Footsteps

by Susan Fanetti

  Elsa came to the top of the stairs as they entered the house. Once she was satisfied that only her people had come in, she huffed a weary greeting and then went back to Trey’s room.

  They went up, and Carlo went in to check on his boy. He was sleeping peacefully, his arms and legs wrapped around the big stuffed shark Uncle Ben and Aunt Angie had given him. There was a paper stuck on his new bulletin board, and Carlo went over and looked at it—his first school paper—a worksheet of some sort. Printed across the top was the title “I am Me,” which seemed to Carlo a pretty dumb title. There was a large oval in the middle of the sheet, which had obviously been blank when the papers had been handed out. Trey had drawn himself, using the oval as his head. In the background, around the head, he’d made several sharks, a big brown dog, and three stick people grouped together, one a female, with long brown hair, one a larger male, with black hair that stuck out oddly (thanks, Trey), and a small male with yellow hair. Behind that group of three were six others—four males and two females, with black or brown hair. His family.

  Under the drawings were several lines. The first line started with the printed words, ‘My name is….’ He’d written ‘Trey’ in fairly steady letters. Under that line was were four others, the first one of which started, ‘Things I like.’

  Trey liked, ‘SRKS,’ ‘LSE,’ and then a few lines that just weren’t letters, at least none that Carlo could make out. He chuckled and pinned the paper back in its place of honor.

  When he got back to his room, Bina was in bed. Her hair was loose, and she was naked, sitting up against the headboard, the comforter and sheet loose around her waist. Sweet Jesus, she was beautiful, her breasts full and tipped with dark nipples. The ends of her hair curled just at the point where her skin began to darken. He fucking loved finding her in bed like this, waiting for him.

  Carlo closed the door. “Hi, baby.”

  “Trey is asleep?”

  “Very.”

  She held out her hand. “Come to bed.”

  He stripped fast and went to her. As he climbed in at her side, she turned away from him and looked over her shoulder. Oh, yeah. It was wonderful to take her from behind like this, when he could get to all of her, fill his hands with her and make her feel him everywhere. With a growl rumbling deep in his throat, he pulled her down and shoved her leg up. He pushed into her slick, ready heat and then wrapped his arms around her, filling her, feeling full of her. He buried his face in her luxurious hair. And then he simply was still, letting them feel each other. She swelled in his arms with every breath.

  “I love you,” she whispered.

  He sucked lightly on her shoulder. “I’ll end my days making you happy. I swear it.”

  “And I you.” She rocked back, taking him more completely into her, and he groaned and thrust forward. They picked up a rhythm with which they had become expert together, and Carlo ran one hand over her firm belly and between her legs. She sighed deeply, erotically, and brought her arms up over her head, reaching back to bury her fingers in his hair and hold him close.

  They went slowly, feeling each thrust, each throb as a distinct moment. Carlo was completely at ease and at peace, at home in this house, in this bed, inside this woman. He buried himself in her and let that contentment, which he had not known before he’d known her, sweep him up in its wake.

  It was Bina who first changed their tone. He felt it happen, her body tensing, when before she had lain supple and open. Her breath changed, her deep, slow inhales becoming gasps that went out on little whimpers. He flexed the hand that had been gently cupping her sex, and the one that had tenderly held her breast, and she spasmed sharply. The time of languid coupling had passed. Without pulling from her, Carlo rolled, pushing her flat onto the bed, and then drawing her hips up as he rose onto his knees. Moaning, she pushed her elbows under to bring herself up higher.

  And then he fucked the daylights out of her, slamming into her in a growing frenzy. She grunted with each impact until she clutched a pillow to her face and screamed into it, her core closing so tightly around him that he thought the pressure would undo him completely. He came hard enough to find the limit of pleasure. And then he collapsed on her, and her knees gave. They landed in a tangled, wet heap.

  After a moment, Bina, still breathless, lifted her head and looked back at him. Her hair was over her face, but through that curtain he could see her sparkling eyes and lovely smile. “I like the way you make me happy,” she purred.

  He chuckled, feeling his cock thrum inside her, and kissed her nose. “Me, too.”

  ~ 26 ~

  A couple of days before Joey came home, Carlo, Luca, and John moved furniture around, setting up the guestroom for him so that he didn’t have to go up the stairs until he was stronger and had easier breath. Then Carmen and Sabina went about making the room pleasant and homey for him. He was still not strong enough to be on his feet for long, so he would, for a few weeks at least, be spending a lot of time within those walls.

