by Reed, Sophia
She pointed at me, her freckled nose reminding me of her late mother. “Unco Sandro.”
“Pfft,” Ricky spat. “I don’t know why I didn’t guess it.”
“Screw you,” I growled. I pulled Willow over to the table. “Anna.” She looked up at me with a smile. “This is Willow.”
She waved cheerily. “Hi, Wiwwow.”
Willow giggled. “Hi.”
I put a hand on Antonio’s head. “And this is Antonio.” He was still aggressively rolling his crayons over the paper taped to his high chair table.
“He’s so cute.” She looked over at Luca. “He looks just like you, papa.”
Luca smiled back at Willow, and it was warm and inviting. He got up out of his chair and walked over. “Thank you. It’s good to see you again.”
He gave her a hug, and it gave me fuzzy, happy feelings. I wished it could always be like that.
When they released, I turned Willow’s attention to Molly. “And this is Molly, Luca’s wife and Antonio’s mom. Though to be fair, she’s a mom to Anna as well.”
“A damn good one,” Luca added.
Willow stuck out a hand to shake. “Hi. I’m Willow.”
Molly swatted Willow’s hand away and stepped forward to hug her. “Nice to meet you. I’ve heard lots about you.” She pulled back. “Lots about you. Like, lots. So much.”
“You done?” I asked.
She looked at me and then back at Willow. “Like, many things, all of the time.” Then she grinned at me. “Okay. Now I’m done.”
I rolled my eyes. “I was literally about to compliment your cooking skills.”
“You’re the one cooking?” Willow asked. “It smells amazing in here.”
“Thank you. I have a brisket in the oven and a braised tomato stew on the stove.”
“She was a chef before coming here,” I said. “We still have her cook for us from time to time, because honestly, you can’t beat it.”
Molly feigned coyness. “Aw, thanks, Sandro.” She turned around and noticed Ricky was already dipped over the pot and had a spoon inside. “Hey! Get away from my food!”
Ricky quickly scooped some of it and scootched back before she could get to him to hit him.
Willow laughed. “Sorry. He’s kind of impatient when it comes to food.”
“So I’ve noticed,” Molly replied.
Lunch was good. Thanks to Molly’s no work at the table rule, we refrained from discussing business at all and had a delightful lunch, bonding as a family. The kids were eating Willow up, not that I didn’t understand why. She’d always been good with kids, which was how I knew she’d be a fantastic mother one day. Whenever she got up from the table for any reason at all, Antonio would start to cry, and Anna would try and follow her. Luca, Willow, Ricky, and I went around and around, sharing stories of our childhood and the shenanigans we got up to in our youth. Molly just sat back and enjoyed hearing stories about her husband before his mature days, back when he was actually a bit of a goofball. The only thing missing was Gabriel, who’d been sent to Scranton to follow up on our app situation with our extension out there.
After lunch, Molly went to put the kids down for a nap, and Ricky and Luca were going to talk business, so I decided to take Willow outside to walk through our garden out back. We’d taken several walks through that garden as teenagers, and I knew she would enjoy spending some time out there again. We spent some time walking amongst the pristinely manicured hedges until Willow suddenly remembered the time we’d hidden in the bush maze on the southern side of the garden and ended up having sex back there. To my surprise and delight, she took my hand and dragged me back there once more, pulling me against her and telling me that she wanted to relive this part of our younger days, too. We only barely managed to get our clothes back on when we heard Ricky calling for us from the other side of the hedges I had pushed her up against.
I didn’t want her to go. Sharing her with my family, surrounding us with love, it felt so domestic, so normal. It was the life I dreamed of. I loved the idea of getting together to share meals, Willow playing with the kids, maybe even our kids, while Molly nagged at Luca to quit bringing up work at the table. Ricky making stupid puns about every single dish he put in his mouth, like some sort of lame uncle. That was what I wanted.
That’ll never happen, Sandro.
