by Malena Lott
“She's sick,” T-Bone said as he walked away. Intrigued, I stuck my head in and saw that a girl was throwing up in the trashcan next to the bed. Da Vinci lay on the bed, in the position I was so familiar with: one arm on his belly, the other above his head, in a deep sleep.
I entered the room to help the girl. I held her hair as she threw up and helped her to the bathroom to wash her face. “Jell-O shots,” she said, clutching her stomach.
I 'd forgotten all about those lethal jiggly things. Jell-O was strictly a kids' thing in my world. “Guys use them to wear down your resistance,” I told her, thinking it didn't seem like da Vinci to get a girl drunk to take advantage of her. A girl didn't need to be inebriated to want da Vinci.
The girl studied my face, the color returning to hers. “I'm Cheyenne.”
“I'm Ramona.”
Cheyenne's eyes widened. “ You' re Mona Lisa?”
I could hear da Vinci begin to snore. “That's right. How did you know?”
Cheyenne rolled her small shoulders back. “Leo talks about you all the time.”
“He does? But I thought… well, you were in here with him.”
Cheyenne shook her head. “Oh, that. Sorry. Passed out. I'm with Pickler, but he's still out partying at the Phi Delt house. Leo and I are just friends. He's crazy about you.”
“He is?” I looked back and watched da Vinci's chest rise and fall, and longed to touch him. He'd been so distant lately, so not the guy that had strolled into my classroom two months before.
Cheyenne nodded. “Yeah. And you're even prettier than he said you were. Younger, too. Not that I really know any thirty year olds.”
“He said I was thirty?”
“Think so.”
Bless him. He gave me six years. Then again, he didn't even know my real age. The only time he'd spoken of our age difference was to say that it didn't matter. “So he's never been with a girl here? Even when he's drunk and not knowing what he's doing?”
“What? Oh, no. The girls try, but he says he's with Mona Lisa. He's kind of become the big brother of the house. All the guys look up to him.”
“Really? Because he's been skipping his English class and not showing up to work.”
Cheyenne shrugged. “Dunno, but he helped one guy move last week, and then he fixed the plumbing in the sorority house next door when they had a huge water leak in the middle of the night and then he's always studying. Frats call him Einstein, which is kind of funny, since I think the real da Vinci was a bigger genius than Einstein, but that's just my opinion.”
“So they mean it as a compliment? But what about his drinking? Doesn't he party all the time?” God, I wasn't sure if I sounded like his jealous girlfriend or his nosy mother.
Cheyenne closed the toilet lid and sat down. “No way. Said he learned his lesson after he peed in your new bed. He doesn't hold much back. But he worries about his frat brothers. Makes sure they're all safe before he goes home.”
“ My da Vinci does that?” My heart swelled with pride.
Da Vinci rustled and opened his eyes and leaned up on his arms. “Mona Lisa? Is that you?”
Cheyenne kept the washcloth on her forehead and left us alone. I sat on the edge of his bed. “It's me. I'm sorry I bothered you. I was just worried. I'll go.”
He grabbed my arm and pulled me down on top of him. “Don't go. I've missed you. I'm sorry I've been so busy. And as Americans say, a real prick.”
“ Cazzone,” I nodded. A prick I obviously couldn't stay mad at for long.
“Forgive me,” da Vinci said, then in one fell swoop, pulled the sweater off of me and kissed my black lace bra. I felt him stiffen underneath me, and I was instantly aroused. “Kiss me, Mona Lisa,” he said, and for the first time in my life, I made love to a frat boy in a frat house and did the walk of shame as the sun peeked over the horizon, yet I wasn't ashamed at all.
Chapter 18
“HOW'S DA VINCI?” MY sister asked as she stroked green eye shadow on Zoe's little lids the following Saturday. A dozen little girls and their pageant moms filled the brightly lit room a half-hour before the pageant was to begin.
