CHAPTER 1

 

“Angelo, I have a question for you,” pausing to gather my thoughts, I continued, “actually it's more of a suggestion.”

“I'm listening.”

I was still unsure of how to bring up what I wanted to say to him without him damn near breaking up with me.

“I sold the car.”

“What!?”

“Ang-”

“That was neither a question nor a suggestion. I gave you that as a present.”

My heart rate sped up. I knew it never would have been easy to tell him and that's why I'd procrastinated for so long. I couldn't help but feel a little bit guilty, I mean we'd only been together for a year and he'd already done more than enough for me.

True to his word, after I'd been passed up for the carer position because I had failed to provide a recommendation letter Angelo had put me in touch with his mother's friend, but I kind of felt some type of way about the whole him giving and giving and I just taking and taking so I had kindly turned down his offer and that was right about the same time that the kindergarten which I loved volunteering at approached me to be a temporary staff to cover another staff's maternity leave, no lie it was divine intervention.

But then as it happens, it comes to a certain time in a young adult's life where they feel trapped and want to venture off to carve their own path in life and be away from a mum who yelled when I didn't clean my room, or a dad, who despite me being nearly twenty years old, still wanted to know where I was going, who I was going with and when to be expected back home.

So one day, three months before my contract at the kindergarten was due to be over, I was at Angelo's house whining to him about my parents and once again he offered to get in contact with his mum's friend who happened to own an au pair agency, wait for it...in Spain.

Yes, for two months I'd been living it up as a nanny in sunny Spain, taking care of a hyper ten year old and a four year old Miss Diva who already expected the highest standard delivered from everyone and everything.

“I knew you'd react this way that's why I didn't tell you beforehand.”

“Of course I'm going to react this way. That car held a sentimental value for both of us.”

“Angelo-”

“Seriously Luciana, that was a serious ass hole move you pulled.”

By this time, I knew I had really hurt him – deeply. Angelo was never the one to mince his feelings, he made it known raw.

Sighing I let my eyes drift to the screen on my laptop where it was opened on the email that I had received earlier in the afternoon.

“How much did you get for the car?”

“Ninety-five thousand dollars,” I answered again fearing his reaction.

“When did you sell it?”

“Last week.”

I'd had to basically beg my father to represent me, as the buyer had been in the States. He wasn't at all happy that I had decided to sell it, especially because both him and my mum had forked out money on the insurance so I had paid their money back and more.

“Angelo...are you there?”

Sighing heavily into the phone, he answered, “Yeah.”

Cars were such a big deal to him, I understood that and the fact that he had given it to me as a gift made it even more of a bigger deal to him. I would be the first one to admit I was being a hypocrite, for I knew for sure if I was in Angelo's shoes I wouldn't have had the best reaction either.

“Do you still love me?”

“No.”

I had to refrain from using expletives because I was trying this new thing where I had been trying not to swear especially because I was taking care of young children, but hearing Angelo's reply had tempted me to forfeit my summer's resolution.

Taking a breath, I asked again.

“You knew how much that car meant to me.”

“And how much do I mean to you?”

“Ninety-five thousand dollars.”

With that I had cut off the phone, feeling my heart ablaze with hurt. We always bantered and he'd always be silly, but the way that he'd slipped the 'no' out casually was not cool and to say I only meant ninety five thousand dollar to him...he was crazy.

I got that he was still annoyed, but honestly once he gave it to me the car had become mine – I only told him out of respect. Within seconds, my phone started buzzing with calls from Angelo but I ignored all of them.

There were a lot of gorgeous Spanish guys and the most surprising thing was that I'd been approached by quite a few of them. I was still the same old Luciana, yet it appeared these guys saw something that I didn't see, or most likely they didn't see what I saw every morning when I woke up. Even though I'd been very flattered with the attention not once had I even entertained the idea of being with another guy.

The thought of breaking up with Angelo, broke my heart even without the deed been done. Nevertheless, he'd acted the asshole and for that reason I kept on ignoring his calls even as unbelievably hard it was to do so.

It was so weird because our relationship was still quite new in my eyes and I was still pretty much inexperienced when it came to relationships in general, so there have been times when I paused myself answering a text as soon as he'd texted me – I didn't want to seem too available but then thinking it to be childish of me I'd end up replying him.

The long-distance thing and six hour time-difference was not the greatest, I mean since I'd started work as an au pair he'd visited me three weeks before and had only been able to stay for two and a half days. He couldn't stay in Madrid for the summer because he had a summer placement at the hospital.

As I tried to take my mind off the argument with Angelo, I read over the email that I'd received earlier in the day – a job teaching English as a second language in Paris. My toes tingled in excitement as I read over the criminal record check documents I needed to submit. The contract of my job as an au pair was only for three months and as sad I'd be to be leaving the troublesome kids, I wanted to make more of my living. I wanted to see more. I felt like a caged bird that had finally been set free. I wasn't ready to go back to America.

Europe just freed me, yes I did get stares being the black girl with bantu knots but to be honest I felt special, for the first time in my life I revelled in the reality that I was the odd one out.

It was astounding to me that about sixty percent of Americans did not own a valid passport, talk less of leaving the country, and so here was me handed this perfect opportunity to explore more and I was going to take up the offer.

With the money that I'd gotten from the car, it was more than enough for me to live on as the work permit I'd been granted was only specifically for the job. The job again was only for three months so after that I'd be backpacking round Europe, sleeping in hostels with my friend Dominica, who was actually the one who told me about the job in France.

Round of applause for Luciana Esther Carter who has finally been able to make a friend. A Cape Verdean girl, I'd met her in the corridor at the language school after she caught me looking lost because I didn't know where my Spanish classes were being held and she'd shown me the way.

Pulling myself from my cloudy thoughts I'd texted her to find out when we could meet up so I could practise for my oral exam coming soon, when I'd done that I left the room and went to the kitchen to make myself a quick ham and cheese sandwich, which I ate whilst standing next to the sink.

The kids bedtime was at eight pm and it was just past nine but I still went to their respective rooms just to make sure that they were asleep because sometimes actually, often at times, I would check up on Little Miss Diva and she'd be surrounded with her dolls, talking to them. It was quite adorable but what was not to so adorable was when she refused to go to bed. At the beginning of my tenure at their house, I'd had to bribe her with some milk and cookies to sedate her to sleep.

Upon opening the door to her room, I held my breath hoping that she was not awake. Fortunately when I slipped my head in through the door she was sound asleep so I quickly shut the door back close.

Next was her brother's room, and as expected he was eagle spread on his bed in deep oblivion lightly snoring – he burned through so much energy in a day that by the time bed time rolled he was more than willing and never really put up a fuss like his sister.

Their rooms were next door to each other whilst mine was opposite and their parents was on the floor above. The mother was a journalist and father a bank manager so for obvious reasons they were busy people. They still made time for their children but I basically had most of the responsibility.

Going back to my room, I checked my phone and saw that I had two missed calls from Angelo which I reluctantly ignored and one missed call from Ivanna, the owner of the au pair agency. I hesitated in calling her back as even though she was Sara's friend, she intimidated me even though I'd only met her once, but her cutthroat honesty and flippant attitude made me think why she was more of a casting director.

