my head on his chest while the rest of my body pressed against him.
“You’re safe with me,” Ignacio whispered.
“I know,” I breathed.
No words were exchanged for sixty seconds. It was a long, contemplative minute. There was an internal battle between wanting to share my past but feeling like it was a burden to the relationship.
“Yes,” I answered, finally.
Ignacio’s arm tightened around me, but he didn’t say anything. He didn’t have to say anything to show that he had been fueled with anger. I could hear his heart racing.
“How did he hurt you?” His voice was almost a whisper.
A wave of nausea came over me, and I gripped onto Ignacio’s shirt, recalling the moments that created deep lashes over my heart. “It started with teasing, but mean ones, then transitioned to verbally assaulting me when he was angry, and then he would push me around, nothing too intense, but it happened frequently.” I paused, not wanting to expose the true lengths he went in our relationship.
Looking back at it, I was ashamed for staying in a relationship that only took from me. Every moment I had been with Cesar, I would forget to breathe because being with him felt like I had a weight locked around my ankle and I was thrown overboard into the dark depths of the ocean.
“Did he physically hurt you, Estella?” Ignacio asked, forcing the words out of his mouth.
“I’m so stupid,” I cried, burying my face into Ignacio’s side.
“God, no,” he assured, squeezing me even tighter.
“But I am because he mistreated me, and I stayed.”
“It’s so much more complicated than that. Love is blind.”
Ignacio’s words were supposed to bring solace, but they didn’t. I wasn’t sure what they made me feel. I still felt like a fool for enduring the unnecessary.
“On our semi-anniversary, he took me out to a beautiful restaurant in Manhattan, and he hated that my dress caught the attention of other men. He started snapping at me before the appetizers, and I couldn’t take it. I headed to the bathroom because I wanted to cry, and I didn’t want to do it in front of him. He stalked behind me and pinned me against the wall.” I inhaled deeply, finding it hard to catch my breath. It seemed like I had performed a five-minute-long speech despite it only being a couple of sentences.
“If this is too much, we can end the conversation here and circle back to it when you’re ready.”
“No, I need to tell you.”
Ignacio kissed the top of my forehead.
“He told me that I didn’t get to leave when he was in the middle of a sentence, and that I was just in a hurry to suck another man’s dick,” I said bluntly, but I could feel the bile rise up my throat. “He threw a punch, and I genuinely believe it was intended to hit me directly in the face, but it was angled to the side and barely grazed my face. It went into the wall. The restaurant became dead silent, and I ran out of there after telling him that it was over. I never returned to Manhattan after that. I didn’t want anybody there to see me. I was filled with great shame.”
“Do your parents know?”
“Oh, God no, Papa would kill him.”
“I would help him.”
“I hate him, but I’d never wish death upon him or anyone.”
“Are you afraid of him?”
“I try to tell myself that I don’t have to be afraid of him, but really, I’m so terrified.” I was on the verge of crying.
“He will never hurt you again,” he whispered, running his long fingers through my hair.
I wanted to believe him. Demons lurked around the corners, but lying in Ignacio’s arm and enveloped by his warmth, nothing frightened me at the moment. That was all the peace I needed for the day.
TWENTY-NINE
Ignacio
On the few occasions that I had stayed with my father as a child, he would take me to a private kickboxing studio early in the morning, and I would watch him release his animalistic side. Beads of sweat trickled down the side of his face, a stream of blood would fall from his nose, and his hands never left his face unless it was to make a move.
Fighting wasn’t something that I witnessed much even if it was all planned. It made me uneasy to see two men strike each other, and whenever I did witness my father get hit in the face, I would jolt in fear.
I remembered that I had expressed my concern for him after one of his sessions, and he told me that it was his therapy. That sometimes men needed to physically expel everything out of their system, and as much as he wanted to direct them to the people who deserved it, he opted for a consenting adult.
I didn’t understand that need until now. Sure, I’ve had outbursts such as throwing a man’s camera in the water, but I had never laid my hands on anyone.
I never cared enough about people’s wrongdoings toward me or my loved ones; there was no physical urge to punish them. Until now.
Until I became involved with Estella, the only person who consumed all of me. Body, mind, and soul.
On the ride back to Manhattan, my knee wouldn’t stop bouncing, and my hands automatically balled into tight fists. All that came to mind was the image of Estella’s fearful face and me bludgeoning the face of the man who had hurt her. Cesar Ramos.
I didn’t feel great about prying into Estella’s life, but I needed to know who the threat was in her life. All I needed was a name, and Maya gave it to me during our early morning sittings. Estella wasn’t an early riser, which was to my advantage. I gathered as much information on her ex-boyfriend, and Maya didn’t hold back. She had told me that if he suddenly disappeared off the face of the planet, she wouldn’t think twice, and then winked in my direction.
