by JM Darhower
Dominic got home a few minutes later and looked at Carmine with confusion. “Where's your car, bro?”
Carmine smirked. “Dad traded with me so Haven could drive.”
“She drove? And the car’s still in one piece?” He glanced out the window. “Okay, well, you obviously clipped something.”
“It was a mailbox,” Carmine said. “I freaked her out a bit. I’m not exactly the most patient person on the planet.”
“You got that right. But why would Dad ask you? Did he want his car to be destroyed?”
Carmine shook his head. “I don’t know, but it was a disaster. I’m lucky she didn’t kill me with the way she was running red lights and stop signs.”
“I didn’t run any stop signs,” she said.
“Stop sign, yield sign—same difference. They both mean you’re supposed to slow the hell down in case something’s coming, which you clearly didn’t do.”
“There is a difference. One you stop at, no matter what, and the other you slow down in case something’s coming, right?”
He sighed. “Like I said, it was a disaster.”
“That was probably the point,” Dominic said. “Anyone with half a brain could see throwing you two in a car together without any mishaps is impossible. He could’ve done it himself, so why ask the one person guaranteed to fuck it up? No offense.”
They were all quiet for a second before Carmine spoke. “Whatever, I’m not playing his games.”
Haven heard a car approaching and glanced over to the window, watching the Mazda pull up outside. Dr. DeMarco stepped out with some boxes of pizza. “He’s home.”
The front door opened, and Carmine sighed exasperatedly as he let go of her. Dr. DeMarco walked into the kitchen and lay dinner on the counter before glancing at Carmine, a light groan escaping his throat. It was barely audible, and Haven looked at Carmine with uncertainty, seeing he was sipping from his glass of Cherry Coke.
“Do you have my keys, son?” he asked. Carmine pulled them out, and Dr. DeMarco exchanged keys again. “I have some things I need to take care of tonight, so I won’t be back until tomorrow.”
He headed for the door again before any of them could react. Dr. DeMarco walked to his car, pausing at the passenger mirror. It had a long scratch dug into it, noticeable against the shiny black paint. He turned his head slowly toward the house, his eyes coming to rest on Haven at the window. She worried he’d come back inside, but he just climbed into the car and drove away.
Haven sighed, turning to Carmine once Dr. DeMarco was gone. “I think I want to go upstairs now.”
“Alright, we can do that,” he said, snatching the top box of pizza. “I can still get fucked up, right?”
She smiled at his expression. His lips were turned down into a childish pout. “Of course you can.”
“And you’re still gonna drink with me, aren’t you?”
“If that’s what you want.”
“I wanna do everything with you,” he said. “Even shit we’d probably be better off not doing together.”
“Like driving?”
He laughed. “Yes, driving. So let’s get smashed and forget you nearly killed me today trying.”
* * * *
Haven brought her cup to her lips cautiously and took a sip of the sweet fruity drink. The alcohol taste lingered in the background, not so bad that it hindered the taste. “This is good. What is it?”
“Sweet-Tart. You know—orange soda, kool-aid and Everclear.”
Haven didn’t know, but she liked it anyway. She took another drink as Carmine laughed. “What do you wanna do while you’re still coherent, hummingbird?”
“What is there to do?”
“We can play a game or something.”
“Like 21 questions?”
“No, I think we’re past that. We have some board games around here, or we could play a card game. There’s always drinking games, but I don’t think you need any help getting drunk.”
He glanced at her, raising his eyebrows, and she pulled her already half-empty cup from her lips. “It tastes good.”
Grabbing his bottle of liquor, Carmine took a drink. He was shirtless, and Haven was captivated by the way his stomach muscles grew taut as his body quivered. He scratched the scar on his side, and she was transfixed by his hand. It was rough and calloused from playing football, but it was strong, his fingers long and lean.
Carmine cleared his throat, and she glanced up. He’d caught her ogling him. “I know what we can play,” he said.
“What?”
He held up a finger, silently telling her to wait, and crouched down to look under the bed. He started digging out boxes and glanced inside of them before shoving them back under. He finally found what he was looking for and pulled out a gray game console and a controller.
“What is it?” she asked as he hooked it up to his television.
“It’s the original Nintendo. Kept it from when I was a kid.”
“And we’re going to play it?”
“We’re gonna try.” He blew into a game before sliding it inside the console, turning it on as he glanced at the screen. It started up right away as he sat down on the floor, stretching out his legs and patting the space between them. “Come here. Let me teach you how to do this.”
She sat down carefully between his legs, and he held the controller in front of her to explain the buttons. She watched as he played the first board. “What’s this game called?”
“Mario. It's like a rite of passage. You’re nobody until you’ve conquered it.” His tone was serious, yet youthful and innocent. It made her smile. “Here, finish this part.”
She took the controller. “But what if I kill him? He can die, right?”
“He comes right back to life. It’s not like we’ll have to plan a funeral or anything.”
She turned back to the television. It took her three tries to get the coordination going to get him to jump over things, but she eventually got the hang of it. Carmine grabbed their drinks and sat back down behind her, pulling her body against his chest.
