Skins

by Laura Rossi

  As If he could feel our eyes behind his nape, he turned and stared at us for a moment before smiling.

  I squinted at him, shielding the sun with my hand.

  Brown, wavy hair, that rested on his shoulders and a little beard. Dark eyes. Tattoo on his neck.

  “Sebastian!!!” Eddy- Matt dropped my hand and ran towards him, tossing his bag on the floor, leaping into his arms.

  The man bent down to catch him and lifted him up to his hips, kissing Matt’s amber cheeks.

  I stood there motionless, my body in shock, I was afraid I would wake up disappointed by another one of my dreams. Dreams about Sebastian.

  But this was real, he was real.

  They were still hugging when I rushed down the alley and leaped into his arms, too.

  Tighter, hold me tighter- I thought, closing my eyes and burying my face in his chest for a moment.

  I breathed him in, laughing- or maybe I was crying, I wasn’t sure.

  How had I missed his big, strong arms around me, his warm skin, his smile.

  My flesh, my blood, my rock.

  Then I looked up at him and touched his beard, his lips and took off his sunglasses.

  I searched his face. It was him.

  How could it be him? He came for us, he came looking for us.

  Almost two years, two years without seeing him and I didn’t know what to say but I wanted to say so many things.

  So I kissed him and he held me tight, close to his chest as Eddy danced all around us.

  “It can’t be you,” I smiled shaking my head.

  “It’s me, Sad Eyes,” he smiled and tugged at my back.

  “How?” was all I could say, my voice shaky.

  “It took me a while, but I got here,” Sebastian cupped my face and looked at me, really looked at me.

  I was smiling, with my eyes, my lips. My body was shaking, not for fear but for the joy of having him here with me.

  “You are even more beautiful than I remembered,” he said, examining my face. “I don’t think I have ever seen you smile like this.”

  “How can I not smile?” my lips trembled. “You came for us.”

  He nodded and then bent down to pick up Eddy again. He took us both into his arms and looked from me to him.

  “I came as soon as I knew It would be safe. I couldn’t stay away any longer.”

  I don’t know how long we stayed like that, hugging, standing in front of my door in the middle of the street. A few people were around and they all turned to stare at us but we didn’t care.

  The world could have stopped spinning, we wouldn’t have cared. We had our own little world, it was us three as a family for the first time.

  Lies, distance, our miserable past lives- they had all lost against us. We were there, together. We had made it. We were connected, the world could have ended and we wouldn’t have noticed. We had each other.

  Eddy wrapped his little arms around Sebastian’s neck and his face opened up in a huge smile. I knew that smile all too well.

  “Mommy, can I show Sebastian our boat? Can I take him down to the beach? Around the island? Can we?” he asked, turning to Sebastian for his last question.

  “Show me your boat, show me everything. I want to know everything,” Sebastian couldn’t stop looking at him.

  Sebastian

  There comes a time in a man’s life when you need to assess the damage- things you did right, things you screwed up.

  I'd had a lot of time to think about that over the past months, walking around the streets on my own. Noises distract you, it’s easy not to think about your life when you are around people. But I had been alone, going over the same things, over and over again.

  The list of things I had screwed up in my life-my family, surviving on the street, my education and my criminal record- was long, too long but strangely enough, my thoughts had been all for Andrea and Eddy. For the things I had done right.

  Two things, just two, but in the hell I was living, they were enough to allow me to walk with my head high and less weight on my back.

  I had kept my promise, I had kept them safe and now I was looking at Eddy, right into his big, blue, happy eyes again. They looked at me with the same candour and affection as a year and a half ago.

  Eddy was one of the things I had done right, a work of art, my payback.

  I couldn’t stop staring at him, he was perfect and all the things I wasn’t – joyful, serene, safe.

  He tilted his head back and giggled at some cartoon on TV then.

  I counted the times he smiled, the times he looked up at me and thought of all that I had missed.

  Life doesn’t give back the moments you’ve lost, but I was there now and I wasn’t going to miss anything else. It wasn’t too late for us.

  I reached for Andrea’s arm and pulled her gently towards me, forcing her to set the dishes back on the table. I hadn’t touched her in so long, I didn’t want to let her go.

  I had seen Andrea in every place I had been.

  One time, I had imagined her sitting beside me on a bus. Once, I had spotted her, sitting across from me in this café in Vienna.

  Sometimes, my mind had enjoyed playing funny tricks with my heart, I thought I could smell her sweet, flowery scent in the breeze. At night, I could hear her soft moans, her raspy voice whisper things in my ear: ‘I am here’

  She’s here.

