by L. D. Davis
“Massimo said Laura will come in July and Francesca might let Lucia come too.”
I gave her a small smile. “That’s good.” I glanced to the living room where Gavi was being attacked by his sisters. No one was crying yet and there was no bloodshed, so I didn’t intervene. “Gavin is going to be excited about Armano being close.”
“When will you tell him?”
“Soon. After the plans are firm.”
She suddenly looked mildly alarmed. “I should call Mamma. Not only is one more child moving away, but he takes grandchildren too.”
The Manginis were very tight as a family. Elena seemed to thrive off having everyone so near, even if it was chaotic at times. She must be devastated. I made a mental note to check up on her myself soon.
The whole situation was a lot to take in for me, so Tessa and Massimo were probably overwhelmed as well. I wanted to be able to help them where I could, but there was one thing that I just couldn’t accept. Maybe I didn’t have a leg to stand on in this regard, but I was going to make sure I shared my feelings on the matter with Marco.
I carried my empty teacup to the kitchen and went back to his office. I knocked twice and entered before he responded. He was at his desk, glasses on and eyes focused on the computer screen that was back to its usual place.
“Massimo wants to live outside the city,” he murmured. “I think I found a few places suitable for their needs.”
“I don’t want Celia to live in your apartment,” I blurted.
His head rose slowly. He stared at me for a few seconds before pulling his glasses off and resting them on the desk.
“It is not permanent. It is only until—”
“She will find a way to make it permanent. I don’t want her there, or on any property you personally own.”
He stared at me, bemused. “Why?”
I laughed cynically. “You have to ask? She did everything she could to come between us just so that she could have exactly what you are gifting her in a hand basket with bows and a welcome card. She wanted to come to America and reside under your roof. Maybe I’m being petty, but I don’t care. I don’t want her in that fucking apartment. I don’t want her to get exactly what she wanted.”
His eyes closed for a beat and he leaned back in his chair and regarded me patiently. “It is not exactly as she wants. It’s not under the circumstances in which she wanted.”
“It doesn’t matter. The end result is the same.” I hesitated, my eyes narrowing. “Unless, that’s what you want.”
“Exactly what is it you believe I want, Lydia?” His tone of voice was soft, but dangerous, and reminded me of a calm before a shit storm. It made me pause before answering.
“Maybe you want her to be here just as much as she wants to be here,” I said, my voice just as soft as his.
There was silence, a heavy silence that draped over the entire room. I couldn’t even hear the kids in the other room. I barely breathed as we stared at each other. I knew by coming to him about this would only muddy our waters that much more. After the distance I’d kept between us for months, I didn’t have a right to make such demands.
“Do you want me?”
The question was asked so quietly, I wasn’t sure I’d heard him correctly.
“What?”
“Do. You. Want. Me.”
My hands began to shake. I crossed my arms to hide the trembling. “I don’t know what you mean.”
“You do know what I mean, but I will spell it out for you. Do you want to be with me? Do you want to be in a relationship with me again? Are you ready to drop your defenses and your pride and love me, for real this time?”
“I…I loved you for real before,” I said weakly.
“If you did, we wouldn’t be in this place we are in. Are you ready to do it now?”
I bit my bottom lip, too afraid to say yes, and too afraid to say no. So, I said nothing, and just stood there, looking at him. My silence hurt him more than anything I could’ve said, though. It showed on his face for a flash. Heartache, pain, disappointment.
He cleared his throat and asked, “But you don’t want Celia to have me?”
“No,” I admitted in a whisper. “I don’t want her to have you.”
His chest rose and fell slowly as he sighed deeply. “So, you are content to leave me in this limbo? Alone, unable to move forward or even sideways, only to exist at your mercy.”
“That’s not—” I didn’t get to finish my sentence.
Abruptly, he stood and interrupted in a loud, harsh tone. “I have not spoken to Celia since the night before I left Italy, and I have no plans to do so in the future. I made it clear to her that I did not want anything else to do with her. I refuse to be a part of her games any longer, and I am not going to play yours either, Lydia. I love you, and I would give up almost anything for you, but not my dignity. It is all I have left.” He turned his back on me and began jamming items into his bag. “I am going to the city. I have a lot of work to do, so I will not be back until the weekend.”
I stood there, shell shocked and eyes burning with unspent tears. Marco looked over his shoulder, looked me up and down like I was disgusting.
“I will find somewhere else for Celia to live.” When I still did not move or speak, he waved me away. “You can go now.”
Like a machine, I turned stiffly, and left his office. Ignoring my kids and Sofia’s chatter on the phone, I went upstairs to my room, and let the tears come. I was as sure as I was about my own name that my relationship with Marco was over for good, and the thought tore me to pieces.
Chapter thirty
“You have a few screws loose.”
“You’re a bone doctor, not a psychiatric doctor. You can keep your opinions on my mental health to yourself.”
“No,” Adam said slowly. “I mean you have a few screws loose. In your femur.”
I sagged. “Oh.”
“That’s why you’ve been in so much pain lately.” He pointed to an x-ray that was on display. “This screw here and this one both moved since your last x-ray in the fall.”