The next few hours passed as they fell into a cycle. She’d kill the character, and Carmine would complete a level so she could try the next one. Haven could feel the alcohol in her system, her limbs tingly and head foggy. She found it nice, the two of them doing something so carefree. She never got those types of experiences before. He was giving her parts of a life she missed out on.
She was playing a board with a bunch of turtles when Carmine nuzzled into her neck. Distracted, she ran the character right off a ledge. He chuckled as she shrugged and tossed the controller down.
“Does my drinking bother you?” Carmine asked, taking a swig from the bottle of vodka.
“You don’t drink enough for it to bother me,” she said. “You aren’t a mean drunk like Master Michael. The more alcohol he drank, the worse the punishments got.”
“I’d like to kill that guy,” Carmine said. “You don’t know how bad I want him to suffer for what he did to you.”
She shook her head. “You can’t do that.”
“Why not? You can’t seriously care about him.”
“I don’t care about that man, but I do care about you. I don’t want you to hurt people anymore. I don’t want you to be a killer.”
Carmine pulled her back to him tighter, kissing the top of her head. “You know, I never knew what I wanted out of life. Going to Chicago always made the most sense, but now that I have you in my life, I’m starting to see it differently. What you want matters, so if you don’t want me to do that shit, then I have to really think about it. It’ll be your life, too, and you mean a lot more to me than any of them.”
She smiled as his words washed through her, but her relief was dampened when he continued. “Maybe we should just go. I’ll find a way to block your chip, and we’ll just take off.”
“No, I don’t think we should,” she said. “I don’t want you to have to leave everything behind.”
“If that�
�s what you want.”
She nodded. “I just want no problems for awhile.”
“We’ll stay put then,” he said, pausing before adding, “for now.”
He started taking the game apart, and she watched as he put it back into the box. “I wondered what was in those.”
“It’s where I keep the old me,” he said. “Everything I kept from Chicago is in these boxes.”
She sat down on his bed with her drink as he pulled out a smaller box and took off the lid. It contained mostly papers, and he dug through the stack briefly before pulling out a black picture frame. He held it out to Haven. She took it carefully, glancing at the picture. Her gaze came upon a woman with bright red hair, eyes the same color as Carmine's.
Haven felt like she couldn’t breathe. She recognized the woman, the vision of her heartbreakingly familiar. It was a face Haven had seen repeatedly in her dreams, the angel in white that glowed in the sunlight.
Haven was so overcome with emotion that she hadn’t noticed Carmine crouched down in front of her until he placed his hand over the picture.
Haven’s voice came out as a broken whisper. “She’s an angel.”
Carmine went rigid. “What did you just say?”
She hesitated. “She looks like an angel.”
His posture relaxed as he took the frame from her. Instead of placing it back into the box, he set it on his desk. “She is an angel,” he said quietly. “Now, anyway.”
Dreams filtered into Haven’s sleep that night, interrupting her slumber. It was a dark, cloudless night, the glow of the moonlight illuminating the scene playing in her mind. She was back in Blackburn again, a fresh-faced little girl with nappy hair, trying to squeeze by to see out of the stables. “What's going on out there, Mama?”
“Nothing that concerns you, baby girl,” Her mama said quietly as she tried to shoo Haven away. “Go lay down.”
“But I'm not tired,” Haven argued. “Please, Mama? I want to see.”
“Nothing's happening,” she said. “It's all over.”
Haven gave up on trying to go around, instead getting on the ground and scurrying between her legs to see out into the night. She could faintly make out the outline of a car with the trunk open. On the ground beside it, lying still, was a person. “It's Miss Martha!”
“Hush,” Her mama said. “You don't want them to hear.”
“Sorry, Mama.” Haven tried to whisper, but she couldn't help herself. She watched as Miss Martha was placed into the trunk, her eyes closed like she was sleeping. “Where's Miss Martha going?”
“Away from here,” Her mama answered.
“What's away from here?”
“A lot,” she said. “There's a whole world out there.”
“Is Miss Martha going out there to the world?”
She shook her head. “Miss Martha's gone to Heaven.”
“What's Heaven?”
Her mama sighed. “Heaven is the greatest place you can imagine. People don't hurt anymore when they go to Heaven. There's peace there. It’s beautiful. Everyone’s beautiful.”
Haven smiled excitedly. “Will I get to go to Heaven?”
She nodded. “Someday an angel will come to take you away.”
Suddenly the darkness erupted in blinding light. Haven shielded her eyes. She could feel the sun burning her as she ran, air hitting her sweaty skin and cooling her off. She was pretending to fly, like Miss Martha did to Heaven the night before, and slammed into something in her path.
Falling to the ground, she could barely make out the form in the blinding light. She was confused until a soft voice shattered the silence. “You’re awfully dirty, little one.”
The blindness cleared as the form knelt down to look at her. Sheer beauty, love and compassion. Up until then, Haven hadn’t seen an angel, but she was sure one had come.
* * * *
Carmine rolled over and reached out, searching for Haven in the bed beside him. He didn't feel her and opened his eyes, seeing nothing but blanket where her sleeping body should’ve been. Sitting up, he heard a shuffling as Haven walked over from the other side of the room. She slid back into the bed without a word.