  Andrea looked at me and smiled. She took a seat on my lap, her eyes still dreamy as she examined me.

  “How did you find us?”

  That first question sparked the conversation. I had all the answers to her questions, I was going to tell her everything, leaving out nothing. Nothing.

  “I knew your new identities, but still it took me a couple of months to locate you,” I told her. “You did good. I had a hard time tracing your whereabouts this year and half. And I couldn’t look for you, really look for you until my name was cleared.”

  Something crossed her face then. Confusion, something wasn’t adding up.

  So, I told her I had to change my name a few times, change countries. I had lived in Austria, Spain, France and Poland, before coming down to Greece to look for them. I couldn’t risk our past lives come looking for us, destroying our present. I couldn’t let anyone know where they were hiding. I couldn’t let anyone know who I really was.

  “Andrea,” I started and stopped, my hand running through her short, shoulder length hair. “I saw Alejandro. I was there when they arrested him. I was arrested, too,”

  “What?” she shivered, her body shook over mine. I took her hand.

  Tell her everything, everything. The whole truth.

  “I am a cop. I am an undercover cop, always have been since the first day we met,” the words were hard to say, at times I had almost forgotten who I was – nobody knew my real identity, besides the sergeant leading my operation.

  I let the silence between us be, until Andrea looked back up at me and I told her what needed to be said.

  I hadn’t been on Alejandro’s case, on anybody’s case. That was not how I operated.

  The police moved me around the country, letting me settle in the underworld long enough to get some valid information on the drug market, the prostitution business. I leaked names, places, situations, but I never executed arrests. I was always moved on before or after that.

  My face, the same face the nuns in the institute had once said would always show my true colours, had been the reason why I had been chosen to be an undercover cop. I came from the pit, from the street. I was the perfect inside man, with a respectable criminal record to serve the cause.

  “You were after Alejandro the whole time?” Andrea asked, but I was already shaking my head at the mention of that fucking bastard.

  “I wasn’t after anyone. I was gathering information on the criminal situation in the Market. I work with the drugs’ department. I don’t get into clans, gangs. I work around them, I am the eyes and ears of the police. This is what I do. What I did,
before I saw that picture of you and Eddy, the day Alejandro offered me the job. That day changed everything. From that day, it was all about you.”

  I explained how I had ended the cycle, being there during Alejandro’s arrest. I had to be arrested too and I was taken away, so not to blow my cover.

  Bars don’t stop criminals like Alejandro De la Crux, I had seen too much shit happening to believe that. I knew he was still moving his hands in there, thanks to his soldiers and his influent family.

  I was also aware of the fact he had given orders to find me, kill me and Andrea.

  “That’s why I told you not to look for me, why I didn’t look for you. I couldn’t let Alejandro trace me back to you. I came when I knew they were off me, I had lost them.”

  I paused and cupped her face with one hand.

  She closed her eyes for a moment, turning to the side to kiss my fingers, my heart beating fast for what was to come.

  “I’ve been to Hungary, too,” something flickered in her eyes.

  Andrea opened them wide and let out a sound, her lips moving but no words came out of them.

  “Your family is good, Andrea. I had made sure they were protected and kept away from Alejandro.”

  “Sebastian,” she mumbled and covered her mouth, tears of joy swelling up in her shining eyes.

  “They are waiting for us, they are in Athens waiting for us. I thought it would have been better to give us a day, to explain and be with you. We are leaving tomorrow to go see them. You, me and Eddy.”

  She let out a cry, my chest rumbled to the sound of it, and her hands were on my face immediately, as she pressed her pink lips on mine.

  “Thank you,” she cried. “What you have done for me…” her fingers brushed against my lips and I kissed them, each and every single one of them, interrupting her train of thought.

  “There isn’t anything I wouldn’t do for you, Andrea. Nothing,” I whispered. Then I went for her lips, leaving her breathless for a moment, before I went on. “I fucking want to be that happy ending.”

  She nodded, wiping away the tears with the back of her hand.

  “You are, you really are.”

  This big smile sparked on her thin lips, it lit her entire face making her look so ethereal, I thought I was witnessing something big, something magnificent.

  A broken heart can be mended, a broken person can be fixed. I could still see Andrea’s wounds, just like I could feel my scars. All of them.

  Once you’ve been hurt, lived through the violence of the flesh and of the words, you can only do your best to move on, but the signs on your skin will always be there. They still ached, they still tried to push you down. The past would still hurt, it would still try to break us from time to time, but only if we’d let it back into our lives.

  Behind, I had left my past behind and I had made something good out of it.