The first time I'd met her she'd told me to drink water more often and wash my face twice a day to unclog my pores – I never asked her for any beauty advice. When I'd told Angelo that he'd laughed and said it was nothing to worry about that she just liked to add her two cents on everything – more like fifty cents.

Before wasting out the courage I had left, I called back Ivanna and as the phone rang I wondered why she called me personally because usually she'd pass down any message she had for me to her assistant who then forwarded it to me.

“Luciana, why is your boyfriend calling me to persuade you to pick up his phone calls?”

Of course as always, Ivanna dived straight to the deep end of the matter. I was not at all pleased with Angelo getting other people in to our personal business and he was not helping himself to get back in to my good books.

“Oh it doesn't matter, Ivanna. I'm sorry he bothered you.”

“Cuál es el problema?”

The way she asked, left no room for hedging, the more I thought about it, the more similarities I picked on between her and Sara.

“Angelo said something hurtful to me because I sold the car he gave me as my graduation gift,” I explained but then I wondered if he had said anything to her, “didn't Angelo already tell you what happened?”

“Yes, but of course there's three sides to every story – el suyo, la suya y la verdad. And the truth is that you both love each other so don't let stupid things said and done distract both of you from what's really important, okay?”

“Okay.”

“Call him Luciana,” and with that she eneded the call, never the one to waste time.

Still mind-blown at how quick Ivanna had turned into a relationship counsellor, I followed her advice and put the Buttbag out of his misery.

The phone didn't ring up to three times before he picked it up, “Hey.”

“Hi,” I replied a little bit stiffly, “have you learnt your lesson?”

“I'm not a child Luciana.”

“I know that,” I said sighing deeply into the phone, knowing if I didn't switch up my attitute the bickering would commence, I started, “I-”

“What happens now?”

“You tell me.”

“I'm asking you.”

“Okay, first of all, why did you have to be telling others about our personal issues?”

“You weren't picking up the phone and I needed to speak to you.”

I quickly forgot about switching up my attitude, “Maybe if you thought about what comes out of your mouth before it actually comes out, I wouldn't have been ignoring your calls.”

For the next two minutes we argued some more, neither of us accepting our faults in why we were disagreeing to such an extent. I couldn't believe it had gotten to this. Flashbacks of the last time we'd gotten this heated really didn't help matters, because after that happened for the next four months we didn't talk – and I did not want a repeat of that. We loved each other and that was the truth.

“Angelo... I am sorry for upsetting you but I'm not sorry for selling the car. ”

“ I still don't understand why you sold it.”

“A much as I love your big heart it -- the car was just was a bit too much for me. And the fact that I never had peace of mind driving it when I was in the States for fear of crashing it or me having so many worries that someone around my neighbourhood was going to vandalise it didn't help matters either. You know it's true, you probably can count on your fingers how many times you saw me in it.”

Instead of him responding, I heard him sigh slowly as I got myself comfortable underneath the covers.“I've got more news to tell you.”

“Okay...”

“I'm staying in Europe for longer than I had planned.”

“That's cool.”

I was the least happy with his response. “That's cool?”

“What have I done now?”

“You're supposed to be sad that you don't get to be with me.”

The rough chuckle that left his mouth, easily warmed up my core, “ I just can't get it right with you, can I?”

“No you can't,” and after a seconds thought I asked, “Should I be worried?”

Yes, my jealousy was blooming out of the root of my insecurities, but damn it was hard not to be a little worried.

“Worried about what?”

“I don't know...” my sudden shyness making my voice quieter than usual, “that you found someone else.”

“Please, I should be asking you that.”

“Not at all. You got the looks and I've got the brains, that's how our relationship works.”

“This is news to me.”

“Point proven, you catch up to things at the last minute.”

At what I said, he let out a belly laugh and then he proceeded to burp through the phone. “I just had the best enchilladas money can buy with -”

“I miss you.”

“Don't take this the wrong, actually that might be the wrong thing to say to what I'm about to ask, but I'll still go on ahead and ask it and run the risk of you getting pissed at me. Are you on your period?"

"No I'm not,” truth be told I couldn't blame him for asking because I had gone through a roller coaster of emotions in the last two hours. "You burping just reminded me of your uncouth self and how much I miss it."

He let out a small laugh before there was once again a brief silence between us.

"I got a job teaching English as a second language in Paris for three months, when I'm done with that, I want to go to see other parts of Europe."

"Like where?"

"Hm, I don't know, Belgium, Norway, Austria, Greece. I haven't really made up my mind yet."

"Y'know one of the benefits of marrying a European guy is that you can get a European passport and won't need visa again."

I didn't say anything, because then I knew he was just being ridiculous but it certainly did make me feel all girly and mushy inside.

"I'm taking by your silence I'm not doing well in being reinstated in your good book."

"You got that right."

He let out a short laugh before saying, "Well the offer is always there."

I couldn't help the smile that sat on my lips but not wanting to further think too deeply on it, I refocused our conversation. "So are you going to visit your family before you go back to med school?"

In other words, I was asking if he was going to come and be with me for my birthday, which was the next month, even if that meant paying for his ticket but I couldn't outright ask him that because I was just too chicken and I wanted him to come out of the goodness of his heart.

"Yeah sure."

"You don't sound that enthusiastic about it."

An exasperated sigh left his lips, "Luciana I've had a long day and I'm tired. You know I'm excited to see you."

My lips curled into a smile but I didn't say anything, he was obviously tired if he hadn't heard that I said his family and not me.

"So what did you get up to today, Dr. Henriquez?"

With that question he then proceeded to tell me his day's events. Honestly, we were like the most bipolar couple ever, in the back corner of my mind I felt that we were coming on like my parents.

My growth in the tidbit of confidence I had didn't stem from Angelo dishing me compliments right, left and centre but on how comfortable I was around him. But with these impending longer separations between us, I couldn't help but invite the doubts in.

So as he continued talking telling me about his day all the things he was excited about with his second year of medicine coming up, teaching Spanish to the homeless, I couldn't help but feeling ingenuine enthusiasm.

The mortality rate for relationships between young people was at an all time high especially in the 21st centruy and to add to it a long distance relationship – I couldn't help but feel we were calling trouble for ourselves.

“Hey Luciana, are you still there?”

It took me a moment to respond, “Hm yeah I am.”

“Okay, something is up with you.”

“There's nothing 'up' with me, I was just listening to you talk is all.”

A short groan could be heard at the other end of the phone. “Please don't be a girl now and wait for me to excavate through all the delicate mess in your head when you could just tell me what is wrong.”

I didn't want to tell him all the doubts I was feeling because I didn't want to be projecting it into the future, I felt that once I said it the likelihood of it happening became more real, whereas if it was just in my head, then it'll forever always be just a thought.

My head kept playing back at my insecurities and what it had cost me in the past - someone who was worthy of me and I, him. But I also knew that if I didn't talk about it with Angelo, my doubts would manifest into something and eventually toxicate us.

“I'm scared that our distance is going to take a toll on our relationship.”

“We won't let it.”

“You sound so sure.”

“That's because I am,” before I could cut in, he continued, “look, I believe God has brought us together for a reason. And as much as I believe in our relationship, I need you to believe in it too. You need to want it to work as much as I do, for it to work.”