I parted ways with Willow, with a kiss and a promise to see her soon, and then stood on the front stairs as she and Ricky drove away. The feeling was all too familiar. It was the same one teenage Alessandro felt every time Willow left for the day. Any time spent away from her was too much time.
Luca walked up and stood next to me. “You’ve got it bad, don’t you?”
“I don’t think I’ve ever wanted anything this badly,” I said. “All this shit we’ve gone through, and I think this may be the most difficult, and you know what the craziest part is?”
Luca shoved his hands in his pockets. “What?”
“I wish dad was here.” It felt weird to say it out loud. Of my brothers, I was probably closest to our father. Because I was willing to always give the benefit of the doubt, I was generally the only one who saw his human side.
“For as much of an ass as he was, it did sometimes feel like he had all the answers,” Luca responded. “But, you know, he’s not here. We’ve gotta figure it out.”
I imagined Willow heading back to California and me never seeing her again. “Yeah. I know.”
17
Willow
At the end of week three of still being in Philadelphia, my mom finally came back from her vacation. She was reticent regarding my still being there when she got home and started awkwardly floating around me, randomly asking questions to try and ignite conversations with me that I had no interest in having. As a result, I’d started spending more and more days at Alessandro’s house instead of my own. It made me uncomfortable to be there, considering I was in the thick of it whenever I was there, but as long as I could be somewhere where I couldn’t actively see or hear it, I could pretend it didn’t exist.
Ricky would come around often, as well, and I could see from how comfortable he was walking in and out of the house he must have spent a lot of time there before I came to Philly. Often, I would be in the middle of spending time with him, playing chess, which was his favorite game, or hearing about the dates he was going on while I was there, and then he would get called away by Luca, Alessandro, or Gabriel to go work on business. It annoyed me, but I tried my best to take it in stride. Sasha’s words centered themselves in my mind. Don’t think, just do.
I worked as best as I could, especially when neither Alessandro or Ricky was around. I took breaks and spent time with Anna and Antonio and got to know Molly a little bit more, but I was shocked to learn that she was deeply involved in the organization, as well. She’d become known as Queen Molly for her control over certain aspects of the business. She could be as ruthless and cutthroat as the rest of them. She told me about the importance of making sure everyone knew that she was a dominant, active member of the family, not just Luca’s wife. It actually made me think a little bit, hearing how drastically her life had changed all because of one thing, but to say she met the challenge head-on would be an understatement. She was a badass and wasn’t around to be shuffled along. In many ways, Molly Varasso was the most powerful of them all.
I was in a tailspin of emotions. Whenever we were sitting down to a meal or doing something domestic and simple like game night, I was willing to jump on board. I loved it. I loved going to sleep with Alessandro at night and waking up next to him in the morning. I loved sitting out in the beautiful garden to work when it was warm enough, occasionally looking up to see one of the Varassos or Ricky carrying me out a glass of lemonade or coffee. I was quickly developing an affection for Anna and Antonio, who regularly tried to convince me to abandon my day job and become their fulltime play-person.
When that was my reality, I was fine, but I was beginning to witness other things I did
n’t like to see. Luca, and even Molly on occasion, storming through the house with blood spatter on their clothes; Gabriel overseeing the discarding of weapons and other evidence that would link one of the Varassos to a crime; Alessandro rushing off upon the receipt of a phone call to stand outside of earshot of me, clearly agitated by his body language and movement. They were stark reminders that I wasn’t just hanging out at my boyfriend’s house. I was holed up in the epicenter of a mafia organization, working on my computer like it wasn’t all happening around me. The more I tried to ignore its existence, the more glaring occurrences I saw.
One day, it all melted down. The house was abuzz with something that all of the brothers and Ricky were looking into. They tried to keep the conversation away from me, but Luca exploded, saying that it was his house, and he would talk about his stuff wherever he wanted to. Once his temper was blown, he was on a tirade, storming through the estate, talking about how the Binachis needed to be aware of exactly how much power he had, and that if they wanted to fuck with his family, they would feel the consequences.
