Sempre (Forever)

by JM Darhower

  “Do they have them in New York?”

  “Palm trees?”

  She laughed. “No, art schools.”

  “Oh. Yeah, of course. Art schools are everywhere, but there are probably more in New York than anywhere else.”

  “Have you ever been there?”

  “I went a few times when I was a kid. My father used to go to New York City on business.”

  “Is it nice?”

  “The part I saw was. It’s pretty chaotic.”

  “I saw on Jeopardy that it’s the city that never sleeps.”

  He smiled. “Yeah. Some people call it the city of dreams, too. I guess because people go there to chase their dreams.”

  She gazed at him. “Maybe we could.”

  “Maybe. I’m pretty sure they don’t have palm trees, though.”

  Despite the fact that they were cramped in a car all day, it ended up being pleasant. The weather let up, and with it so did their moods. They talked about college and the future as they ignored the reality of the world outside of the Mazda for the time being.

  They stopped for food and gas every few hours, occasionally finding a bathroom in between. Carmine tried to call his father each time. He never got an answer and his concern grew, all of the possibilities creeping into his thoughts.

  They slept in another Holiday Inn that night, getting back on the road early the next morning. Another day was spent driving, this one more tense. Haven fell asleep in the car sometime after nightfall, once again slumping over in an uncomfortable position.

  Carmine was antsy, needing something to distract him, and compulsively fiddled with the radio. His legs were cramping, his fingers locking from holding the steering wheel for hours on end.

  Haven woke up when they reached California, and Carmine massaged her neck again. “We’re almost there, hummingbird.”

  Her head snapped in his direction. “Already?”

  “Already? I’ve been driving for days and you say already?”

  She turned to look out of the window. “Sorry.”

  Carmine watched as she fidgeted, picking at her fingernails. He felt guilty. He knew she was nervous. “I’m just tired,” he said, grabbing her hand. “I shouldn’t have been an asshole like that.”

  * * * *

  The Blackburn city limits sign was worn and faded, the green paint sandblasted into more of a dirty gray. The white writing on it was barely legible. Carmine had to do a double-take as they passed by.

  “Did that just say population seventeen?” he asked incredulously.

  “Maybe,” Haven said, “but I didn’t think it was that many. I ran for hours before I saw another house.”

  Carmine glanced out the side windows, seeing nothing but uninhabited land surrounding the barren highway. “I believe it. We haven’t passed anything for miles.”

  They drove for a few more minutes before he finally spotted some buildings in the distance. He slowed the car, hoping to find a gas station since the gas gage was hovering near empty. A hotel would be nice too, since his eyes burned from fatigue, but as he neared the structures, his hope diminished. They were abandoned, shells of buildings that looked as though a small gust of wind would knock them down. His hair stood on end as they drove through the area, an eerie feeling overcoming the car.

  “This is a ghost town,” he said. “Where the hell are the people?”

  “Maybe they moved.”

  He laughed dryly. “Yeah, or they all died.”

  “Some did,” she said.

  He glanced at her, her strangled voice telling him there was a story behind those words, but he knew it wasn’t the time to ask questions. She looked to be teetering on the brink of a breakdown as it was. He couldn’t risk pushing her over the edge.

  Carmine continued to drive, and in a few minutes they passed another city limit sign. They’d gone from one side of Blackburn to the other without seeing another living soul.

  The town was an enormous prison cell. There were no bars or chains, no physical restraints, but it was a mass of oblivion cut off from the world. There were no people, no cars, no stores, no houses. There wasn’t even any color. It was like it didn’t exist.

  Suddenly, so much more made sense to Carmine. He knew she’d grown up isolated, but knowing and seeing were two vastly different things. He wanted nothing more in that moment than to pull over and hug her. She was communicating, and driving, and taking GED tests. She opened herself up to everything when she’d literally come from nothing.

  Nothing.

  He was fucking dumbfounded.