The last year had been fairly great, I admit, with me slowly gaining my confidence back, but just because I'd been making efforts to progress did not mean I did not have many backslides – I mean words cut deep – all that negativity that I'd fed myself since I was eleven wasn't that easy to detox in a short space of time.

And at that moment, I could feel all my demons at full force because I was insecure about the relationship I had with Angelo and if it'd last. That's the trouble, I wanted it to last, but knowing me from my past records when I was scared, I'd break the thing whatever it was, before it broke me, in this case Angelo.

“Luciana what's with all the pregnant pauses?”

It took him calling me out, to draw me out of my thoughts, but before I could answer back, he'd answered for me. “You're still worried?”

There was no point in me lying. “Yeah.”

All he did was sigh and tell me that he was going to do something but he'd call me later, before hanging up without saying bye to me.

I was in a state of panic that I had already self-sabotaged and I'd pushed him over the edge. Trying to busy myself, I ironed the kids clothes and did some more laundry whilst I was at it – being a maid for Angelo did do me some good.

When I was near my room, I could hear the loud vibrations of my phone, so I quickly paced inside and answered a little breathless.

“I've booked a ticket for three days before your birthday.”

“What?”

“What's what?”

“Erm...nothing,” I said still shocked, “thank you.”

“Why are you thanking me? I'm your boyfriend,” before another garble could come out of my mouth he intercepted, “let's pray now, because I have to go over to my uncle's house, he needs me to do something for him.”

And without saying anything, I let him lead the prayer listening to him ask God to heal my past wounds and bring him and I closer as a couple spiritually, mentally and emotionally.

 

 

 

 

CHAPTER 2

 

 

Driving Action-Man to his football match (as in European football) was a task in itself - the boy just wouldn't keep still.

Strapped in his seat, he was describing all the ways he was going to tackle, mark the players, dribble the ball and then pretending to take a shot, he curved his leg before making a fist pump in the air.

“GOAL!”

I jumped in shock as his voice vibrated around the car. Yes it was inspiring to see how much confidence he possessed at such a young age, but there was a very thin line between confidence and downright arrogance.

“Pepito,you need to remember that you have a gift from God and He can take His gift back when and how he pleases.”

That got him – faith, family and football were the most important things to Pepito.

Ten minutes later of silent driving, we finally reached the football field. Parents were already seated on the chairs of the ample sized pitch. With a quick bye to me, Pepito eagerly got out of the car and ran over to his teammates and his coach. His energy had made him the captain of the team, but still it was to no surprise that the coach had had words with his parents concerning him not always following instructions.

Going over to where the seats were, which was on the edge of the freshly cut green grass of the pitch, I unfolded one of the blue plastic chairs and got myself comfortable. The weather was still as hot as ever but there was a light breeze that accompanied it that didn't make it irritatingly hot.

As I sat for over half an hour looking over at Pepito doing his stretches alongside his teammates I was overcome by a great sense of pride as I knew I was watching a star in the making. The dedication in him was like no other for a boy his age. His mother had told me how he'd been scouted out the previous year to join the football academy for under-tens.

'Never let it rest. 'Til your good is better and your better is best,' his parents had that saying drummed in Pepito's and his sister's head which was clear by the passion they each had in whatever they did. Little Miss Diva, Candela, was a ball of fire once she was in her tutu's and ballet pumps. The kids' parents were very keen on them having a strong work ethic despite them having more than enough disposable income to provide for their children. But often at times I worried that Pepito was a little bit too hard on himself.

“¿Cual es tuyo?”

Not expecting the person that sat next to me, I gasped in surprise and twisted my neck so fast that it ended up hurting me. I regretted gasping too because as soon as I had a taste of the air, it made my eyes water. He stunk. I couldn't really pin point what exactly it smelt of, the closest description would be like a mixture of piss and goat cheese

“Oh, lo siento, yo no hablo español,” I said keeping a sly distance away and half-registering it was a guy before glancing back to the field where the referee had just blown a whistle to signify the end of training.

“But you speak Spanish now?” he asked confused by my contradicting statement.

It was only after making sure that Pepito was following the referee's instruction that I gave my attention to the guy next to me.

And my oh my was he completely and utterly ruggedly handsome. His off-blonde hair was shaved round the sides and then in the front part he had a top knot and he had green eyes that reminded me of mint leaves.

He looked awesome but he smelt awful...and he was doing some weird shaking with his legs and tapping with his feet- it was a little unnerving.

Before I could allow my staring to go any further, I told him I spoke little Spanish in Spanish and that I could speak English.

“Okay, I say, which one,” he pointed out to the field, “ is for you?”

“Red top, number four,” I said pointing to a Pepito who was putting his captain armband on whilst calling his teammates to gather round for a moment of prayer. “You?”

“Green top, number seven.”

My eyes scouted the boy who fit that description on the field, playing as a defender.

“My name Gabino. You?”

“Luciana.”

The whistle was blown again and the players now gathered around the referee who was initiating the coin toss. I couldn't make out what was being said but the the ball being passed to Pepito spoke louder than words.

When he played I felt like I was playing with him, shouting out to him like it'd make all the difference, so it wouldn't come as a surprise that when the whistle for kick off sounded my nerves were shot. My heart was at a stand still as I watched Pepito make a pass to his teammate.

A few weeks back I had accompanied his father to do his medical and the doctor had said he had a heart like that of a horse. That was no lie. Pepito was a thunderball on the pitch.

Unfortunately within a few minutes the opposition had scored a goal, parents of the opposition clapped and jumped up in celebration including the guy next to me.

When I looked at Pepito there was a sullen look on his face but also determination as he jogged back over to his starting position. I feared that he might have pulled a tantrum - see that was something his parents and coach were still working on with him, as there had been one or two occasions that the opposition scored and he'd had a full-blown tantrum and argued with the referee and everyone knows not to argue with the referee. His passion was evident, but he needed to get it under control. 

His parents and coach had had a serious talk with him last time and said if he behaved that way again they were going to ban him from playing until they saw positive changes in his attitude.

From where I sat I knew the fact that the other team was ahead was eating him alive, but I was glad he could control his temper.

So after fifty minutes, a yellow card and a score of 2:1 in favour of the opposition, it was safe to say that Pepito was in the least bit in a good mood. It would be the second match of the season and his team had lost one, which in Pepito's eyes was unacceptable.

“He very good player.”

I felt really bad saying this but I really wanted to throw up from Gabino's body odour.

“Who?” I asked putting a little distance away subtly as I grabbed my bag to leave.

“Your son?”

“Oh no, I'm his au pair.”

“Oh.”

The grounds where they played football had a one storey building where the changing rooms were. Gabino followed me and as much as I hated how mean I was being, I really didn't want him to get too close to me in fear of others thinking I was the one with the odour, I was already too self-conscious as it was, I didn't need something else to add to it.

Fortunately as I waited for Pepito to get changed, I caught eye contact with the coach and I excused myself from Gabino to have a little word with him. In scrambled English he'd told me how proud he was of Pepito that he'd had stayed focused for the remainder the rest of the game despite them not winning.

Between us and everyone else, Pepito was the coach's favourite, and even though he'd threatened to ban him from further games, he was less convicted than his parents were. Pepito was becoming more and more notorious for his excellent delivery on the pitch and his temper and his parents wanted only his football talent to be the one emphasised.