  I was there to pick up Andrea’s pieces. And it was worth it, every single moment had been worth it, I would do it all over again. For her, for Eddy.

  “Mommy, mommy. Why are you crying?” Eddy came running towards us. He then turned to me, worried. “Are you leaving again? Is that why mommy is crying?”

  I smiled to the side.

  “No Eddy. I’m staying. I’m not going to leave you. Ever again.”

  “My guide and I did enter, to return

  To the fair world: and heedless of repose

  We climb’d, he first, I following his steps,

  130

  Till on our view the beautiful lights of Heaven

  Dawn’d through a circular opening in the cave:

  Thence issuing we again beheld the stars.”

  Canto XXXIV, Inferno, The Divine Comedy Dante Alighieri

  The end

  References

  Alighieri, Dante (1472) The Divine Comedy. Foligno: Johann Numeister and Evangelista Angelini da Trevi, Inferno Canto III

  Alighieri, Dante (1472) The Divine Comedy. Foligno: Johann Numeister and Evangelista Angelini da Trevi, Inferno Canto XXXIV

  First of all thank you, reader for picking up this little Indie Book and making my day.I can only hope you enjoyed the story and fell in love with the characters in Skins. Yes, they are a little dark, yes they have issues and flaws, but that makes them alive, doesn’t it? At least that’s how I feel. Flaws make us humans, flaws are the reason we sometimes make mistakes, but it’s then in our nature to make sure we set things right. Unless your name is Alejandro De la Cruz, in which case you are scum :P

  The first person I want to thank is my PA Marley, who stands by me when I go completely crazy and reminds me I can do this. Thank you for believing in me, even when I don’t.

  Thank you Gem, for being my friend, my proof reader and for listening. I am always here for you, just like you are always here for me.

  A big, big, huge shout out to the girls that support me in my readers group La Dolce Vita with Laura Rossi, to all of you, old and new. I’ve met some great people. You have a laugh with me, you are there to say hi and support me during live readings and takeovers. Thank you for being my friend. You know who you are.

  Special thank you to Stina, Vera, Carolann, Lucrezia, Johnna, Angela, Beverley, Johanna, Monja, fellow authors Holly Webb, Laura Farr, Kelly Lowe, Andrea Bills, J Lee, Ellen Buikema, Kiera Jayne for being there always and for sharing the love. This Indie Community has its ups and downs but you make it all so fantastic.

  Thank you Talia, for this amazing cover. Love it.

  Thank you to every single blogger, reader, friend, supporter that has shared, read and reviewed Skins, given me invaluable feedback on how to grow as a writer.

  Thank you also to Monja, Gem and Michele for being my extra set of eyes. Thanks for taking the time to examine the script closely.

  I have so much to be thankful for. Some people thought I wouldn’t be able to pull this off, writing that is. They told me it was just a silly dream “you should just stick to what you do” and “Don’t waste your time on these things, it won’t make you rich” They were so wrong. Every time I see a new review or a message from someone that has read my books, I feel the happiest person on the face of the earth. In your faces :P

  But none of this could have been possible without the love, support and understanding of my wonderful family and friends.

  So thank you Luca Carducci, my partner for listening to my ramblings and being proud of what I am trying to do. Love you, I can’t even express how much.

  Thank you to my kids, who sometimes look at me like I am an alien when I am in my bubble, thinking about what to write next.

  Thank you to my mom and dad as always, for being the first to believe in me.

  My wonderful brother Carlo, Ekaterina, Gaia, Saeid, Susanna, my friend Carlo, my University lecturer Christopher, Eleni, Pablo, Francesca, Rosanna, Rita, I am so grateful you are in my life.

  But as I said in the first pages of the book, this story is for my mom. You kick ass, mom. Love you

  Grazie, grazie mille. <3

  Did you enjoy Skins? Please take one moment to leave your review on amazon.com. I will be forever grateful. Thank you.

  Want to say hi? Here is where you can find me??

  ??facebook: https://www.facebook.com/laurarossiauthor/

  Twitter: https://twitter.com/authorLRossi17

  ??Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/laurarossiauthor

  ??Blog: https://laurarossiauthor.wordpress.com/

  ??Readers group: https://www.facebook.com/groups/1652427688131420/

  ??Amazon: https://www.amazon.com/…/e/B01M7O2JHZ/ref=sr_ntt_srch_lnk_1…

  ??Goodreads: https://www.goodreads.com/author/show/2381552.Laura_Rossi

 

 

 
-o-filter: grayscale(100%); -ms-filter: grayscale(100%); filter: grayscale(100%); " class="sharethis-inline-share-buttons">share