Page 25

Valencia

“Well, that’s good to know,” I replied and then I teased him, “At least you aren't dangerous.”

“No, he isn’t,” Tito said. “He’s been here for a long time and we would have found out that he was dangerous before now. I mean damn, he was almost like a parent to us.” He paused to look at Max. “Except he never laughed or got angry with us.”

“The rules for a true English butler are that I am not supposed to show—”

“But Max, you already broke rules a while back,” Tito reminded him. “I hate to be like a downer here but you killed someone and re-animated two people. That’s probably against the rules, right?”

I nodded at him and added, “And I don’t think you are supposed to love anyone, are you?”

The room got really warm and the fire in the fireplace suddenly roared up.

Tito and I looked over at the fire then up at Max.

His eyes were actually red. Not red as in tired or red rimmed. But all out red!

Suddenly, the room spun and I hung onto Tito while thinking I was about to faint again.

When the spinning stopped, I opened my eyes.

Tito and I were in his bed…in his room.

Lying on my side, I looked at Tito as he slowly opened his eyes. We stared at each other.

I felt afraid to ask but I did anyway, “Was that a dream?”

He stared at me. “Unless we had the exact same dream, no.”

“Max is a time traveler and we found him in the basement, coming out of…fire?” I asked him just to be sure.

“No,” he said as he shook his head at me. “Has to be some book you read.”

My mouth popped open in surprise.

Tito laughed and wrapped his arms around me. “I’m kidding, baby. That is what we found out. I won’t repeat it back, because if I do, I will then need to call a therapist.”

I laughed now. “The both of us would have to. We still might sometime soon?”

He gave me a brief but sweet kiss. Then he pulled his head back to look at me again.

“So what do we do now?” I asked him.

“I’m not sure. I think I need to speak to my uncle before we do anything else.”

“You aren’t going to ask him about Max, are you?”

“No…” He shook his head. “I don’t think you and I should talk about Max or look at Max. At least not more than we would have normally.”

I stared at him. “Really?”

“Really. At least for a few days. I think we upset him a lot.”

“Yeah, we did, I think?” I agreed. “But he really didn’t look at it right, ya know?”

“Yes, baby, but even humans don’t like it when someone comes along and tells them what they have or have not done correctly. Not employees, not a friend and certainly not a 300 year old butler.”

“Wow, 300 years old!” I exclaimed. “Unbelievable!”

“Right?” he agreed. “Can you imagine what that must be like? To live for more than three centuries?”

“No, I don’t think anyone can imagine that, Tito.”

“People think that they want to live forever, but not if you will be alone and no one you love will live forever with you.”

“Exactly,” I agreed. “Not that we would think that way. Who lives forever?”

Our eyes met as we both exclaimed, “Max!” We still felt shocked.

“Must be lonely too,” I said.

“He claims to have no feelings about any of it,” Tito reminded me.

“I don’t think that’s true,” I replied. “He loves this family a lot and he doesn’t even seem to realize it.” I smiled at him. “Especially your mom.”

He slowly shook his head. “I don’t know how to feel about that.”

“Yeah, the time travelling, 300 year old butler being in love with your mom. I don’t think anyone would know how to feel.”

“She stays true to my father,” I informed her. “I’m not sure she would reciprocate said feelings.”

“But what if she did?” I asked him. “You wouldn’t be mad, would you?”

He let out a long breath. “I’m not her boss.” He chuckled. “If anything, she’s mine.”

“Yep, whomever holds that spatula,” I teased him.

We both laughed.

“But honestly, your mother has been a widow for a long time.”

“Yeah, and she seems happy,” he said.

“She keeps busy is why,” I told him. “She cooks and helps to serve three meals a day then she manages the staff for all the clean up and other parts of the house. She deserves some happiness. Maybe some time away?”

He shook his head. “She would never agree to that. She refuses to leave the estate.”

“Like ever?” I asked in surprise.

“I think?” he replied.

“Wow, so how long has she…”

“Ever since my father’s funeral. She flew over to Italy, attended it. Then she…” he paused.

“What is it?” I asked him as he looked troubled.

“I was a young teen, Rocky wasn’t eighteen yet. Mama was in the hospital. I forgot about that. I mean that whole year was super bad. I just wanted to forget everything.”

I grabbed his hand. “Of course, it was. So why was she in the hospital?”

“I don’t know.”

“No one told you why?” I asked him.

“No. And I didn’t ask. I spent a lot of time at the pond. I even camped out there. Fish, swim, hike and the days all blurred together. It all got fuzzy, time didn’t seem to matter to me. I actually thought I would lose her too. I was determined to be a sad sack of shit.”

I lightly slapped his arm. “That’s an awful thing to say.”

“After 3 months, Rocky came out to get me to come home and that is what he called me.”

My mouth popped open in an O of surprise. “What?”

He nodded at me as he laughed. “Now that day I remember well.” Tito chuckled.” We got into the worst fight. It topped any argument we ever had before or since. He was the big brother coming to talk some sense into his kid brother. Only his kid brother threatened to kick his ass if he didn’t leave.”

“Really?” I exclaimed. “I can’t imagine that at all with how you two are now.”

“I can't either. But I told him to mind his own damned business. That he wasn’t my dad, cause my dad was dead anyways. And my mom was soon to go…” Tito sat up in bed. “Oh, wow…”

I stared at him. “What happened?”