After the talk with the coach, Pepito walked out of the changing rooms and strolled over to me, with his gym bag off his shoulders. He only gave a half-hearted responses as his teammates said bye to him. Boy, was he one sore loser.

“Vamos al parque después de recoger a su hermana,”I said to him as I opened the car door.

I knew he was behind me, before he even spoke. His smell was just overwhelmingly bad, I held my breath as I swivelled round to meet him face to face.

“Oh hey.”

“Ciao, I hear you go park.”

I asked God to forgive me as my initial reaction was to lie, but nobody was perfect and I was far from it. I willed myself not to be like Jacey from high school.

“Yeah, we're going to Buen Retiro, but I'm going to pick up his sister first, so you can just meet us there.”

 

Presenting an old phone, with the green screens, he said, “You put number here and I call you, so you have my number, when you enter park you call me. Okay?”

After swapping phone numbers, he'd introduced me to his rather quiet brother, standing next to him shyly, who was called Manuelo.

I waved bye for the time being and watched as they entered a old silver wagon car. I felt some type of way as I turned seeing the black jeep that I was driving which reminded me of why I had sold Angelo's gift to me.

Entering the car, Pepito was still in a mood and I knew better than to try and entertain him in conversation. Within twenty minutes, we'd reached where Candela held her ballet classes and picked her up.

One thing about Candela was that she could be really mischievous, and she just loved provoking her brother especially when he was in a sulky mood. Even as I placed her in the car seat, she kept on kicking her brother's seat at the front and giggling to herself.

“Candela, stop that right now or as soon as we get home, you're going to bed and I'll tell mummy and daddy.”

At hearing that, she immediately stopped. I never knew that white parents hit their children, until I saw Pepito getting smacked after several times of not listening to his mother. It wasn't like their parents disciplined them whenever they felt like it just when it called for it.

I ended up taking the kids to a little cafe to have lunch. Pepito's mood hadn't really changed, the only action I saw from him was when Candela had asked him to open her iced tea can for her.

It was times like that, that I thought of Angelo, he had a magical way with children. I'd messaged him in the morning, but he hadn't responded as I'd figured it was still early in the morning in the States.

It was just past one in the afternoon but now the gentle breeze that I had been clinging on had disappeared and in its place was sticky, suffocating heat. The kids obviously in their native land, were fully evolved to deal with the weather but I didn't deal well with it. I'd had a little case of the sciatic nerves where the sensation was my ass cheeks being set on fire, and as I sat on the metallic chairs of the cafe I could feel it kicking in again.

Ignoring the pain in my butt, I watched the interaction between the siblings; even as much as his sister got on his nerves, he loved Candela fiercely and took the role of big brother seriously. It brought a nostalgic memory of my brother. I missed him a lot and remembering how his smile had been the light I needed through my times of darkness made me miss him even more. I had already made plans to fly him out to Paris for Christmas if my parents allowed him to.

Smiling to myself, I remembered when I'd confronted Bobby after the barbecue party about giving my very private poem to Angelo without permission, he acted as if I'd done him a huge favour – which truthfully he did but I wouldn't admit that to him.

 

The other week he'd asked me when I was coming back to the States and my heart broke hearing his voice. Luckily he'd been having plenty fun with all his friends so he was pretty much busy.

The summer had been pretty eventful, the most eventful that it had been in years. The last time my summer had been this height of eventful was when my dad had first been incarcerated and then all the bureaucracy of changing schools and moving house made the days go quicker.

All the other summers from then on had basically been me staying indoors most of the time except when I took Bobby to daycare and when he evolved into a social pedigree I would chaperone him to his and his friends' outings.

Two months of independence and I was still finding it strange how much had changed over the last year. Needing to take a break from memory lane, I stood up but as soon as I did so it was as if someone had set a match on my butt. The pain was bad.

When I eventually sat in the drivers' seat, my butt's pain silenced to a humming sting and I knew when I got out of the car it'd get worse. It had been something I'd been dealing for over a month now on and off which I noticed that it only happened when the weather was especially hot. I thought it was an embarrassing thing to be suffering from and one I didn't think anyone would take seriously, so it was something I had to nurse myself with painkillers and some massage oil, but it didn't really help.

It was a silent drive to the park, which was unusual but highly welcome. It was only a ten minute drive and I'd already texted Gabino that we were on our way.

When we got to the park, Gabino was already there with his brother who was kicking a ball by himself near their beat up car. As soon as Pepito saw the ball the eagerness was bright in his eyes but he was still fronting and stuck to my side as I approached Gabino

“Hi, you take long to find here,” he said I couldn't help but detect the little agitation in his voice.

“Oh no, I just had to let the children have their lunch.”

Speaking of children, Candela had her hands in mine and I was growing more and more worried that her and her brother will say something out of turn concerning Gabino's smell, but so far and so good, they hadn't said anything.

“Oh okay. You want boat?”

At the mention of boats, there was no way I could have said no, with the excited yeses that came from the children, especially Little Miss Diva, who then started jumping up and down in my face.

We eventually rented out boats for an hour. It was one the things I enjoyed about being in Spain, the beauty in the simplicity of the scene.

Gabino being the man, steered the boat out into the lake and also allowed Manuelo and Pepito to have a go after much pleading.

Gabino's smell was still pungent and there'd been a few times I'd held my tongue when I really wanted to tell him to jump in the water. I hadn't missed Pepito wrinkling his nose a few times when Gabino was showing him how to row the boat.

 

Little Miss Diva hadn't been so reserved in letting known her feelings over the foul smell. But I was thankful that instead of her telling Gabino to his face,she'd said it quietly as she lay against me, as we rested at the back of the boat, whilst watching the guys do all the hard work. She had told me that he stunk and I told her it wasn't a nice thing to say and she should keep her thoughts to herself.

Needing to adjust my position due to the incessant stinging in my butt, I told Candela to sit up a little. Within me, I knew she was right and Gabino needed to so badly do something about it, but I didn't think it was my place to say anything to him because I'd only just met the guy.

From onlookers we looked like a young couple on a family day out with our kids, but I imagined that a reality with only one person. But it was such a shame with Gabino's body odour because he was honestly gorgeous and he seemed like a pretty chill guy.

After the boat ride, we walked along the long path, that led back to the grassy area. We found a place where to settle, Gabino and myself sat on the bench whilst the kids played football.

Even though Candela acted like a princess who only walked on ground made of gold, she was pretty much sporty and for a four year old, she didn't play so bad at football.

There were times when she so decided like a typical diva that she didn't want to adhere to the rules of the game and instead picked up the ball and made her brother and Manuelo chase her for the ball.

“So you with them for long?”

“No, not for so long, just until September.”

“Okay. You Americana?”

“Yes, you Espagnol?”

“Yes,” he replied grinning which made me fall in a full out laugh and he soon joined in. Nothing funny had been said, I just felt there was some unspoken connection there. It was weird.

After our laughing died out we engaged in a couple minutes of polite conversation before we entered into a comfortable silence and I took it as my opportunity to study him properly as he quietly looked over at the kids playing.

First thing I noticed was that there was a hole at the front of his black worn-out converse. The black chinos he wore were ill-fitted because he appeared at least two sizes too big for him. The white plain top was probably the only article of clothing that appeared to be in good condition. And round his neck he had a wooden bead rosary dangling in the middle of his chest.