Alessandro came up to me in the throes of Luca’s fit and quietly told me to pack my stuff up. I did so quickly, and we left, heading to a nearby hotel. We checked into a nice room where Alessandro told me I could stay for the rest of the time I was there. I started to argue about the finances of it, but he cut me off with a kiss, begging me not to add any more stress to him. He’d feel better knowing I was there. It made me nervous that things were getting much worse within his family, as opposed to outside of it. Luca’s temperament made me afraid that the biggest risk to Alessandro was right in his own home.
To alleviate some of our collective stress, we went to the rooftop restaurant of the hotel, which happened to be one of the top five-star restaurants in the city. We picked a booth to squeeze into and sat as close as we could.
“I’m worried about you,” I told him. I traced the creases at the corners of his eyes, thinking that such a young man shouldn’t have crow’s feet already. “Luca’s volatile.”
“He was doing okay for a while there,” Alessandro said. “We’d had this really good conversation, and he actually admitted that we may be a little out of our depth. You know, we didn’t really have a choice in any of this. We were born into it like my dad was, and like his dad was. I think about Antonio and Anna, or even Amanda. Are we doomed to do this shit forever, until the world stops turning?”
“Amanda?” I asked.
“Oh, right,” I said. “Marco’s daughter.”
My jaw dropped. “Wait. Marco has a daughter? Where’s the mom?”
“They’re together, in…” He stopped short. “Nevermind.”
“No, it’s okay. Tell me. I know how I’ve been in the past, not wanting to hear about it at all, but it’s stressing you out, and it involves Ricky. I want to know.” I grabbed his hand and squeezed it in mine. “It’ll help to get it off your chest.”
I was terribly torn. On the one hand, I wanted Alessandro to feel like he could come to me about anything he had going on in his life. If it was stressing him out, I wanted to know about it. I wanted to be able to help. I wanted to be able to comfort him when things were going awry. That’s what relationships were about, being there for one another, in every sense of the word. But Alessandro’s world wasn’t one that I was okay with. The only way we were going to succeed as a couple was if I could successfully pretend that world didn’t exist. To remain uninvolved and go about my business as though he was only a guy with a tough job and a twisted family.
That was what he was, but not in the kooky, rom-com sense I was looking for.
Life would never be sunshine and roses, but the kind of mountains that I wanted us to overcome as a couple did not include regularly fearing that I’d get a call that my boyfriend was being carted off to a prison cell or a morgue. I didn’t want to bring children into the world and have to helicopter over them, not because I was a first-time mom trying to figure it out, but because at any time, a black car could drive by and open spray.
Alessandro looked at me, gauging me to make sure that what I’d said was true. I gripped his hand tightly. “I promise you can tell me. I’ll be okay.”
Could I balance the two? Supporting him and staying out of every other aspect of his life, or were we already doomed to fail?
Alessandro looked all around, checking for any listeners, and then moved even closer to me. “Marco fell for this girl at one of the restaurants we bought out to launder money through last year. She was a waitress there, and he completely flipped for her. He got all mixed up with her, and it turned out…her brother was a cop.”
“Holy shit,” I murmured. “Did he get arrested?”
“Yeah. She didn’t mean to do it, Kelly didn’t. She was dealing with pressure from multiple sides, and in the end, he got picked up. Neither of them even realized that she was pregnant at the time.” Alessandro tilted his head to one side. “Amanda, a little girl.”
“Wow. I’ve seen you with Anna and Antonio. It must kill you that you can’t see her,” I said.
“I hate it. We haven’t even been able to see pictures. Until he called me that first night I was with you, I hadn’t spoken to him in ten months.” Alessandro was poking at his food and seemed to be without much of an appetite.
Alessandro loved his brothers. That’s why when I’d originally presented him with an ultimatum, he picked the life instead. He knew turning his back on the organization meant turning his back on his family, and he couldn’t imagine doing that. Seeing it kill him to not have access to one of his brothers or his niece, it put it all into perspective. I was asking him to do the same thing I was mad at his family for asking my dad to do—turn his back on his family.