  That day, while the men had gone en masse to the hardware store—Sabina had found it amusing that they’d all gone, when all they were after were anchors of some kind—the nurse therapist Carlo had hired part-time to take care of Joey came by, to give her approval of the way they’d set things up and to make suggestions about foods to have in the house, and a few other things. Sabina was shocked when she’d answered a knock at the front door and seen a slender, blonde, lovely young woman wearing navy scrub pants and a pretty, floral scrub top that had a wrap-around effect. Much prettier than the kinds of clothes Sabina expected nurses to wear. In fact, she didn’t see the outfit as anything but a pantsuit when she first opened the door.

  Dumbfounded, she simply stood there for a second, until the young woman, her hair done in a kind of elaborate ponytail, smiled and said, “Mrs. Pagano?”

  Sabina didn’t know how to respond to that. She wasn’t Mrs. Pagano. Not yet. Not for a while. “May I help you?”

  “Hi. I’m Louisa.”

  The name didn’t help Sabina identify her. She cocked her head.

  “Carlo hired me? I’m a nurse.”

  “Oh! Oh, apologies. Please, come in. I am Sabina.”

  When she turned and made way for Louisa to enter, Sabina saw Carmen standing at the end of the hall, near the staircase. Their eyes met, and Carmen rolled hers and then walked toward the kitchen.

  Sabina knew what Carmen was thinking; she herself was thinking it, too. If this lovely, young blonde was Joey’s nurse—Joey, who had his hands in a different girl’s clothes five days of seven—then…

  That thought died abruptly in Sabina’s head. Joey wasn’t the same as he’d been. She turned her attention to Louisa. “Joey isn’t home yet. He’ll be discharged the day past tomorrow.”

  Louisa smiled. “That’s fine. I told Carlo I’d like to see how things are set up before he gets here.” She examined the hallways critically. “Will he be using a wheelchair? These hallways are really narrow for that.”

  “No. He’s able to walk. Not for far. He has…a tank? Oxygen tank? On wheels. And, I think, a walking stick—just for steadiness. His legs are not hurt.”

  “Right. He’s aphasia and lung restriction.”

  The way she’d phrased that sentence bothered Sabina. “No. He is Joey. He has aphasia and restrictive lung disease.”

  Louisa smiled. “Yes, I’m sorry. Sometimes, when I’ve been studying a medical record, I get caught up in the terms. Of course. May I see his room?”

  Sabina took her on a tour of the first floor of the house and then the back yard. Carmen made herself scarce as Sabina brought Louisa into the kitchen; she wasn’t one to chat with strangers unless she felt it absolutely necessary. She shared that trait with her older brother.

  Louisa made some suggestions for groceries, fruits and high-protein foods to have in the house, and then, saying she’d be back about half an hour before Joey was due to be home, she left.

  As Sabina closed the door, Carmen materialized from some u
nknown point in the house. “I wonder how much of Carlo’s decision to hire her was based on the fact that old Joey would be diving straight into her little nurse pants.”

  “Wouldn’t that be cruel, though?”

  “Not cruel. Motivating.”

  Sabina didn’t think she agreed. She’d spent some time with Joey in the hospital, and he was very much changed. The cocky boy she’d met in May had been replaced by a hesitant, lost young man. He seemed often bewildered. It wasn’t that he couldn’t think as well as before—he was as sharp as ever. It was more like he couldn’t quite make sense of how his life had become what it now was. It made Sabina sad to see.

  She didn’t think a pretty blonde with a perky bottom and blue eyes would be motivating for Joey. She feared it would be the opposite. She hoped Carlo had not made this hiring decision on such flawed logic.

  But she had great hope that Trey would be motivating for Joey. Trey, as exuberantly young as he was, was an old soul. He healed, as if by magic. By his very presence he seemed to make sense of the world. He’d even healed himself.

  ~oOo~

  It was past dark before Joey made it home on the day he was released. Paperwork snafus and assorted incompetencies kept everyone waiting until the evening. Louisa had come and gone and called three times, but she was there when he arrived.

  He came in using the walking stick that Carlo Sr. had bought him—a tall, burled stick with a dragon carved into the head—and with Luca holding his other arm and dragging the oxygen tank behind him. Sabina knew he hated that thing fiercely. It made him feel like ‘some stupid old guy in saggy shorts and a humpback.’

  Carlo and their father came up behind, carrying Joey’s things. Carmen and John had been at the house, waiting with Sabina and Trey. Rosa, again, had elected not to join in the welcome. Again, her excuse had been school. She had only come home for a visit one time in the weeks that Joey had been in the hospital, and she’d only stopped in for a fifteen-minute visit when she had.

  Rosa’s behavior was a frequent topic of family conversation, but every discussion ended with what amounted to a group shrug. That’s Rosa for you, they all said. Sabina was growing irritated and impatient. Yes, Rosa had been neglected, in a strange, loving way, when Teresa died. And yes, Sabina thought she could see how it might have formed her into the young woman she was now. But this—what they were all doing now—was exactly the problem. No one held her accountable, and as a result, she was on the outside. The whole family had gathered, and where was Rosa? In her dorm at Brown. Family experiences were being had, and she was absent from them, just as she was all but absent from the hall of family memories.