“So erm you work?” I asked after a stretched out silence.

He then proceeded to tell me about how he had been working as a bartender in Ibiza three months before working in the strips, but then he quit after his brother was invited to join a football academy. His single mother worked all the time so she wouldn't have had time to take his brother to training, so he stepped up and came back to Madrid.

 

His openness kind of threw me off guard and when he was just going to continue, Candela, hands folded and an unhappy pout dressing her face came stalling to me telling me that the boys wouldn't allow her to play. That was the indication she'd reached her quota for the day.

Without hesitating she climbed onto my lap and expected me to wrap my arms around her so I could cuddle her, which I did. Within three minutes, I looked down smiling, seeing her already sound asleep. Her auburn curls were a wild mess, but because she was Little Miss Diva, it only made her look adorable.

“You like bebe?”

“Si, but Candela is a lot to handle,” taking a moment to look over the grass where the boys were playing, I briefly watched Manuelo show Pepito a ball trick. “So is your brother always quiet?”

“He likes no talk.”

I really wanted to ask him if he was aware of his body smell, I just didn't understand how someone as gorgeous as him could smell so bad.

Lost in my thoughts, I barely registered my phone ringing. Taking one arm that was holding Candela, I reached into my bag and fished out my phone.

“Hey.”

“Hi, how are you?”

I don't know what it was but anytime Angelo called me, my voice would get all low and girly and soft, it was something I did without thinking. Either way hearing his voice did nothing to quench the ache to see him in the flesh.

“I'm okay, I saw your message, what have you been up to?”

“I'm just in the park with the kids,” whilst I was talking Gabino shouted for his brother to come over and Pepito followed too.

“Who's that?”

“Oh, a guy I met at Pepito's match today, his brother played for the opposition. We decided to meet up at the park.”

At this moment, Gabino was passing a bottle of water for Manuelo to drink, my heart tendered seeing how grown and parental he was. Besides me, Pepito was digging out his own water bottle from my bag.

“Interesting.”

“What's interesting?”

“This guy you've just met.”

I could only roll my eyes at him. “I thought being insecure was my job?”

“Some may think that people with looks have it easy, but what about, God forbid, you find someone who completes the package?”

“You'll get over it.”

“That's not funny,” he said and in my head I could just see the pout he would have had if he was with me. “Promise me, you won't go looking for the complete package.”

I laughed at this. “Angelo, are you being serious right now?”

“Yes,” he said before I heard him curse to himself.

“What's wrong?”

“These fourteen year olds who are unable to wait for the traffic lights to go red before crossing.”

“Wait, hold on, are you driving?” 

“Yeah, I'm on my way to the hospital.”

Now it was my time to get annoyed. “Angelo how many times am I supposed to tell you to stop taking calls whilst your driving?”

I hated when I felt that I was mothering him, but I didn't have enough fingers and toes to count how many times in the past month I'd told him not to call me whilst driving.

“Yes, but you also know this time is the longest time we have to talk on the phone.”

“There's always something called text messaging,” looking over my side Gabino had a concentrated look on his face on the boys but I knew he was also taking in my conversation on the phone.

I didn't want to be having an argument with my boyfriend infront of others. “We'll talk later.”

Before Angelo could respond, I cut off the phone on him.

 

 

 

 

 

CHAPTER 3

 

 

“How can you tell me you're going to Paris for three months and you don't even know where you're going to stay, what you're going to do, you don't even know anyone there?”

 

“Me and this girl that I met in our language classes are going to be staying together.”

 

It was early in the day, but never too early for my mother to piss me off. She'd been gracious enough to squeeze time between her getting ready to go to work to list off as many reasons as to why I shouldn't take the job.

 

Pepito and Candela's grandparents had picked them up in the morning and they would be with them till the Saturday evening, so that just left me in the house with the cleaner who was currently cleaning the bathrooms whilst I was in Pepito's room, putting my mother on loudspeaker as I made his bed.

 

“You say you're going to be staying with a girl you met in your language classes. How long have you been there, two months, that's not enough time to know someone. Even then, I don't know her, your father doesn't know her, we don't even know her family.”

 

It would have been the wrong time to point out that she'd barely known Sara for more than six hours before she was all buddy-buddy with her and taking all of us to her family's Christmas dinner. If I had said that she would have probably told me to shut up and go on a rant about how I thought I was all grown up just because I was in another continent and on and on and on and I was in no mood to deal with an argument.

 

Mother Carter had calmed down somewhat the last year - or maybe not, she was still very much hot headed with thin patience.

 

“Mum, this is what I want to do, I've been in America all my life, I ju – I want to

live my life.”

 

“Oh, you want to live your life? Well what about if something happens to you, whilst you're over there? Then you won't have much of a life to live.”

 

The only reason why my parents were okay with me coming to Spain was because Angelo's family was here, so in their head it meant that if anything were to happen to me there was always someone local I could get in touch with.

 

“Mum I just told you I'm going with-”

 

“Have you looked at the news lately and seen all the crimes going on? I don't have that kind of money to look for a lawyer if you get kidnapped.”

 

I could only roll my eyes. “Mum, nothing is going to happen to me.”

 

“Okay well don't say I didn't tell you so. You don't even know anything about where you're working. You don't even know if it's prostitution that they use young girls your age to do and 'teaching English' is what they use as a cover up.”

 

If her goal was to discourage me to go, well I applaud her because it was working.

 

“You can't even speak French.”

 

“I only need to know basic French, because as I said I'm teaching English.”

 

“You're not serious. You really think you're grown and that you know everything. I've told you now, don't take that job.”

 

The way she said that sounded so ominous. It hurt me deeply that my mother would go to extreme lengths to stop me from doing something which I thought would be a great experience for me.

 

These were the times that I wished I could speak to Angelo, but he was at work, plus our communication was kind of awkward ever since I'd hung up the phone “in the presence of another male” as he so nicely put it.

 

When I'd called him later that night he was calm yet unresponsive, typical pissed-off Angelo style. He still wasn't getting the point that the only reason I had hung up the phone on him was because he was driving whilst on the phone – I wouldn't be the reason why he got himself into an accident.

 

But then he'd argued back that the previous times when he'd called and I knew he was driving I never did hang up the phone on him – which was true. And I'd tried to explain why I did but then he said his break time was ending and he needed to go.

 

I practically stayed up the night waiting for him to Skype me, but he didn't. We hadn't said our prayers together for the first time.

 

I mean, yeah, back when I was in the States we did argue as per usual. We probably argued about something everyday, but it was always cool between us, because we'd come together and squash the beef quickly. We pretty much acted like one of those couples with the wife complaining about how useless her husband was and then in the next second she would ask her husband what he wanted for dinner.

 

But for the last four days, it was like there was some sort of wall between us. The night before, our conversation had started out a little icy but a little better than the last few days but then it took a nose dive when he said we should video call and I'd said no. I just wasn't feeling it yesterday, I was on my period and felt like bleurgh and I didn't want him to see me with my raccoon eyes, clammy face and chapped lips. I could sense that he was trying to avoid an argument too and so he told me he had to do some work.

 

I put my foot down and before I let him go, I made us pray but even as I led the prayer, I felt disconnected and it felt empty between us.