  In the next town over, they came upon a tiny motel. Carmine pulled over and paid the old man at the front desk some cash, grabbing the key from him with very little conversation. He grimaced at how shabby the place was and complained while Haven just shrugged. “I’ve stayed in worse places.”

  She had. He understood that now.

  * * * *

  Carmine was startled awake by a ringing, the shrill noise causing his heart to violently pound. Sitting up, he rubbed his eyes and grabbed his phone off of the little stand beside the bed.

  “Yeah?” he answered without looking to see who was calling.

  “Have you arrived?” Corrado asked.

  “Yeah,” he said, yawning halfway through the word.

  “I’ll be spending the day at the Antonelli’s if you want to bring Haven out to visit with her mother,” Corrado said. “Otherwise, I’d appreciate it if you kept in contact with me about your location.”

  Glancing in the bed beside him, Carmine met Haven’s apprehensive eyes. “Yeah.”

  Corrado sighed. “Is that the only word you know? Yeah?”

  The sarcastic ass in Carmine wanted to say, “Yeah,” but he knew it wasn’t wise to fuck with a poisonous snake, so-to-speak. “No, sir.”

  Corrado rattled off the Antonelli’s address as Carmine scoured the room for a piece of paper and something to write with. He found a short, dull pencil in a drawer and snatched the Bible out of the nightstand, opening it up and tearing out the first page. Haven gasped and sat up, gaping at him as he scribbled down the address. “Thanks.”

  He hung up the phone and looked at Haven, who was still staring at him. “I can’t believe you just did that.”

  His brow furrowed. “Did what?”

  “You just tore out that page.”

  “I needed something to write on.”

  “It’s the Bible, Carmine!”

  He rolled his eyes. “Do you really think someone who would come to a place that looks like this would be reading this?” he asked, holding up the Bible. “Anyone who stays here is far from holy.”

  He glanced around at the room with disgust.

  “We stayed here.”

  “We did. Like I said, far from holy,” he said, chuckling. “But whatever, it was only the title page. I didn’t tear out anything with the story on it. The paper just says ‘Holy Bible’. Anyone who looks at the damn book knows what it is.”

  He shook his head. His father would be furious if he knew.

  “It’s still wrong,” Haven said.

  “Maybe so, but I needed to write down the Antonelli's address.”

  She froze, her expression panicked. “Why?”

  Sitting back down, he reached over to brush some wayward curls out of her face. He tucked them behind her ear and smiled softly as he took her in. She looked so vulnerable, and he wanted nothing more than to right every wrong and make the world better for her sake.

  “You wanna see your mom, don’t you?” He hadn’t brought up the subject of her visiting her mom, and based upon Haven’s expression, he knew she hadn’t even considered it.

  “Can I?”

  He nodded, running his fingertips along her cheek. “Corrado will be there all day and said I could bring you by to visit.”

  Her eyes glassed over with tears. She threw herself at him, knocking him back onto the bed.

  * * * *

  Carmine slid on his Nike’s, watching Haven from t
he corner of his eye. She wore a blue top, slightly low cut, and a pair of skintight jeans. He wondered what they were all going to think, because she wasn’t the same broken girl who had left Blackburn a year ago.

  Standing up, he held out his hand. “Time to introduce your boyfriend to your parents.”

  Carmine punched the address into the car’s navigation system, and it led them back down the same remote highway from the night before. After a few miles, it alerted them to a path that cut through the desert. Carmine turned on it, and Haven tensed a fraction of a second before the navigation system announced they’d arrived at their destination. She recognized it, he realized. She could sense it in the middle of nowhere.

  Haven’s hands trembled as he drove slowly down the path, her fear so powerful he could feel it where he sat. The ranch came into view, and she inhaled sharply as Carmine parked behind Corrado’s rented black sedan. A woman on the porch glanced at the vehicle and bolted inside when he made eye contact.

  “I don’t think I can do this,” Haven said, shaking her head so frantically it nearly made him dizzy. “I can’t be here.”