He pulled her toward him. “What were you doing out of bed?”
“I couldn’t sleep.”
“What’s wrong?”
“Nothing.”
He sighed, too tired for guessing games. “How about I ask again, and you tell me the truth this time?”
“What do you mean?”
“I mean I know you pretty well by now. Something’s on your mind.”
She lay still for a moment, so motionless Carmine wondered if she’d fallen asleep.
“Now’s not the time,” she said, rolling over to face him.
“Now is the time,” he said. “What’s wrong?”
There was a flash of panic in her eyes. He could tell her mind was working fast for a way out of the conversation. He took a deep breath and brushed some wayward hair out of her face.
“La mia bella ragazza. Non capisco,” he said. “Tanto gentile e tanto onesta pare la donna mia.”
A small smile appeared on her lips. “What does that mean?”
“So kind and so honest my lady appears to be,” he said. “It's a line from Dante’s La Vita Nova. Poetry, I guess.”
His brow furrowed—when did he start quoting poetry?
“That’s sweet,” she said. “Do you know more?”
He shook his head. “I’m too tired to remember that shit.”
“We should go back to sleep.”
“No, I wanna know what’s on your mind,” he said. “I won’t flip out. All I know is wherever you are, I’m gonna be, because we belong together. We’re like two peas in a pod. Like peanut butter and jelly, or macaroni and cheese.”
He was half-asleep and probably still drunk, so he wasn’t sure if that made any sense.
“You mean like spaghetti and meatballs?”
He smirked. “See, you know what I mean. We’re like milk and cookies.”
She laughed. “Salt and pepper, or chips and dip.”
“Yeah, and it’s gotta be ripple-cut chips and French onion dip.”
“Finicky.”
“Whatever, it’s just a fact of life,” he said. “We’re like questions and answers. What good is a fucking question without an answer?”
“You’re the missing mate to my sock.”
He shook his head—only Haven would incorporate laundry into it. “I’ll be that. Socks are useless on their own, unless you only have one foot.”
“Bert and Ernie?”
“Shit, that’s a good one. You watch Sesame Street?” She smiled sheepishly, shrugging. “Well, there you go, we’re Bert and Ernie. How about Bonnie and Clyde?”
Her brow furrowed. “Who are they?”
“Don’t ask,” he muttered, pausing. “Where were we going with this again?”
She lay there, gazing at him. “I don’t remember. We should just probably get some sleep.”
Chapter 28
The room was encased in bright light when Carmine woke up. His head pounded, his eyes burning. He blinked a few times as he sat up, realizing he was once again alone.
Stretching, he popped two Tylenol to squelch the hangover before strolling out of the room. As soon as he reached the second floor, his footsteps wavered when Haven stepped into the hallway with his father. Her eyes met his the same time Vincent noticed him standing there. “Do you need laundry done, Carmine?”
He shook his head. “Why?”
“Two days in a row you’ve walked around the house with barely any clothes on.”
Carmine looked down at himself. “My, uh… goods are covered.”
“Well, I’m glad at least that much has sunk into that thick skull of yours over the years.”
He chuckled. “What, do you think you’re too young to be a grandfather?”
“As a matter of fact, yes,” he said. “I’m only forty-one, and seventeen is too young to make life de
cisions. But frankly, I'm just as worried about you picking up something as I am about you impregnating someone. For a while, every time you said the words, ‘what’s this?’ I feared you exposing yourself to show me something suspicious.”
Carmine laughed. “Well, thanks for the concern, but I assure you my dick's in fantastic shape.”
Vincent shook his head as he glanced at Haven. “You’re excused, child. I’m sure you have things to attend to.”
She practically bolted for the steps as Vincent turned back to Carmine. “Go get dressed.”
“Didn’t we just go through this? It’s not like I’m indecent.”
“I didn’t say you were indecent. I do hate that ink on you, though. I wish I knew which parlor you went to, so I knew who to blame for marking my teenager.”
“Yeah, well, they thought I was twenty-one. Besides, I like my tattoos. I was thinking about getting another.”
“Not until you move out of my house.”
“If you say so. You’re the boss around this motherfucker.”
“You’d do well to remember that, son,” he said. “And stop cursing so much. It sounds ugly.”
“You curse.”
“Rarely, and your mother hated it. How do you think she’d feel hearing you right now?”
“Are you seriously gonna stand there and talk to me about how my mom would feel about what I do? How about what you do?”
He ignored that. “Are you going to get dressed? You can run around the house like that but not out in public.”
“Public? Where are we going?”
“I have a free day, so I figured we could go shooting.”
He gaped at him. “Vincent DeMarco cleared his schedule to spend time with little ol’ me?”
Vincent sighed. “Go before I change my mind.”
Chuckling, Carmine headed back upstairs and threw on some clothes. He was in the bathroom brushing his teeth when Haven walked in. “Are you and Dr. DeMarco going away?”
He nodded, rinsing out his mouth. “We’re gonna go play with our guns.”