Then, in the midst of all that fucking madness, somehow, I fell in love. So deeply in love that I couldn’t tell the difference between passion and anger anymore. I wanted to slap him and kiss him all at the same time.
Slap him for not telling me.
Kiss him for saving me. For suffering for me. For all that he had been through in my honor.
Marry for loyalty, not for love. Love kills the soul quicker than a sharp dagger to the heart.
He had taken a dagger to his throat. For me.
I took one to the heart. For him.
I touched my stomach. I’d forever be connected to him, the proof of his blood vow taking up space in my womb.
We both had to bleed for this.
I wondered if tomorrow our arrangement would be null and void due to…love. A weapon he had no defense against.
It didn’t matter. Nothing mattered. After he’d slammed me into that metaphorical rock, I was set adrift.
I slammed the door in his face right before I slid into bed and hid myself in the darkness.
A week had gone by. We hadn’t spoken. We hadn’t touched. We hadn’t even looked at each other.
In the morning, I used to cook him breakfast before he left for work. We were in contact during the day. We’d make dinner plans. Sometimes he would even send me a dirty joke. There wasn’t a night since our wedding, or day for that matter, that we didn’t have sex. I hadn’t gone even a day without seeing him. When he worked too much, I felt it, the absence of the most important person to me.
I struggled with missing him and wanting nothing to do with him. When I smelled coffee in the kitchen after just waking up, or his cologne in our bathroom, or saw one of his shirts in the hamper, it made me want to burn it all down, but at the same time, savor each scent, each touch.
Love doesn’t make you sick, like people claim. It silently goes in, nick by nick, causing cuts that might never heal. Noemi was right about one thing: Love isn’t a disease. Love is a dagger.
On the seventh day of silence, I got an unexpected visitor.
Uncle Tito.
He hugged me tightly before patting my stomach. “How is our boy?”
I patted the same spot. “The Dr. said all looks good. He’s still looking like a little boy.”
Uncle Tito laughed at this. He handed me a loaf of what looked like bread. “Scarlett wanted me to bring this over. Would you mind putting on some coffee so we can enjoy it? The baby will like the blueberries, I am sure.”
After pouring him a cup of coffee, I cut us each a slice of the cake, and we ate in silence. Every once in a while, he took a sip of coffee. On one sip, my eyes rose to meet his, and the kindness in them almost knocked me off the chair. It happened at the most unexpected times.
“I know,” I said. “You were the man who saved…my husband.” It was hard for me to call him anything but husband. The other names seemed wrong, and when I thought of the name he was given at birth, Vittorio, it made me think of talking about a dead man.
He patted my hand. “A different time. A different place. I am only thankful that I was there for him.”
Silence came between us again. I didn’t know what to say. I still hadn’t settled on one feeling. Loyalty kept me rooted. Love was killing me because it gave him the power to stick the dagger in further. His secrets were the poisonous tips.
When I looked up, Uncle Tito was watching me again. “He sent me here.”
“Who?”
“Your husband. He is unsure.”
“That’s a new one for him, right?”
“Right.” He nodded. “In my humble opinion, it can do a heart good to feel things it has never before. He is feeling everything now, not just existing for vengeance.”
“I disagree about the heart. Sometimes when the heart feels things it never has before, it hurts. Really bad.”
“Good thing the heart has the amazing capacity to heal itself after time when it comes to such things, ah?” Uncle Tito took a sip of coffee and then placed the cup down. “All that Amadeo did, farfalla, he did for you. You understand that, don’t you? You showed him something he had not seen in a long time. Such innocence…an innocence he hadn’t seen since his mother.”
“Why…” My knee bobbed under the table. “Why didn’t he tell me? Who he was? What he’d done?”
He smiled, but it made the kindness in his eyes turn to sadness. “He was unsure then, as well.”
“Unsure of what?”
He picked our plates up and set them in the sink. “Perhaps in time you will understand. It is not my place to say. The words should be shared between husband and wife. If you would like to know, speak to your husband. Open the lines of communication.” He took a deep breath. “You speak of the heart. The heart cannot beat without an open flow. If it has clots.” He shrugged. “It will die. Think of a marriage in these same terms.”
The good doctor stayed with me about an hour longer, and after we shared normal, family gossip, from Noemi’s side of the family, he kissed my head firmly and left.
After he’d gone, the house seemed too quiet. All I did was stew on the same issues over and over, my brain starting to short circuit, my heart bleeding out or maybe backing up. Uncle Tito had given me more to consider, which made my need to get out stronger.
Giovanni would have to okay it with my husband before any plans were made. I knew my husband would make me take Giovanni if I left the house.
I needed to be away from everything related to him.
Maybe without his influence, I could think clearly, and if things were not as bad as they seemed, maybe my heart could start to heal. Or maybe get rid of the clot, as Uncle Tito had said.
I called Keely and told her to meet me at our place in thirty minutes. We could have some of the cake Scarlett had sent with Uncle Tito.
You see, I’d figured out a few things after I moved in.
My husband really knew everything, but the watch was a way for him to keep track of my movements. Giovanni, too, once I crossed over into the other side of the house. I always came down from the bedroom, so he had no idea about the secret firehouse.
Right before the thirty minutes, I asked Giovanni to look for a pair of boots in my closet. I told him my legs were hurting. Lie. He gave me a suspicious look but did as I asked. I’d never asked him to do anything for me before. I quickly called the control room and told them to check the cameras in the back of the house. It seemed like two men were fighting out in the street.
Leaving my watch on the kitchen counter, I took off out of the front door, using my hands to signal to Keely to not get out of the car. She understood right away and restarted the car before I was even in it. She took off once I was in, and I had to slam the door shut while we burnt rubber.
“Okay.” She eyed her rearview mirror, making sure we were not being followed. “Why are we running from your house?”
“I...need a break. I don’t feel like being surrounded by men today.”
“Ooh. The honeymoon is over. Let the games begin!”
“It’s not a game, Keely. It’s marriage.” I waved a hand. “We just had a fight.”
“Over what type of diapers to use?”
Only if our issues were that domesticated. I couldn’t give her the entire truth, so basic would have to do. “Something like that.”