“Da Vinci is…” I rolled the thought around, but wasn't sure what to say. One minute, da Vinci was the best thing that ever happened to me After, and the next… well, I wondered what the hell I was doing with him. I worried he was getting too serious and that I was incapable of being serious with anyone. I worried that my quest for fun had resulted in more than I'd bargained for. I worried my boys liked him even more than I did. I worried most of all that after so many months of not having anyone else in my life, my world was complicated by Cortland, Monica, and da Vinci, and I'd brought it all on myself.
Rachel peered into my eyes. “Earth to Ramona. The boys told me he sleeps in the house now. So this means you're moving on, right?”
I hadn't wanted the boys to know, but keeping it a secret and keeping da Vinci in the backyard like some sort of sex slave-as he'd put it-wasn't what I wanted, either. I'd taken Joel's clothes down from the closet, lovingly folded them, and put them away in a box. I wasn't ready to donate them by any means, but it was a start. Seeing a bare spot in the closet where his clothes had been made me feel strangely calm. I wouldn't have to look at things that he would never wear again.
Next I had cleaned out Joel's bathroom drawer, full of all the products that had kept him so put together: his hair gel, whitening toothpaste, the aftershave that turned me on with one whiff. I placed the aftershave in my own drawer and threw the rest into the trash. I doubted even Judith would want his cleaning products, but I wasn't about to ask, for fear she would reprimand me for tossing them out.
The act was liberating. I wasn't sure if my cleaning binge was because I was truly progressing or if it was a by-product of my nerves.
“Da Vinci is wonderful. I think he's acclimating well to American life.”
“ So not what I meant,” Rachel said, shaking her pinpoint straight hair. “I just want to know how you're acclimating together. Is this love or what?”
Da Vinci had told me he loved me again, this time as we were falling asleep, my back against his bare chest. (So much for my arm's length policy.) He had kissed my shoulder and said it clearly. In English. I pretended not to hear, and though many days I had wondered if a man would ever tell me he loved me again, I felt no urge to say it back. As a linguist, I am careful with word choice-sometimes too careful. I tend to want to correct people when they've said one thing, but really mean another. I had no way of knowing if da Vinci meant what he said, but as a woman with a broken heart, I am even more careful that my words don't come back to haunt me. If pressed, I would feel comfortable with the following:
I really, really, really like you.
I love making love to you.
I am extremely fond of you.
I adore you.
I care for you.
The sum of all of the above could equal love, but something didn't add up. I was just shy of being in love, but had no idea why. I knew I needed to tell da Vinci we should slow down, that I wasn't ready for anything serious, but I was afraid he wouldn't understand or that it would hurt his feelings unnecessarily. Just days before, I was certain he would dump me for a sorority girl. He was making such progress, and so was I. Why cause drama? Besides, he made me feel good again. That's what I'd wanted, wasn't it? La vita allegra. Joyful living, not drama. Not heartache.
Rachel had opened the door, so I took it. “And you and Cortland? What's the latest there?”
She only shrugged her shoulders and continued to pin Zoe's hair, causing her to flinch. Zoe's face reminded me of the sad blank eyes of a puppy in a dog pound, caged and hopeless.
“Well, I really like him,” I told her.
“I guess,” Rachel said. “What's not to like, right?”
I wanted to tell her that I'd really meant I like liked him, but then, I had only just admitted this to myself. I had romantic feelings for my sister's boyfriend. The kiss had been real and made m
e feel something I hadn't felt with da Vinci. If da Vinci was the fantasy, then Cortland was the reality. Not that I wanted something real. Real was scary. Real was heartbreaking. Real would cause me to become a Normal again, only to get my heart broken again after Cortland moved on to his next socialite. I had to confess about the kiss. Sisters should be honest, and I wanted to beat Cortland to the confession.
“Something happened the other day with Cortland,” I said tentatively, but my sister was in pageant zone.
“Zoe, I swear to God,” Rachel said, as Zoe dipped her chin down instead of holding it up like a mannequin so her mom could finish sticking, poufing, and spraying her hair.
I was frustrated enough to not give a damn how my sister took it. My anger had been building like a roller coaster charging up a hill, and I'd finally reached the crest. “How come you never listen to me? And aren't you tired of torturing Zoe? Can't you see she hates it?”
