Page 52 of Lying Hearts
“Okay. Great. Thank you. I mean, Grazie. I’ll see you. Bye.”
I look over and see the door nestled in between a series of shops, the buildings all touching, almost as one. They’re tall, the color of sand and look like they’ve been here for centuries. They probably have, now that I think about it.
“Una piacere, Annie.” I think he just said it was a pleasure, or maybe I want to give you pleasure. I know the word pleasure was used.
“Thank you.”
Speechless, I stare in amazement as he bows once more, rises and gives me one last smile, then turns and walks away. Whoa. Come back? Scuffling off, I swear to myself for not having bought something prettier to wear already. Why am I still wearing black, black, and more black? Sigh.
I pick up various bottles of marinara sauce with unknown ingredients, thinking hating yourself is so fucking exhausting. And man does it make you hungry. Searching through the compact aisles, I grab the fixings for bare-bones pasta, just the basics. I’m dying to try something new, but that would take wasting money if I didn’t get it right.
I need to get a job soon. Maybe if I’d chosen a place that spoke my language, it would have been easier. To make matters worse, I’m terribly lonely. Bending down to grab a bag of bow tie pasta, I think to myself, so basically nothing has changed.
“No. You cannot do this. It is not right.”
I look up to see Christiano standing above me. “Oh, hi! You came back!”
He takes the bottle of sauce out of my hands and puts it on the wrong shelf. “Let me make you a real Italian meal.”
I look at the bottle sitting out of place among various olive oils, and back to him. “Really?”
“Come.” He takes the bow tie pasta from me, too, and puts that next to the rejected sauce, also where it’s not supposed to go. I glance down quickly to the bottom shelf where I just got it from, back up to where it is now, thinking how odd it is that he did that. Oddly rebellious. I love it.
He steps aside and says it again. “Come”
It’s so assertive, that I walk past him toward the door immediately. The teenager behind the register is still reading his magazine and doesn’t look up. I glance to him, and then look over my shoulder, catching Christiano looking at my ass. Only he doesn’t fall all over himself like I did when I was caught. Instead, he just looks at me. No smile. No shyness.
“You’re going to cook for me?” I manage, nervously.
He nods and we walk out into the sunlight. I blink it away until I get used to it. Again we walk in silence, but my nervousness isn’t going anywhere. I don’t know this guy. What am I doing?
“Um…Where are we going?” I’m hoping he says a restaurant where there are lot of people…and safety.
“We are going to my kitchen. In my home.” He puts his hands in the pockets of his tan slacks, looking ahead of us. “It is just out of town. We’ll drive. Come.”
There’s that word again.
Coming to a halt, I stare at him like he’s nuts. “I’m not going to just drive off with a complete stranger! I know I look young, but I wasn’t born yesterday.”
He turns on his heel, the sound loud thanks to my nerves being on end. Saying no can be scary, like you don’t want to hurt a person’s feelings, but come on! I’m not a fucking idiot. So, I stare at him, firmly holding my ground, my lips a thin line.
He thinks for a moment, and then realizes what’s going on. “You are worried I will hurt you.” The words said out loud are a little hard to hear. It’s a fucked up world that I even have to think of such a thing, but I do.
“Well, yeah. Can you blame me?”
He stares at me. I’m expecting him to say forget it, nice meeting you. Goodbye. But he laughs instead. He belly laughs and it’s big and free and infectious. It makes me want to join in, but I have no idea why he’s laughing. I hold back, in case the joke is on me.
“Come back.” He waves his hand in the direction we just came from and starts walking. Curious, I follow him. At the first little shop, he walks in, beckoning me to follow. “Come!”
I look in the window and see pretty dresses, mostly summer style and all high quality. I particularly am drawn to the green floor-length sundress on the right. The pink in the middle reminds me of Corinne. And the white one on the left is so unlike anything I’ve ever worn, with lace and mini-cut that I look away and step inside. My eyes take a second to adjust to the quaint lighting to see we’re in a dress shop, old school style. I walk in further to see him talking to a beautiful Italian woman who’s hemming a red knee-length dress.
“Who am I?”
She looks at him like he’s crazy. With a thick accent, she asks him, also in English, “Christiano, what is this about?”
“Who am I, Sophia?” he asks again.
She pushes her long curly hair back and stands. She is everything I am not – beautiful, exotic, owning every bit of it and adding more. Italian woman work it. They wear the jewelry. They have the hair. They jut the hips. They know how to do it. I stare at her, openly envious and taking notes.