 

After hanging up, I'd cried. It'd be the first time that I'd cried over a guy- actually that's a lie, nevertheless, the idea that I was crying over a guy just seemed so foolish to me and I had cried some more purely for that reason. I just did not understand what was going on.

 

I never usually was this overly emotional but the distance and decisions that I'd had to be making was overwhelming me.

 

After forever and ever had passed, my mum finally ended the phone call, but not without emphasising again how much risk I was putting myself under if I decided to go to Paris.

 

Let's just say I was not mad about the phone call coming to an end.

 

After finishing up tidying up Pepito's room, and seeing the cleaner off, I got myself ready to meet Dominica, so she would help me with my oral exam that I was seriously praying that I'd pass as language was most definitely not my forte and asking Angelo to help was totally out of the question.

 

 

I arrived at the fast food place first. Between getting the kids up and ready for their grandparents, studying a little and tidying a bit, I'd foregone eating, very unusual but when the smell of crispy French fries flirted with my senses, I didn't bother waiting for Dominica to show up and I just went to order.

 

Half an hour later when Dominica strolled in with a mildly annoyed look, I'd already finished my chicken burger and fries and I was slurping on my coke.

 

“Ciao bonita.”

 

Getting up, I placed one kiss on both her cheeks. “You're usually on time, did something happen?”

 

“My manager tell me he wants me to stay for one hour more because one staff call in sick but I say no. All the time, someone call in sick or late he always come to me the only negro that works there, to do overtime like I have nothing to do other than work like a dog.”

 

Okay, I was completely baffled. “So hold on, you just walked out?”

 

“Yes. He know I'm right and he couldn't say anything after I said all that, so I take my bag and leave.”

 

“You quit your job?”

 

“No. I have shift in the morning. I dare him to tell me that I can't work tomorrow,” then as an afterthought she added, “I'm not one of these black girls that these white people think they can dribble and manipulate.”

 

I laughed because of how I'd imagined the scene between her and her boss go down in my head. Whenever Dominica got real heated which was rare, her African side will make an appearance and she'd start cussing out in Portuguese. This boss of hers must have really had it coming for her to be this mad. Dominica was quite an easy-going person but nobody could take her for an idiot. Lord knows I wouldn't have the guts to do what she did.

 

After she cooled down she went to order for her food whilst I threw my rubbish away. When she came back with her everything large meal – another thing I liked about her, she loved to eat a lot - she didn't hesitate in digging into her food whilst cussing out her boss again for not giving her a proper break.

 

“So anyway tell me what's been going on with you?”

 

“Nothing really, just taking care of the children and studying for my exam.”

 

“So why do you look as if a cow sit on your face?”

 

Some may take offence at Dominica's humour but I found it completely hilarious, so when she said that my automatic reaction was to laugh.

 

She looked at me weird whilst putting some fries in her mouth. “¿Estás bien?

 

“I'm fine, just been a little bit busy.”

 

She wasn't convinced but she let it go and carried on eating her meal whilst engaging in some light conversation with me. Then out of nowhere she changed the topic to what I was really trying to avoid but silly enough to think Dominica would forget.

 

“Luciana, have you submitted the forms yet? We really need to look for apartment.”

 

“I haven't,” I said looking up to her forlorn expression, “but that doesn't mean I'm not going to...I've just been busy.”

 

That brought out a more relaxed look on her face and she was content enough that she resumed eating her fries but I felt sort of bad because I was sugar-coating the situation in order to give her the answer she wanted to hear.

 

See this is what I meant me being overwhelmed with decisions; there was another thing that happened during the week that was making me question my move to Paris and that was that the kids' parents had offered to extend my contract until mid January of the following year.

 

Two days ago they had called me to sit with them and told me they thought I was a positive influence in the children's life and they were happy with their progress. The told me how the kids too wanted me to stay, plus their work schedule left them too busy to interview for a new au pair.

 

And there lied my dilemma – I couldn't lie that the troublesome kids already held a special place in my heart but I also knew I wanted – no, needed more adventure in my life.

 

Been in Europe had changed me to quite an extent in the short period of time I'd arrived and I really did feel I was growing into my own person as opposed to when I was back in the States when I was basically over hovering over Angelo like a halo.

 

Little exaggeration, but the point being made is pretty clear. As sad as it sounds, Angelo was like my only friend; doing stuff and going out with him was my only respite.

 

It's like all the time people always want something from me, and then there's this generous, annoying, beautiful, frustrating guy who happens to be my boyfriend and all he wants to do is just give me all of him, just to appreciate how much he loves all of me.

 

I had wanted us to have our own lives, instead of clogging each other's space but now that we had that and more, it was like there was a huge gaping hole between us getting bigger and bigger.

 

Thinking about it, brought tears to my eyes, I bent my head down slurping on my drink to avoid Dominica seeing me.

 

“Luciana, les puedo decir que algo está mal con usted.”

 

“I didn't understand a word of what you said,” I said whilst trying to show some humour on my face.

 

She didn't buy into it one bit. “I can tell there is something wrong with you.”

 

I also wasn't the type be talking about my problems in general, courtesy of my mother, but all the decisions that I was expected to make within the next couple of days weighed heavy on my spirit and I thought having a secondary opinion on the situation wouldn't hurt.

 

“I don't know, I'm just having all these worries about Angelo and I.”

 

I never thought I'd one day be sharing my relationship problems with someone, it was still weird for me to think that I had a boyfriend, like an actual boy friend – it was pure madness.

 

“What kind of worries?”

 

“Like... are we going to be able to cope with our relationship in the long-term,” I said whilst feeling knots of anxiety being made in the middle of my chest.

 

She breathed out slowly before starting, “Okay, I'm going to be honest with you, but please don't think I'm being negative.”

 

“Okay,” I replied already predicting that I would not like what she would have to say.

 

“How old are you bonita, nineteen? Twenty? And he is what you say?”

 

“Nearly twenty-three.”

“Okay,” she said before taking another deep breath, “you both still very young. From little you mention of him he seems like a good guy but at twenty-two – no guy wants to be tied down to a girl.”

 

“He's not tied down.”

 

“Okay maybe not tied down -- think like this – from what I've gathered if a guy can fly out all the way from America, just to spend time with you for two days, that must mean his pocket swell, sí? But what about if he not rich?

 

“His money does not matter to me.”

 

“Oh you say that. But imagine if the guy had to save up for months just to buy a plane ticket. Long-distance never ideal.”

 

I stayed quiet because she was only saying what I couldn't voice out loud.

 

“Hm and don't think I haven't seen you staring at some nice looking hombres.”

 

“No I haven't.”

 

“Sí, sí, I see you don't lie.”

 

“Okay, give me an example of when I've stared at a guy longer than it was appropriate for me to have.”

 

“When we went bowling.”

 

“No, you cannot use that against me, he was talking so fast in Spanish I could not understand what he was saying.”

 

“He wasn't even talking to you!”

 

“Yes he was.”

 

“No he wasn't. His friend was behind you and he was telling him about the date he go to, the night before,”she replied lifting her eyebrows at me expectedly for a comeback.

 

I remained quiet because I realised I may or may not have been wrong – I had a thing for staring.

 

And Dominica had yet to finish what she wanted to say, “It's easier and more tempting to cheat in long-distance relationships.”