  It was the same thing that Joey had experienced, though he had never left the fold. This love without support. This expectation without consequence. It had finally broken Joey, a little, at least. Sabina found it vexing. But she had said nothing so far. She wasn’t sure it was her place. And she was quite sure if she said anything directly to Rosa herself, it would be taken amiss.

  But Joey was home at last. The ride seemed to have tired him. He was pale, with a shine of perspiration over his forehead. Luca led him straight to the guestroom.

  Louisa was standing at the intersection of the front hall with the side hall. She smiled and said, “Hi, Joey. I’m Louisa. I’m going to help you out for a while.”

  Joey stopped and stared. After a couple of seconds, he said, “W-what?”

  From behind him, Carlo said, “She’s a nurse. Joe. I told you. I hired a nurse—just part-time, until you’re stronger.”

  “Y-y-you hired…that? …F-fuck…no!” He jerked his arm free of Luca and walked the rest of the way on his own, right past Louisa, not stopping when he bounced off the wall near the door to the room that was now his.

  Sabina bit back the urge to tell Carlo she’d told him so. She’d mentioned her concern the night after she’d met Louisa. Carlo had said that he’d simply hired the most qualified person, someone Natalie had recommended highly. She believed him. But he’d discounted her concern that Joey would be self-conscious in his weakness around such an attractive woman.

  Louisa, however, seemed unmoved. She followed right behind him. He told her to get out. She told him that he wasn’t her boss, and she needed him to sit and be quiet so she could get his vitals. He told her to get fucked. She told him that her plans later were none of his business.

  The whole family—except Rosa—was standing in the hallway. Carlo and his father still had Joey’s bags in their arms.

  Luca, at the front of the group, turned back and grinned. “Oh, this is gonna be fun. I might move in, too. Just for the show.”

  “Oh, no, you won’t,” Carlo Sr. groused. “Okay, people. Break it up. Where’s Trey?”

  Sabina answered that. “I put a movie on in the cellar for Elsa and him. I thought it would be better if he weren’t under foot—until Joey is ready, that is?”

  “Good thinking. Okay. Come on, let’s break up the traffic jam. The boy doesn’t need an audience.”

  ~oOo~

  That night, Sabina put Trey to bed while Carlo helped Joey get set up for the night. As they performed the nightly chore of picking up his toys and putting them away, Trey peppered her with questions.

  “What’s on his finger? It glows like Rudolph’s nose!”

  “That’s a machine that tells if Uncle Joey’s breath is getting all through his body.” She wasn’t sure how else to explain the ‘pulse-ox’ machine. But he was satisfied with all her answers.

  “Why is he sleeping downstairs? That’s not his room. He sleeps with Uncle John when he lives here.”

  “I think it makes him too tired right now to go up the stairs. The bedroom downstairs is easier.”

  “Mommy made a loud boom with a cowboy gun and Uncle Joey fell down and went to sleep. Do the stairs make him tired like that?”

  Her stomach clenched. She took his hand and pulled him to sit with her on his bed. “No, Trey. Not so tired as that.”

  “But she made him really tired.”

  “She did, yes. But he’s better. He’ll keep getting better.”

  “He wouldn’t read me a story. Is he too tired for stories?” He had wanted Joey to read his bedtime story, and he’d brought his book of shark facts downstairs in anticipation of it. But Joey, self-conscious of his struggles for speech, had told him no and sent him away.

  Perhaps Sabina had been wrong about Trey’s healing abilities. But it was still early.

  “I think today, yes, he was too tired for stories. But maybe not always. I would like to read you a story tonight. May I?”

  “Okay. Daddy and me stopped at G for Goblin Shark.” Trey sat up sideways on his bed and opened his big book of sharks at the place marked with a piece of folded blue construction paper. They got all the way to the Japanese Wobbegong before Trey’s eyes started to droop and Sabina closed the book.

  She got him tucked in and turned on his undersea projector. Then she kissed his forehead. “Goodnight, Trey. I love you.”

  “Love you, Misby.” His voice was faint, following him into sleep.

  Sabina blinked. Every time he called her that, her heart filled a little bit more. He’d said once that she was his. She felt that, too, that he was hers. She stood in the doorway and watched him settle totally, his room awash with fish swimming in blue light.

  Carlo was sitting in bed, working, when she went into their bedroom. It was their bedroom now; she thought of it only in that way. The only reason now that she had not given up her little attic was that they hadn’t had a chance to pack her things and move her out of it.

  He was wearing black boxer briefs and his glasses, and he had his laptop and papers, some of them large building plans, strewn across the comforter. He looked up as she began to change into a nightgown.