Murder sounded enticing, but not something I wanted to add to my resume. The reality of the situation was that I couldn’t touch him without being provoked. There wasn’t much I could do aside from being vigilant. I hoped that was enough until we boarded on Sunday, and until then, I had to ease her stay in New York.
“How long has it been since you’ve seen your mother now? Five years?” Adler asked.
“I don’t know,” I responded.
I knew exactly when I last saw my mother. Nonna died in the summer, and I visited my mother shortly after in hopes that she would be able to fill the maternal hole that I desperately needed. Nonna was more than a grandmother to me; she raised me when my biological parents decided that their needs were more important than mine. I thought that my mother would understand my need for a connection with her after losing an important person, and she did for a day and then told me that she was too busy to tend to her ‘emotionally exhausting’ son.
A part of me, or more so seventy percent of me, didn’t want to have lunch with my mother. I didn’t see the point in sitting down and going over the last five years when she could’ve just been a mother during that time and contacted me to show that she cared. I texted her on holidays, her birthday, and all that was reciprocated was a ‘Thank you, my sweet boy’ response.
I had my reservations about my mother, but if I’d learned anything from the week, it was that no one was guaranteed another day. Estella would’ve never imagined that her father would fall into a coma from a heart attack. If anything were to happen to my parents, I’d at least want to say that I tried to reach out before their demise.
The rest
aurant that my mother selected didn’t surprise me. It was on the eighteenth floor, a penthouse lounge that had everything glittery and gold—two of her favorite things. The restaurant was known for serving high-ranking celebrities such as my mother. She was in line with Meryl Streep, which itself was a massive accomplishment, but I’d only wished she didn’t feel the need to abandon me to become successful.
Florence Amatore. I noticed her sitting in a private booth in the corner of the lounge. There was never a time where she was undone. She was a woman of class, pose, and femininity. Her honey-brown hair gently grazed her straight shoulders, her hands were perfectly manicured, and she wore a classic cream ensemble that stated she had it together. She certainly knew how to deceive her audience.
“Hello.” I leaned over to kiss her cheek.
“Oh, my sweet boy,” she said, placing a tender kiss on my cheek in return.
I took my place in front of her and crossed my arms over my chest. “How have you been?”
“I’m usually very busy. I finished a movie yesterday, and I will be starting a new project in a week. Busy, busy, busy.” She flailed her hands.
I nodded and stared at her while she fiddled with the stem of her wineglass. I waited for her to reciprocate the question, but I didn’t hold my breath. She wasn’t good with personal conversation. My mother could talk anyone’s ear off on a superficial level, but conversations about emotion were nonexistent. It made her uncomfortable.
“Where will you be flying for your movie?” I asked, not interested, but it was better than sitting in deafening silence.
“Vancouver, Canada.”
“I’ve never been to Canada.”
“Oh, it’s so beautiful. Beautiful.”
God, someone put us out of our misery.
The waiter appeared to take our drink orders, and I was fine with water, but my mother had ordered her favorite red wine. The waiter disappeared and reappeared within seconds and poured her wineglass halfway, but she motioned to him to keep pouring until it barely hit the rim. He proceeded to hand us our menu and left us to suffer in discomfort.
“I see that you still love your wine,” I commented.
“Very much, it’s my coffee.” She laughed dryly.
I looked down at the menu, and my mind couldn’t process any of the food descriptions. I couldn’t think about food when I was sitting across from a woman who didn’t know how to be around her own child.
“I’m buying; you pick out whatever you’d like to eat,” she said, slipping on her glasses and looking over the menu.
“I’m not too hungry.”
“Neither am I, but I need to include fiber into my diet, so I will have a salad.”
I nodded and leaned against the lounge chair, closing my eyes and taking in the jazz music that played. It wasn’t what I studied, but I loved everything about the genre. The complexity of the chords, the syncopations, and the improvisation. It reminded me of freedom, and Estella.
“Do you still play the piano?” my mother asked.
“I stopped playing for about five years and started playing recently again.”
“Oh, that’s so wonderful.” She leaned over and reached over for my hand, squeezing it. “Do you remember when you used to play for me as a little boy?”
She brought up the memory with fondness in her voice, but it was far from that. The nights following after my father had spoken to my mother about separating, she didn’t take it well. She appeared in my bedroom one night, with a glass of wine in her hand but several already in her system, and tenderly brushed her fingers through my hair to wake me. She pleaded with me to play one song for her to help her go to sleep, and I did.
Little did I know that she would wake me every night at midnight for a month, so I could play with her. It was a lot for a twelve-year-old boy, to have to be responsible for his mother’s emotional well-being. Every night, the songs became slower, sadder, and soul-churning. She would have me play for hours on end until she allowed herself a ‘good’ cry. At times, she would vocalize what she wrote in her diary. Too many times, I heard her say she regretted the path she created for herself, that she wanted to end her life, and that every day was too much of a pain to bear. And I couldn’t do or say anything. I had to endure her suffering.