 

“I'm not going to cheat.”

 

That I could bank on. But what I couldn't exactly bank on was Angelo not cheating on me. I mean, I did trust him, but with my insecurities I couldn't help but fear that one day he would get tired of my ways.

 

“Bonita, you really need to think about what you want. You're young, don't stick to one just because you've grown familiar and you're scared of change. Change is how people grow in life. And I'm speaking to you as you're friend, not because I want you to come to Paris with me, even though I really want you to come.”

 

Dominica's words rung loud in my mind but not wanting to bemoan my uncertainties any longer, I lit up a forced smile and told her it was about time that I started practising for my oral exam.

 

 

 

CHAPTER 4

 

I woke up something past nine on a Saturday morning thinking I was in a toaster. Two hours before I had got up highly irritated; my covers in a game of Twister with my legs, sheets damp with my sweat, and eyes heavy with sleep, to open the damn windows but in a thirty-something degree weather, that did absolutely nothing to get some fresh air into the room.

 

And if anyone knew anything about me is that I was not keen on opening windows to prevent having unwanted intruders i.e. wasps and things of that nature disturb my peace because then it'd be another hoopla of me chasing the damn thing around or pulling weird faces and screaming if it got close to me and made that God-forsaken buzzing noise, I'd not be able to rest until I beat the life out of it with my slippers. Another reason why I didn't like opening my windows was because I had a fear of a bird flying in and biting my face off.

 

Strong imagery there, I know.

 

Anyways, I was tired. And this is why I was tired – Dominica had made me go clubbing with her to take my mind off the oral Spanish exam which I knew I didn't pass and I had only entered the house at four am and didn't get to sleep until an hour later.

 

The kids were returning home from their grandparents' house towards evening time, but before that I'd promised Gabino I was going to meet up with him. Even though I didn't drink, my chopped up sleep did not help matters and just the thought of the full day I had ahead brought on a headache.

 

Reluctantly, I sluggishly got myself out the bed and proceeded to go to the bathroom. I was so tempted to text Gabino and tell him I was not going to be able to make it but decided against it because...I don't know, I figured time with him wouldn't be so taxing.

 

I stripped off my clothes and entered the shower - my favourite part of the house. It had body jets, pretty much meaning I had a massage everyday. For someone who didn't really care about the latest technology or was so much into expensive things, I couldn't deny that it was a wise investment by the Almas'. Because of it, I struggled everyday to want to get out of the shower.

 

As the water pressed into my pores, I couldn't help but think how badly I failed my Spanish exam. Dominica, being the friend that she is told me that I was just over thinking things and that's why she had made us go out in the first place, but I knew deep in my heart I had failed.

 

I cringed just thinking about how I'd stuttered and mixed up the grammar and tenses as I fumbled my way talking about my experience living in Madrid so far. Even when I rolled my 'R''s it sounded rusty and just plain unnatural. I just did not understand why I was making so many mistakes when I'd practised so many times.

 

My saving grace was that I'd passed my reading and listening, writing I was shaky about that, a lot of the times I forgot where to place all the accents and so I guessed.

 

Inhala, exhala.

 

I let my nerves get the best of me even my teacher that was assessing me picked up on it, she was nice about it and told me to take my time.

 

Language was just something I was not great at – I mean for the last nineteen years I only needed to know one language. My father's family - the one I hardly knew of were Jamaican, and my mother no clue, so the only other language I could possible know would be patois, but then again patois was basically an isotope of the English language and not that hard to understand but damn hard to speak.

 

Dominica was like a friggin' monster or master when it came to language, I'll go with monster. As well as Portuguese, she spoke her native Creole dialect for cursing purposes, obviously Spanish, and she was in the same language school with me because she was in advanced English classes and learning French at the same time.

 

It was a wonder how she didn't get all jumbled up in her head with the many languages that she spoke.

 

So I would have loved if I could just stay in bed and sulked until the kids came home. If I was in the States I could guarantee that's what would have happened but here's me...going out, making plans, spending time with a friend. It was almost hilarious how everything had changed.

 

Despite it all, I missed my baby. Yes, I was cheesing, I was cheesing hard, but I just wanted him to hold me and kiss my neck and whisper into my ears that everything was going to be okay. And because I was missing him so much I made up my mind that I would squash all the beef between us by the end of the day. It would be only a week until he'd be coming to Madrid and I just wanted us to make the most of our time together without any further arguments.

 

But today as with most other days, I couldn't really afford time to myself so within fifteen minutes I was back out the shower again.

 

Before leaving the house, I had made sure to take the maximum dose of ibupofren because I was taking the metro. I knew that the kids' parents wouldn't mind if I took their car out for my own leisure, but I still thought it to be unprofessional.

 

And plus, the Madrid traffic was crazy mad in the centre so that was another reason for me to take the Metro. Hence why I needed the painkillers, to deal with with sciatics theatrics.

 

I was wearing a floral maxi-dress, gold sandals and a pair of black shades. As I made the ten minute walk to the station a smile curled on my lips remembering a few months back wearing the same dress when Angelo had made me go Costco with him to feed his supply of energy drinks and a bunch of other things he wanted to buy for the homeless shelter.

 

It was a bad decision for me to go because I'd hardly eaten the whole day and I'd gone straight from work to be with him, and because I was so hungry I ended up thinking with my belly and bought two large boxes containing twenty- four croissants in each – one for the family and one for me. In two days I finished them, in my defence though one or two or five croissants is hardly ever filling.

 

Anyway, after Angelo finished what he needed, we'd of course, like normal human beings, if such existed, sat down in the restaurant and indulged in the Costco pizza.

 

I was in my own little world salivating and feasting on my pepperoni pizza when Angelo randomly said he wanted to kiss me.

 

Me being caught unawares by his demand had an 'huh' look on my face. But then Angelo snorted and said he loved me but he'll postpone the kiss and pointed out that my front teeth was smeared red with tomato paste and bits of pepperoni on my gums. The word 'mortified' was not enough to describe how I felt at that time, but now that I thought about it, my shoulders shook in laughter as I entered the station and I was the subject of strange looks thinking I had lost it.

 

Gabino had texted me that he'd be waiting in the square for me and when I did get out of the station, him and his handsome self were already there, looking all cool and unbothered, hands stuffed in his cargo shorts, wearing a plain tshirt, with the same beaded cross on his chest and black aviators – a cool hippie. Unfortunately the closer I got to him, the obnoxious odour of uncooked meat gone bad pounced off of him in waves and latitudes. A lot had happened in the week since I last saw him and I had completely forgotten about it and I'd come unguarded to the smell.

 

“How are you?” he asked as he reached out to hug me.

 

Putting on a smile on my face, I put my arms around him, hugging him back, but not before sucking in a breath. “A little tired but I'm okay.”

 

“Why you tired?”

 

By this time he had let go of me and we were walking along the myriad of shops off the square. The heat was as fierce as usual, some people were sitting around the fountain, some sun-bathing, sun-burnt, walking lazily, walking hurriedly but me and Gabino we were just going at our own pace.

 

“I went clubbing yesterday and I came back this morning.”

“What time?”

“Four.”

 

An apologetic look crossed his features at hearing what I said. “You tell me you want to stay home. We go out another time.”