Rachel batted her long lashes at me and stared at her daughter, whose hair was now teased eight inches from her tiny head. “What do you mean? Zoe doesn't hate pageants. She just hasn't reached her full potential in them yet.”
“Zoe?” I asked. “It's okay to tell the truth. She's your mother. She'll love you no matter what.”
Poor Zoe shook her sparkly shoes and took a deep breath. “I hate pageants, Mommy. I hate them more than cleaning my room or picking up Princess's dog poop in the backyard.”
“Oh, you don't mean that,” Rachel said, shaking a comb at her daughter before turning to address me. “She doesn't mean that. She's just nervous is all.”
Zoe stood on her chair so she was face-to-face with her mother. She raised her little arms and screamed so hard, her little face brightened like a stoplight. “ I hate pageants! ” The moms in the rooms stopped coiffing their daughters and stared at Zoe as if she had cursed, but the girls began to giggle.
“Stop that right now,” Rachel said, grabbing her daughter. “Don't embarrass Mommy. Do you see what you've done, Ramona?”
“In your motivational speeches, do you not promote girls and women not trying to fit into the mold of what society or others think of them?”
“Absolutely! The women eat it up.”
“Well, if you mean that, then you wouldn't make Zoe do pageants.”
Zoe jumped into my arms and rubbed her face in my neck, smearing makeup all over my white shirt. “Look, if Zoe can't stand up for herself, someone's got to do it for her.”
Rachel forced a smile at the other moms and began gathering up her things. “Well, if you meant to humiliate me, congratulations. Pulling Zoe out at this late stage will make me look bad. Is that what you want? Zoe, you don't want to make Mommy look bad, do you? Look at Mommy's sad face.”
“Don't manipulate her like that. You're going to give her a worse complex than Mom has given us.”
“She hasn't given me a complex.”
“Only because you do exactly what she wants you to do.”
“Church? Big deal.”
“Dating Cortland.”
“Completely my decision. He's a doctor. And handsome.”
“Remember when you were in third grade and you wanted to play soccer, and Mom said it was only for boys, even though there were two other girls on the team? She made you take baton lessons instead.”
Rachel stuffed the curling iron in the bag, burning herself in the process. “Shit. Fine. I remember. Mom wouldn't let me play soccer, I hated baton lessons, I was the fattest girl on the squad and she wouldn't let me eat cookies after practice like the other moms did.”
Exasperated, she pulled a Hershey bar out of the bag and ripped into it, splitting it into two. Even my skinny sis needed her chocolate fix. She rolled her eyes back into her head. “Here, Zoe. Mommy's not mad. Let's eat chocolate, and all will be right in the world again.”
“Oh, that helps,” I said, taking Zoe with me to the restroom while Rachel went to talk to the judges.
Zoe thanked me with a kiss on the cheek. “Think she'll finally let me play soccer?”
“Maybe. We may have cracked her shell.”
“Mommy has a shell?”
“We all do, honey. We all do.”
“Will you wash my face off so I look normal again?” Underneath all that rouge and lipstick was a regular five-year-old girl. No wonder I identified so much with my niece: we both just wanted to be Normals.
In the car, Rachel's anger at me subsided after a phone call from her manager, telling her she was invited to a party in Los Angeles that weekend where A-list stars were expected to attend-a gala to promote fitness and nutrition for kids, though Zoe was currently eating a Hershey bar her mother had hoarded. “God, why did I eat that Hershey bar? Think you can watch Zoe for me? I'll just be gone from Saturday morning to Sunday afternoon.”
“Sure,” I said, looking back over the seat at Zoe sleeping in her booster chair. “After all, you're the one with the life, right?”
“Oh, crap,” Rachel said as she checked her Blackberry at a red light. “Cortland wanted to go out Saturday night.”
My stomach tightened. “Really?”
“Sounded serious, too. Think he'll ask me to move in with him?”
I had to blink back tears. “I don't know. Is that what you think? I didn't think you were that serious.”