“How could I forget?” I answered, watching her take a sip of her wine. Her dependency on alcohol was one of the main reasons I didn’t drink often. It left more than a physical bitter taste on my tongue.
My pocket rang, snapping me out of my memories.
Estella: PAPA IS AWAKE!
A large smile broke across my face reading her message. I envisioned her happiness and genuinely felt it.
Me: That’s amazing news! When will he be home?
Estella: Doctors are running tests on him. Maybe Friday night, or Saturday morning.
We would have to move our date to another day. I didn’t expect nor want her to miss her father’s homecoming, but Estella was a step ahead of me.
Estella: Can we do the date night tomorrow? I hope it’s not too much of a hassle to do so. I can help as much as I can; I’ll still act surprised!
Me: There is one thing: Do you think Maya could stay over at a friend’s (or girlfriend’s) house? I’d like to take you back to my penthouse.
Estella: I don’t think she’ll mind at all lol. Our little secret though, okay? Both Mama and Papa would kill us all.
Me: All your secrets are safe with me.
My mother cleared her throat, and I looked up at her, noticing her I’m-ready-to-know-more smirk. “May I ask who is putting a big smile on my handsome son’s face?”
I didn’t want to tell her about Estella, only because she would never be around to meet her. Correction, she would want to meet her once just to get it out of the way and never ask for Estella again. I knew my mother and her intentions with people, yet I couldn’t stop myself from sharing about the girl who had contributed to some of the best days I’d had.
“Her name is Estella.”
“Estella Salvador,” she said, matter-of-factly. “Pamela told me a little about your plus one.”
“Yet you ask me with such innocence that it makes me think you know nothing.”
“This is why I have numerous Best Actress awards,” she shared, doing her triumph shimmy. “Now tell me more about her. What are her aspirations, goals, desires?” She narrowed her eyes, trying to see into me, but there was nothing for her to read.
“She’s an artist. She wants to create sculptures, figurines, and whatever else her heart desires.”
“Does she own an art studio?”
“She shares a space with her friend back in Castel Vecchio.”
“Ah, is that where you met? Is she Italian?”
“It’s a long story, but no, she’s not Italian.”
I rolled my eyes before she could go on a tangent about not having an Italian daughter-in-law. Mom wasn’t fully Italian herself, but she just wanted a reason to complain about someone she knew absolutely nothing about, and I wasn’t going to allow it.
“You two will never meet, so don’t get too upset.”
She gasped. “Why would you say that?” She had her manicured hands over her chest.
I furrowed my eyebrows and looked at her oddly. “I’m sorry to have offended you. It’s just, you’re hardly around for me; I don’t expect you to be around for my girlfriend.”
There was something in her eyes that I’d never really seen in her before until now—guilt. A part of me believed that my mother purposely decided to abandon me with my grandparents and that she didn’t care about me, but maybe I was wrong. Maybe, she had been haunted by all her actions after all these years.
Her eyes grew heavy with sorrow, and she reached into her purse for a tissue. There were no tears, but she pressed the edge of the tissue to her eyes. “I know I haven’t been the best mother, and knowing what I know now, if I could go back in time to spend time with you, I wo
uld. I regret that you spent most of your childhood with your grandparents. I’d like to make it up to you now; let me be here for you now. Let me be your mother,” she whispered, cradling my hand.
I studied her face, trying to see if she would break character at any second, but she didn’t. She was a fluid woman, a woman with many sides, and I wasn’t sure who I was talking to at that moment. Regardless, I decided that there was no harm in taking a chance with her. If she failed, I knew that her words weren’t true, and I wouldn’t allow her to make a fool out of me again. And if she succeeded, then it would’ve been the best move on my part.
“I was planning on giving Estella a date night that she would never forget. I had mostly everything in line, but now the date is a day earlier, and I still have a lot of the little details to figure out. I could really use your help,” I offered. “It isn’t something that is specifically to do with me, but it’s still personal.”
“I would love to help you. She’s very lucky to have a man like you in her life.” My mother sighed, giving me a look that only a mother could give to her child.
“I suppose we should eat something heavier than salad with a busy day ahead of us, hmm?” she said, reaching over for the menu again and calling over the waiter to let him know that we would be staying for longer.
“I’ll get the steak and vegetables,” I chimed in.
My mother gave me a large smile, and for once, I really hoped that she would keep her promise of being more active in my life.
THIRTY
Estella
There was so much to do in so little time. My date with Ignacio would be in the evening, and I still had to pick an outfit along with fixing my hair and face. I also wanted to plan a surprise welcome brunch for Papa who would be back home Saturday around noon. I wouldn’t have much time with him, considering my flight would leave Sunday in the afternoon, so I had to make sure I had plenty to do with him on Saturday but also not exhaust him.