“Did they move because of the physical therapy and all the activity I was doing?”
“Maybe that helped them along, but here are the imaging results from your previous ortho before I met you.” He pointed to another display. “Between this one and the one you had in the fall, I can see the screws have moved. Sometimes that happens in patients, but it’s minimal enough that there is no further damage and doesn’t cause a problem. However, you excel at the dramatics, therefore your situation is dramatic.”
I gave him a dry look. “Is that your professional diagnosis?”
“Yep.”
“And the solution is…”
“Surgery. If you weren’t knocked up, I would start preop procedures today. Right now, it’s causing you a great deal of pain and irritating the bone, but it isn’t an emergency situation, yet.”
My eyes narrowed and my heart rate kicked up. “What would constitute as an emergency?”
“If it becomes infected, which is a possibility in these situations. An infection can be dangerous to you and the babies. Hey, are you about to cry?”
He looked at me warily, like I was a bomb about to explode. Indeed, I was about to cry.
“Hormones,” I sniffled and placed my hands protectively over my belly.
“Hey,” Adam said soothingly and placed his hands over mine. “It’s okay. I am not telling you any of this to scare you. I want you to be aware of the possibilities, and to know what signs and symptoms to look for. I want you to take it easy. No dancing or Chuck Norrising anyone. Once you evict those two little parasites from your womb, we will discuss surgery. Until then, just do everything I say like a good girl and everything should be fine.”
He handed me a few tissues and watched me with concern as I wiped tears off my cheeks and blew my nose.
“What else is going on? How are things between you and Marco?”
The question made the tears f
all faster. I shook my head and wiped them away, but it was useless because they kept coming. “Not good. He’s been staying in the city during the week. We didn’t talk much before, but now we can go days without speaking.”
Less than an hour after I confronted him about moving Celia into his apartment, Marco went to the city and didn’t come home again until Friday afternoon. The following week was the same. He told me he was staying there because he was too busy to commute back and forth, but I knew it had more to do with me than his job.
Adam leaned against a counter and crossed his legs and arms. “Celeste and I had dinner with him last week. He was distracted and didn’t talk too much to us either. You know my girlfriend. She called him out on it and he just said that he was distracted by work. So, it probably isn’t you, Elizabeth Wakefield.”
I sniffled again. “Actually, Elizabeth Wakefield was the least likely candidate to be involved in the Sweet Valley angst. Also…it is me.”
Tearfully, I told him about the heated discussion I had with Marco a few weeks ago, and how the next day he didn’t come back from the city, beginning the new arrangement we were in.
“And you know what? He isn’t wrong, about any of it. I won’t give him a chance at all, and Gavin wasn’t the only problem in our marriage. I was fifty-percent of the problem.”
“But it isn’t quite the same. What Marco did was very hurtful, and you already had trust issues because of your marriage, and he knew that. His relationship with Celia was the main reason you two split the first time, and he didn’t learn from that. He allowed it to happen again. You aren’t wrong for having trouble digesting that.”
“I know I’m not wrong, but that doesn’t make any of this right. Honestly, Adam, I want to forgive him. I want to be with him, but I don’t know how to let go of this pain he gave me. I don’t know how to take that first step to trust him again, and I don’t know how to stop feeling so angry.” I said the last part while clenching my fist and teeth.
He offered me more tissues and with a gloved hand, threw the others away. Thankfully, he gave me a couple minutes to cry hard and then calm again. Once I did, he considered me carefully, making his brow crease. I almost laughed to myself because for once he looked like a serious doctor with his serious face and his white coat.
“If you want him, Lydia, and you love him, then I don’t know why we are wasting time having this conversation. Woman up. Stop crying about it and fix it. You won’t get anywhere just letting things go on as they are just because you don’t know how to proceed. Not knowing how isn’t a reason, it’s a lame ass excuse losers use to justify their failings. You did this once already, didn’t you? You let life happen to you instead of being the one to make life happen. Maybe Marco didn’t initially learn from his first mistakes, but you haven’t learned either. You are both morons, so you are made for each other.”
I was still crying. At the same time, I was glaring at my friend, even though I was somewhat smiling.
“With advice like that, you could blow ‘Dear Abby’ out of the water.”
He shrugged. “Just keeping it real, Willow Rosenberg.”
“I am deeply disturbed by your knowledge of all things teenage angst.”
He reminded me of just how handsome he was with his big smile. “Okay, okay. Back to business. I need to get you out of here. You aren’t the only patient I have today. Sadly, you probably won’t be my last sobbing mess either.”
Later when I went to Marco’s apartment, I hesitated before putting my key in the lock. He was supposed to meet me for an ultrasound in the morning, but that was in Jersey. He wasn’t expecting me in New York. What if I was unwelcomed?
I rested my head on the door. If I were unwelcomed, he would’ve taken back his key or given me some indication that I wasn’t allowed there anymore. There was only one way to find out. With a deep breath, I stood up straight, and slid my key in the lock.