  “Listen and listen good, tesoro. We’re about to get out of this car, and I know it won’t be easy. It’s gonna make you remember shit that’s happened. I know that, because every time I’ve gone back to Chicago and seen the alley I was shot in, I’ve lost it. You may wanna run as far away from this place as possible, but you can’t. You can’t run anymore. I was wrong when I even suggested you and I run away, because it just gives power to the people chasing you. You can’t let them control you. You can’t let them win.”

  She stared at him intently as she took in his words.

  “You’re strong, Haven. It may not feel like it right now, but you are. These motherfuckers tried to tear you down, but it didn’t work because you’ve built yourself up. Have you seen yourself lately? You’re a force to be reckoned with. You’re tough and passionate, and you can’t let these people get to you. That’s what they want.”

  The anxiety in her expression was being replaced with something else. Carmine knew the look anywhere. It was determination.

  “So we’re gonna get out of this car, and we’re gonna go in this house, and we’re gonna tell these people to kiss our asses, because they can’t touch us. And you’re gonna go out there and tell your mom you love her, because you deserve that chance.”

  Having said everything he could say, Carmine got out of the car. Haven stepped out after him, cautiously scanning the property. He groaned at the heat, the sun shining brightly and nearly blinding him. Grabbing his sunglasses, he put them on and unbuttoned his long-sleeved green shirt. “Fuck, it’s hot.”

  “I remember it being hotter.”

  “Well, I’m about to burn up here,” he said, walking over to her side of the car. Gazing into her eyes, he leaned down and softly kissed her.

  She ran her fingers through the hair at the nape of his neck. “You’re sweaty.”

  “I told you—it’s hot as Hell.”

  “It is Hell.”

  He gaped at her. “You just cursed.”

  “Hell isn’t a curse word.”

  “Yes, it is.”

  She shook her head. “It’s in the Bible, Carmine. If you spent more time reading it and less time tearing pages out of it, maybe you’d know that.”

  He started laughing, but a slamming door interrupted the moment. Haven went rigid at the noise as Carmine glanced up at the porch. Something about the man standing there struck him as familiar, his eyes a deep brown that Carmine knew well.

  Leaning down, his lips beside Haven’s ear, Carmine said, “If this is Hell, does that make him the devil?”

  Chapter 40

  Michael Antonelli stood on his front porch, a glass of whiskey in his left hand and a lit cigar in his right. He wasn’t speaking. He wasn’t blinking. He didn’t even appear to be breathing.

  Haven stared at him, stunned by how utterly unchanged he looked. It had nearly been a year, but seeing her old master in his khaki pants and polo shirt, too tight around his bulging gut, made it feel like no time at all had passed.

  He seemed surprised. Haven continued to stare at him, trying to get a read on his mood. His brow furrowed as he stared back. It dawned on Haven that he was confused because she hadn’t yet looked away. They’d been trained to keep their heads down, their gaze on their feet. She’d gotten beaten many times for doing exactly what she was standing in the yard doing, but that didn’t deter her. The longer she gazed at him, the more her fear lessened. He couldn’t touch her. He couldn’t hurt her anymore. He held no power over her and never again would.

  The tense silence was broken when the door behind Michael opened, jolting him back alive. Blinking rapidly, he moved out of the way as Corrado stepped onto the porch. “Carmine, Haven... nice to see the two of you again.”

  Carmine nodded in greeting. “Uncle Corrado.”

  “Sir,” she said quietly.

  “Are you enjoying your trip?” he asked.

  The nonchalance of the question seemed strange to Haven, but Carmine didn’t appear to be surprised as he answered. “It was a long drive. Other than that, it’s been fine. Well, except for the fact that I feel like I’m being boiled alive.”

  Haven smiled involuntarily at his complaining, and Corrado actually laughed. “It isn’t that bad. Isn’t that right, Haven?”

  “Yes, sir,” she said. “The heat is—”

  She intended to say it was bearable, but loud stomping inside the house cut her off. The front door thrust open and Katrina burst outside, wearing a tan dress and a pair of matching high heels. “Where the hell did Clara go?”

