Page 114 of Ruin

I can hear her swallowing over the phone. It’s either a difficult story for her to tell or she’s drinking. Or both. “You can’t always choose your own destiny, and my parents were adamant that I marry your father. I had to choose: keep bleeding for the man he used to be or build the best life I could within the choices available to me.”

“Mom, that’s a really shitty story, and I don’t see how it applies to my situation.”

“I’m saying it might be better if you don’t follow in my footsteps. Maybe marrying Tommy isn’t really what you want. You broke up with him for a reason, Giovanna. He changed. You can’t go back in time and marry the boy you first kissed all those years ago. Marrying him could be a nightmare. But Antonio, he’s kind of the anti-Tommy, isn’t he?”

The idea of marrying Tommy sends my heart through the roof. But she’s right; he changed. I don’t know if our break-up would have finally convinced him to make more timewith me. I guess I’ll never know.

“It sounds like you’re telling me to settle. It’s not like there aren’t other men in the world. It’s not an either/ or situation.”

My mom laughs her light laugh, and her voice gentles, but her words bruise. “You learn to make peace with what you can have, to focus on what’s good and take comfort in the stability, the little kindnesses. I was able to do that with your father. Why cut Antonio loose and go out with strangers, when Antonio could be everything you need?”

Everything except Tommy.

She continues. “He is a good man, isn’t he? He’s good to you?”

“Yes,” I whisper.

On paper, he shows up in all the ways Tommy never did. Though I always turn him down when he asks me out, he’s been coming over almost every day since last Christmas. He makes dinner, runs errands for me, fixes things around the condo. He’ll even sit with me while I work on my thesis and study, and in the past few months, he’s started working out with me.

If nothing else, the man is the picture of patience. I catch him looking at me sometimes, and occasionally he’ll lean forward just slightly, looking at my mouth like he’s going to kiss me, but I always move away, deflect, change the subject. He not only lets me take space when I need it, he keeps showing up, making me laugh, taking care of me.

If Tommy is the only man I love and there’s no way we can be together thanks to Aurelio’s ultimatum, then why not choose the man who is so careful with my heart?

“I think you know what you should do here,cara mia.”

After I hang up with my mother, as if we manifestedhim, Antonio walks in my front door with his arms full of groceries like he lives here. I realize with a start that he practically does.

“Hey,” I say. “I wasn’t expecting you.”

He grins and holds up onions and garlic. “I’m making that sauce you like for dinner tonight and thought you’d want some. Plus, I need a sous chef. Come help me.”

He uncorks a bottle of wine as I move to the kitchen island and Antonio pushes a cutting board with a knife and onion on it.

“Sous chef has to cut the onions,” he says, and I laugh and get started, as he continues to pull groceries out of the bags. Tomatoes, fresh basil, tomato paste.

“So,” he says, looking at me out of the corner of his eye. “I was thinking about Christmas.”

“What about it?” I don’t know why I’m suddenly very nervous, but I keep my eyes on the cutting board, chopping.

“I was thinking maybe we could spend it together on purpose this year. You know, make dinner, watch some cheesy Christmas movies in our pajamas.”

I can’t look at him. I stay focused on the chopping, tears springing to my eyes. I can’t tell if they’re caused by the onions or not. “That could be fun,” I say haltingly.

A huffed breath of relief comes from him and he’s suddenly behind me, his hard muscular chest against my back. He breathes me in, then moves my hair aside and grazes his lips over my neck. “I’d really like to wake up next to you on Christmas Day.”

I stiffen, almost stop breathing, and set the knife down carefully. “Antonio, what’s happening right now?”

Antonio murmurs against my neck: “I’m here every night.I fall asleep on your couch, I leave clothes here, we spend every day together. Why aren’t we calling this what it is?”

“What do you think this is?” My voice shakes, and I keep my eyes closed as he drags his hands down my sides to my hips then slowly traces around to my stomach. I haven’t been touched like this in so long, my body involuntarily jerks, sensitive to his touch.

When he pulls me back into his arms, his warm chest against my back, his erection jutting into my ass, I imagine that it’s Tommy holding me, Tommy whispering in my ear.

“We’re together, Giovanna. Neither of us dating other people. Everyone wants us to be together. It’s time we make it official.”

“Who’s everyone?”

“You know who. Your father, my boss. I think your mother likes me for you, too. I want it, Gigi. You do, too, even though you don’t want to admit it. You know we’re going to end up together.” He kisses the back of my neck, and I whimper as he sinks his teeth in. “You play your cards right and you could be Mrs. Abbiati one day.”