When I carefully entered the apartment, I let my eyes travel across the space. Although I hadn’t been there since I came back from Italy, Marco and Sofia had brought the kids into the city twice since our move, and there were signs of their presence everywhere. A Lego creation of Gavin’s sat on the coffee table. A laundry basket with toys sat against the wall just inside the door. On the floor beside that was a pair of Cora’s shoes. I blinked in surprise when I saw some of the artwork had been replaced by framed pictures of my kids. Recognizing some of the backgrounds, I knew they had just been taken with his phone, but with the frames and some cropping and editing and a few filters here and there, they were beautiful.
I closed and locked the door, and after gazing at the pictures for a few minutes longer, I slowly made my way into the master bedroom. The last time I was there, I’d destroyed the closet. I’d thrown almost everything on the floor in a fit of rage. It would’ve been easy for him to put it all in trash bags and haul it away, but when I opened the door and turned on the light, there wasn’t anything on the floor. The clothes weren’t hanging as orderly as they had before, grouped by color and type, but they were hanging up, nonetheless. The shoes were on a rack, and when I pulled open a couple drawers, undergarments were folded neatly inside.
When I left the closet, I let my eyes travel over the room. It was clean apart from several items of clothes that somehow missed the hamper and lay across it or on the floor near it. The bed wasn’t made, and I could see the outline of where his body had lain. On his bureau, tucked into the lower left corner of the mirror, was a photograph of me, Gavi, Cora, and Mandy at the zoo. It was taken last year when Marco and I first started dating. I’d forgotten about the existence of the picture, and I knew, like the photos in the living room, it hadn’t been there during my last visit.
Staring at the picture, I sat on the edge of the bed. That day was the first time I had literally felt swept off my feet. While we’d been getting the kids loaded into the car, a group of flirty housewives out on their morning power walk approached, smiling and grinning at my boyfriend, batting their mascara caked lashes. I’d prepared myself, knowing they would stop as usual. Marco often chatted with them and got them all giddy. Instead, he had pulled me close to his body. His big hands had cupped my face and neck and he’d kissed me like no one else was there. He’d kissed me like the Power Walkers, the rest of the neighborhood, and even the kids weren’t there to witness it.
I touched my smiling lips in remembrance, but then frowned as I wondered if I’d ever again have kisses like that one.
Sitting there wondering wasn’t going to get me anywhere. I had to be proactive, even if it didn’t end in my favor. I sent him a text message. There was no sense in settling in for the rest of the day if he wasn’t going to be receptive to my presence.
“Hi. I’m in the city. Had to see Adam and met with Hadley. I think I’ll stay and ride back with you for the appointment in the morning if that’s ok. Did you have plans for dinner tonight?”
I watched the dots float up and down while I waited for him to answer. The dots stopped and started several times over the next two minutes. I knew he was debating how to respond to that question. Knowing that he had to think so hard about it hurt but I understood his hesitation.
Finally, his message came through.
“That’s ok and I have no plans.”
I blew out a nervous breath and texted back. “Will you have dinner with me tonight?”
This time it took him almost ten minutes to answer, and I knew it was because he had to think about it. Those dots kept popping up and going away the whole time.
“Yes.”
It was after seven when he came through the door. He was in snug khaki pants, a form fitting white button up, and a navy peacoat. There was about a week’s worth of beard on his face and he wore his dark rimmed glasses instead of contacts. His hair was slightly mussed from the wind that swept between the buildings and down the city streets. He looked like a hot professor, especially with his messenger bag brief case hanging on his shoulder. To make matters worse—or
better—as soon as he pulled that coat off, I could smell him, his cologne, shampoo, and body wash all mixing with his natural scent.
I stood in the kitchen, staring at him but trying not to while he hung up his coat. Damn he was a beautiful man.
“Hello,” he said, throwing me a glance.
“Hi.”
He walked toward me and stopped on the other side of the breakfast bar. We stared at each other in silence for another half minute before I softly and dumbly repeated my greeting. One corner of his mouth lifted slightly.
“Hello again.”
I finally dropped my gaze with a short laugh and went back to my task. “I hope you weren’t expecting a deluxe meal. Turkey and cheese sandwiches and potato chips is as good as it’s going to get tonight.”
“You know I am not finicky.”
“I wanted to be Martha Stewart and make you a nice meal that looks like food porn, but I couldn’t decide what to make.”
I pushed my hair behind my ear and glanced up just in time to catch him following that action carefully. Something about that made my heart skip a beat before it sped up. I wanted to feel his fingers on my cheek and neck like before when he used to push my hair back for me.
“How was your meeting with Hadley?”
“Quick. Basically, she threw a whole bunch of crap in my arms, told me to look it over and she’d be in touch. I did read some of it this afternoon. I don’t know how involved I can get with this planning committee. I’m already halfway through the pregnancy and then there will be diapers to change and chaffed nipples.”
His brows rose. “Chaffed nipples?”
“It happens. Anyway, shockingly, I am interested.”
“Last year you would have wanted nothing to do with it,” he pointed out.
Again, I shrugged. “Things change.”
He picked up the pile of mail I’d retrieved earlier and began to look through it. “Did you see Adam professionally today or was it a social visit?”
“Professional, but it’s unlikely he calls his other patients morons to their faces.”
He gave me a bigger smile. “You have a good friend.”