“She was sick,” he explained. “I think it was her heart. More like she had a broken heart, I thought at the time. But she wasn’t getting better. Rocky came out to get me. He said we needed to go see her. That if we did, it might remind her that she had kids. Like my sister was just ten or so.”

“What happened?”

“Rocky called me selfish. Said we were her sons and we needed to step up. Go and see our mother.”

“And what did you say?” I asked.

“I told him to go fuck himself.”

I gasped and sat up. “You didn’t!”

He nodded and looked away. “I did, but I’m not proud of that day, Valen.”

“Geeze Tito. You were a teen and had lost your dad then your mom was sick. You can forgive yourself, ya know?”

“I may not ever do that. We actually fought like… with our fists. He said he would make me go. I said he couldn't and that he was a pussy. He needed to get away from me. In my head, I felt justified. Like why couldn’t I stay in the woods? Live by the pond. Have peace and let the world go by?”

I stared at him and squeezed his hand in mine. “It must have been so awful.”

He shrugged. “I felt calm and peaceful out there. I could often pretend that my whole world had not cave in on me. I could forget. Until Rocky came and tossed that rock into my peace.”

“Rock?” I asked.

“He was so good at skipping rocks. I spent lots of time doing that too since I had hours to kill while camped out. You know the old saying of tossing a pebble into the pond and it makes the ripples spread out?”

I rolled my eyes. “You fooled me there. I thought you meant literally .”

“I did mean that! I had this rock that I’d found on the trail and for a month or more I would hold it in my hands and drop it from one palm to another.

It was a super smooth one so it helped with my nerves, I guess?

He kept trying to talk to me and I was blatantly ignoring him while I played with that stone and then he snatched it from me. ”

I stared at him. “Oh, wow.”

“It was like my… well, my rock?” Tito chuckled a little. “He’d skipped it along that water perfectly. It tapped the top of the water like 5 times before it went down.”

I stared at him and asked in a hushed tone, “So, what did you do?”

“My peace shattered and my rage came out. The same rage that I felt when they told me my father wasn’t ever coming home. I attacked him and we fought like two juggernauts. We rolled along the ground, we punched at each other. Grappled together like wrestlers. We had bloody noses and busted lips.”

“Oh, no…”

“Oh, yes…” He nodded at me.

“So what stopped your fight?”

Tito paused as he looked stunned for a full minute.

“Tito?” I called to him.

He blinked and looked over at me with a grin on his face as he said, “We both heard our father’s voice.”

“What?” I stared at him in disbelief.

Nodding, he explained, “He shouted at us to stop. He said our mother needed us. It was his voice in Italian, no less.”

I kept staring at him. “Your father’s ghost?”

“I always thought so.” Tito laughed. “But now I know it had to be Max.”

“Wow…” I nodded. “And it worked, right?”

“Hell yeah, it did!” Tito exclaimed as he laughed. “We went home, cleaned up and promptly showed up at the hospital. Max escorted us in fact. We both had black eyes, bruised jaws and busted lips but we were cleaned up and dressed nice.” Then Tito’s smile faded from his lips.

“What is it?’ I asked him.

“When we got to her room door, a nurse came out. She said we couldn’t go in.

She refused to look us in the eyes too. Rocky demanded to know what was happening.

He started to argue with the nurse and I slipped past her into my mother’s room.

” He looked up at me and said, “She had a sheet pulled up over her face.” Tito shook his head. “Oh man, I forgot all of that.”

“So h-how…” I stammered. “What did you…”

“Max went past me into her room. He then shoved me back. The door slammed shut and I couldn’t get in.

I was screaming and crying like a damn baby for them to open the door.

” Tito shook his head and closed his eyes.

“I don’t know how long it was. I told Rocky while I cried my eyes out that Mama was dead, that she was gone.

I was almost hysterical. Finally, the nurse brought a janitor over and he got the door open. ” He paused to shake his head.

I waited while almost breathless for him to tell me the rest.

He went on, “The nurse went in, then she screamed as she turned around and ran out.”

“Rocky and me went in and Mama was sitting up in bed. Max sat next to the bed and he asked us what all the yelling was about. Damn! That must have been when he brought her back!”

I got shivers and rubbed my arms. “Wow, and of course, you never knew the truth.”

“I couldn’t figure it out but I was so glad she was alive that I never considered it again really. Damn, that Max. He saved her!”

“I can see why. So much sadness and grief.” I took his hand in mine again. “So now you know why he saved her. Why she died. You now have that answer.”

“I do. But there are a few things that I don’t know. Who had my dad killed? Who poisoned my Aunt Bella and why did Uncle Stephano need to be saved from death?” He shook his head and scoffed. “Damn, if it doesn’t sound like an Italian soap opera.”

“See?” I agreed.

“Si, amore mia,” he said softly

At his words, I shivered a little. “The Italian is so sexy.”

“As my uncle would say, it is in your blood, that’s why it speaks to you.” He wrapped me up in his arms and whispered, “This will be your first lesson.”

I smirked. “Ok.”

He lowered his lips to mine and gently kissed me then said, “Un bacio. Repeat it,” he urged.

“Un bacio,” I whispered.

“It means, a kiss.”

“Ok.” I smiled and asked, “So how do you say, kiss me now ?”

“Baciami adesso.”

I grasped his cheeks with both hands as I repeated it, “Baciami adesso.”

Tito smiled at me as he leaned closer to my lips and said, “Piacere mio. My pleasure.” He finally kissed me for real. Deeply and perfectly.