“He probably likes me more than I like him, you know? But his house is gorgeous, isn't it? And it would be nice for Zoe to have a sister to play with.”
“Wait a minute. You'd just move in with him for his house? Are you insane?”
“Chill, sis. God, you make it sound like I'm committing a crime. I wouldn't be the first woman to shack up for prime real estate. Besides, I could grow to love him. Unless I meet Brad Pitt at the party this weekend. Think he and Angelina will stay together long?”
I dug my nails into the leather seat. “Did it ever occur to you that you should let him go so he can find someone that might like him as much as he likes her? That you could be standing in the way?”
“Don't be ridiculous. Who could he possibly like more than me? He has been acting awfully strange the last couple of weeks, though. He didn't even invite me back to his house after dinner at Monica's. Who in their right mind would pick going to bed early to get rested for a surgery over being with me?”
I laughed. Rachel believed it was because she was right, but I was laughing because Cortland was obviously very much in his right mind. What if he was going to break up with her on Saturday night?
“Rachel, there's something you need to know about Cortland.”
But she pulled into my driveway and put her index finger up- her sign to make me hold my thought. She began making a phone call. “Guess who's going to party with Leonardo DiCaprio this weekend?” she squealed into the other end.
I rolled my eyes and got out, my sister waving goodbye as she pulled down the drive, obviously not caring what I was about to confess. “I kissed your boyfriend,” I shouted in a big wave.
She rolled down her window, obviously not having heard me. “Love you, too, sis. I'll drop Zoe off Saturday. And let me know what I can bring for Thanksgiving dinner next week.”
Thanksgiving dinner at my house? I tugged at my coat and opened the garage door where I stared at Joel's tools, bike, and sports equipment cluttering half of the garage, with the other half full of holiday décor. A perfect way to spend my Saturday afternoon while my starlet sister was off to Hollywood.
“I'm home,” I sang as I entered the house.
“ Benvenuto, honey,” da Vinci said from Joel's den, which I decided I should refer to from now on as my den.
I found da Vinci bent over a stack of books, clearly tired. “I talked to Panchal,” he said. “Promised no more missing English class.”
“Good for you,” I told him, noticing how much his English had improved since he had joined the frat house. He had picked up slang terms, but he was much more conversational. I felt a pang of jealousy that I hadn't taught him, but then, every bird has to fly on
its own eventually. I hadn't instructed him to talk to Panchal. He had taken his own initiative. Maybe he was more responsible than I had given him credit for.
I left him to hang my coat in my closet and slip into more comfortable shoes, when I noticed Joel's side was no longer empty, but cluttered with a pile of clothes and a few hung shirts and jeans. Da Vinci had moved himself in. Without my permission.
I held onto the dresser drawer for support, my forehead perspiring. I couldn't blame him. After all, it was the next logical step. Just as Rachel assumed Cortland would ask her to move in with him, da Vinci had assumed he could move a few of his things into my closet. After all, he slept here nearly every night. What kind of a girlfriend would I be to make him traipse back and forth between the studio and the bedroom when he could just as easily keep his things close at hand in the closet?
I went back to the bathroom and opened Joel's drawer to find da Vinci's toothpaste, toothbrush, and cologne sitting inside. I didn't have the heart to tell da Vinci I didn't like his cologne, let alone the idea of him becoming a permanent staple in my bed. Did I?
“You can't be sick,” I moaned to Monica Friday evening. We had made plans to get a glass of wine, but apparently it doesn't mix well with cough syrup.
“It's these damn depositions,” Monica said, her throaty voice even sexier. “I always get sick around the holidays. I should just quarantine myself from November through January.”
My mom was already over, playing Scrabble with the boys. “Chicken soup, then?”
“I'm afraid I can't even lift my head off the pillow. It's that aching, stuffy-head, fever thing. I don't want to expose you and the boys.”
“Well, if it's that bad,” I said. Dammit. Dammit. Dammit. “We'll just have to get together after you're better.”
Monica coughed into the phone. “Gonna have to be after T-day. We're traveling to Missouri to be with Jonathon's family.”