I feel like I don’t understand you as much as I should after all this time.
I had more to learn from Alessandro about how to love someone than he had to learn from me.
“When he called me that day, he told me that he got a postcard telling him to watch his back. It had no return address or postage on it, which meant not only did someone know where he lived, but they had been there personally to drop it. Not even we know where Marco lives, and Ricky is the only one in contact with him, and even they have to communicate at a scheduled time, and Ricky calls from a secured line at his office that shuffles both numbers.” He side-glanced me. “I’m sorry, I know it probably makes you anxious to know Ricky’s so involved.”
I nodded. “It does, but I’m glad he can still be a lifeline for you guys.”
Alessandro brought my head to rest on his shoulder and kissed my forehead. “Thank you. For dealing with some of this stuff with me. I love you.”
My heart filled at that simple little phrase that meant so much. He’d said it several times since we started seeing each other, but I still hadn’t said it back. I wasn’t sure if I should. If this plane was never going to get off the ground, was there even a point in putting on the seatbelt? I was content to continue being with Alessandro, where every day was new and uncertain. I didn’t want to think about it ending now, and I certainly didn’t want to think about it continuing.
Dinner bled into drinks, which flowed into breaking in the hotel bed in a way that lifted us both out of our holes of discomfort to a place where we both felt safe in each other’s arms. I didn’t know what the future looked like for us, but I was grateful for one more night to ignore it before I had to figure it out.
18
Alessandro
The sun was just starting to peek in through the open hotel curtains. I was glad I’d decided to bring Willow to a place where she didn’t have to deal with the riff-raff of my family and Luca’s temper. As soon as I’d gotten her to a point where she was comfortable coming over to the house and staying for long periods, he went and blew it all up, being a dick for no reason.
I could hear my phone singing a melody of text and call ringtones on the other side of the room, and at the last one, Willow started to shift next to me, the shrill tone creepin
g into her slumber.
I climbed out of bed as quietly and gently as I could and stepped across the room to my suit jacket. I reached in, grabbed my phone, and confirmed what I already suspected—all the calls and texts were from Luca. I pulled on a pair of pants, swiped a room key off the dresser, and stepped outside. I decided to head down to the main lobby, so as not to disturb any of the other hotel guests, and with luck, I’d be able to snag a coffee for Willow on my way back up.
I dialed the number and called Luca, my blood already turning to fire beneath my skin.
“Where the hell—”
“No, Luca, shut the fuck up for a second, and listen.” The other side went so quiet that I thought he hung up, but a quick look at my screen revealed that he hadn’t. “The way you behaved yesterday was totally out of control. I know that this situation is stressful for you, but it’s stressful for all of us. I finally fucking got Willow to be okay being around us again, and you go and haul off like you’re gonna kill her.”
“Sandro.”
“Shit, I mean, I thought you understood it. I get that you found Molly, and she’s all in, and Marco got to fucking jump ship and go be the Johnsons or whoever the fuck he is and live a happy life with Kelly, but Willow is my one joy. She’s it. The rest of this shit makes me feel like putting a bullet through my skull.”
“Alessandro.”
“We were doing so good for, like, three or four days. She was playing with the kids, we were having family meals, we were reminiscing about good times, and then all of a sudden, you fly off the handle and treat us like we’re the ones that did this shit. We didn’t do it!”
“Sandro. St—”
“All I wanted was some time to be with her with all of you guys and be normal for a little bit. Would it have been so hard for you to take that shit to your office, or not do it at all? All we’ve talked about for the past year is how much dad fucked all of us up by being the monster that he was. I mean, fuck, I respected the man more than any of you, and even I know that. Is that what you want for your kids? Do you want Antonio, twenty-five years from now, to be storming around his house, screaming at his wife, terrifying his kids, and abusing Anna’s boyfriend?”