  Haven flinched at the hostility. Katrina froze, her face twisting with disgust as she spotted her. “What’s she doing here?”

  “Kat, you remember Haven,” Corrado said. “And have you ever had the opportunity to meet Vincent and Maura’s son, Carmine?”

  Katrina’s appearance shifted from hatred to alarm as her eyes darted to Carmine, the color draining from her face. She turned and ran back into the house.

  Michael looked at the door his wife had just disappeared through with bewilderment, while the smile on Corrado’s face hinted he might not have been as far out of the loop as the rest of them. “Are you going to invite the kids in, Antonelli, or do you intend to allow my nephew to stand here until he bursts into flames? You’re being quite rude. I invited them here under the impression that you remembered how to be hospitable.”

  “Oh, yeah!” Michael stuck his cigar into his mouth and opened the screen door. “Come inside.”

  Carmine started for the porch, sweat pouring from his flushed skin, but there was no way Haven could go into that house. “I, uh… I need a minute.”

  “You can have all the time you need,” Carmine said. “This is your show. If you wanna leave, just tell me and we’ll leave.”

  “I don’t want to leave, but my mama…”

  A look of understanding crossed his face. “Do you know where she’d be right now?”

  “I have an idea. I’m guessing she doesn’t know I’m here, since no one else seemed to know we were coming.”

  “Yeah, I can’t believe Corrado didn’t tell them.”

  “He seems to enjoy throwing his weight around,” she said. ”Usually Mas—, uh, Michael is the one barking orders at people. It was kind of nice seeing it reversed.”

  Carmine chuckled. “Yeah, Michael depends on Corrado too much to ever cross him. Plus, you know… no one’s stupid enough to fuck with Corrado. He can be scary.”

  “Michael treated your father the same way,” she said. “I’d never seen him look afraid of anyone until the day Dr. DeMarco showed up. I didn’t know what to make of it. I couldn’t imagine what kind of man I was leaving with if Michael was scared of him.”

  “Yeah, well, someone needs to put that motherfucker in his place,” Carmine said, running his hands down his face. His flush was growing, the sweat pouring off of him. “He was probably a
fraid my father would clip him, too.”

  “What does clipping mean?”

  The corner of his lips turned up into a nervous smile. “Don’t worry about it.”

  She was about to press him to explain, but a loud commotion rang out nearby that stopped her before she could get any words out. Startled by the disruption, she turned around. Her breath hitched the moment she saw her mama standing at the corner of the house, a bunch of metal buckets and tools lying in a pile at her feet.

  Unlike Michael, she looked different. Her dark hair had streaks of gray, and wrinkles lined her weary face. She wore a dirty gray shirt that swallowed her skeletal frame and a pair of shorts that exposed a set of startlingly thin legs. Her mama had always been skinny, but it was beyond that now. She was a shell of her former self.

  “Haven?”

  The sound of her voice was like hot iron striking Haven’s chest, taking her breath away. A sob escaped her throat, and she yanked her hand from Carmine’s to cover her mouth.

  Feet started moving on their own accord, frantically carrying Haven to her mama. Their bodies collided, and her mama lost her footing as she wrapped her arms around Haven. They both fell to the ground, her mama’s embrace strong despite her frail body.

  Her hands frantically traveled Haven’s back and ran through her hair as she clung to her. “My baby girl! You’re here!”

  “Yes,” she choked out. “I’m here, Mama.”

  Her mama pulled from the embrace. “Why are you here?”

  “It’s okay,” Haven said. “No one’s going to hurt me.”

  “You can’t be sure! You know how they are!”

  Haven tried to smile through her tears. “Don’t worry. They brought me here so I could see you.”

  “Is your master here on business?”

  “No, I just told you—they brought me here to see you.”

  “You’re here to visit me?” Her hands explored Haven’s face. “I don’t understand. Are you sure? It doesn’t make sense.”