 

“No it's fine,” I responded even though I was dead weight.

 

“You want something to eat?”

 

“Si, si,” I replied without thinking, anything that would get me off my feet was a good idea at that moment in time.

 

We entered into a fast food joint that was fairly busy and got burgers and chips.

 

“I pay,” said Gabino bringing out his tattered looking leather wallet.

 

Another man who needed to show his chivalrous side. Was this a Spanish thing? Or just a male thing? I didn't know.“Please don't.”

 

“No worry,” he replied passing the cashier a five euro note.

 

“Es €8.50.”

 

By this time Gabino, was emptying his wallet dropping the copper coins on the counter top looking a little frustrated. The cashier was getting a little impatient because there was a growing queue behind us.

 

“It's okay I'll pay the rest.”

 

“No, I said I'll pay for it!” I jumped in shock, not expecting Gabino raising his voice at me before stalking off.

 

Apologising to the cashier, I handed her the remaining change and took our food in a tray put inside a brown paper bag.

 

I spotted Gabino sitting in one of them square tables with chairs on opposite sides. I sat in the empty seat. He was embarrassed I understood that and he'd only acted from that emotion. Men and their ego. Usually I wouldn't have taken a guy shouting in my face like that but with Gabino...there was something about it I couldn't put my finger on.

 

He did the sign of the cross before he started eating, leading by example I said a quiet grace. Opening my eyes I was ready to dive into my burger but Gabino's BO was just too much to bear. It actually made me sick to my stomach that I just couldn't eat.

 

The sad thing about all of this was that he just seemed so unaware of his smell. It was like a girl on her period walking around without a clue in the world that she had huge bloodstain at the back of her white jeans – that was Gabino only in smell.

 

“I'm sorry.”

 

“I don't understand.”

 

“I sorry, okay. I smell!” he shouted again out loud which made the patrons of the fast food joint turn towards our table.

 

The loud scratchy sound of the Gabino's chair being pulled back was heard. I was too shocked for words to say anything. He looked visibly hurt and annoyed. I could see people looking weirded out whispering amongst each other.

 

It wasn't until I saw people wrinkling their noses as he walked past them that I too abandoned my table and went chasing for him outside.

 

“Gabino, wait!” I shouted out as he nearly slammed the shop doors in my face.

 

Quickly rushing out of the shop, by the time I caught up with him, best believe that all oxygen had vacated my lungs.

 

“Gabino, please wait.”

 

The hombre walked so damn fast, Grabbing onto one of his arms, I was able to make him stop moving like he was a man on a damn mission.

 

“Que pasa?” he spat at me.

 

Beads of sweat trickled down his forehead, he was sweating all over. One would thing he'd just finished an intense work out at the gym.

 

I couldn't see his eyes because they were shielded by his aviators. For a moment I stood quiet brooding inside me how to approach the 'situation' without rattling him again.

 

He'd gone zero to a hundred in 2.5 seconds, without any amber alerts.

 

“Que pasa Gabino?”

 

“Que pasa Gabino, que pasa Gabino,” he started mimicking me, “you, que pasa?”

 

People were starting to take notice of Gabino making a scene but they stared for a second or so in idle interest, before carrying on with their business.

 

“I think you mi amigo.”

 

Shocked by his statement, I emphasised, “But I am your amigo.”

 

“No, if you my amigo, you tell me that I smell but you didn't.”

 

I didn't know what to say to this, so again I stayed quiet for a bit. I didn't know if it was wise for me to admit to him that because we'd just recently met I wasn't sure how he was going to receive me being honest to him about him.

 

“I'm sorry,” was all I could say.

 

He gave me the dirtiest of looks even though his eyes were covered, and then just yanked his arm out of my grasp, I didn't know I had had a hold on him for that long. And then he started walking away.

 

What was happening?

 

Again I walked up to him but with every step I took it felt like he was taking ten, so really I was just trying to catch up to him.

 

I was so clueless on what to do. I had wounded his pride that much I could tell and I hadn't meant to do that, it was the total opposite of what I was trying to do. I had to recalculate.

 

I didn't say anything to him but I was deep in thought – there was definitely something going on with Gabino.

 

I had thought I was making a good show of not making obvious about his smell but of course I hadn't. It had totally backfired.

 

And speaking of backfiring – my ass was officially on fire. It didn't help that Gabino was walking at the Flash speed.

 

He still hadn't calmed down. His shoulders were hunched, he reminded me of The Hulk, as he walked through the crowded streets of Puerta del Sol. I didn't know if I should leave him alone to allow him to calm down or I should continue stalking him round the square.

 

In the end, my ass won. I needed to sit down. And he clearly needed to be alone if he couldn't even face looking at me.

 

For half an hour I sat around the fountain – body broken in all types of ways, thinking how I never would have predicted that time with Gabino would be so taxing.

 

I still needed to get home to make food for the kids, I still needed to speak to Angelo and I really would just have liked some cheetos I could dip into mango flavoured ice cream.

 

There was a lot riding on me getting an ice cream, but instead I sat. I sat and sat, waiting for my fairy godmother to wave her wand and tell me what was going on in that boy's head and while she was it, make him get me some gelato.

 

I could have been in bed, I didn't have to deal with this.

 

The urge to message Angelo was strong but I knew that he'd be sleeping in. Sleeping in for Angelo meant being able to staying in bed until eight am until he had to get up for his teaching session at the shelter.

 

My eyes tried to scout out any sign of Gabino, but I came up short.

 

Ten minutes and half-drowsy, there was a second moment of shade and when I turned to my side , I saw Gabino bending down to sit- but this time it looked like he was being careful not to sit too close to me.

 

To be honest, he didn't smell actually it was the total opposite, he smelt fantastic – for the most part. A masculine, citrusy smell, unfortunately it didn't cover up all of his natural scent.

 

I didn't say anything, I think I had a little right to be pissed as well - he could have at least said he needed to be alone. But then again I thought I had no right to be pissed off, because I was the one that instigated the whole thing.

 

“I go to shop and put perfume,” I heard him say breaking the ice.

 

Lack of sleep, chasing a guy, sitting in the damn near nuclear sun, I had no words of response.

 

A truck just needed to appear and take me to my bed.

 

“Luciana, I sorry.”

 

I turned around not expecting the apology. And the tone which he apologised in – there was a certain vulnerability that I wouldn't have expected from a guy of his physique, you know all manly and sporty and gorgeous.

 

Then he asked if he could go on the internet on my phone. I let him.

 

As he did whatever he needed with my phone, I allowed myself to close my eyes and and the smell of fresh spring water flirted with my senses and made me feel calm. I was deaf to the sound around me. Only the gurgling of water behind me and the heat of the sun was all my senses could bear.

 

In that moment when I closed my eyes, I really could have been anywhere, and if there was anywhere I really could have been it would been wrapped up in...my bed.

 

Sleeping with Angelo - I'd only ever slept with Angelo once and once was more than enough to realise that he and I could not share a bed for as long as we wanted to remain all chaste and pure.

 

Six out of ten times during the eight hours in bed, I'd had all the feels in the lower region of my body, but when the heat got too much I turned straight back off. Let's just say...Angelo was very passionate.

 

He ended up giving up his bed for me and went to sleep in his brother's room, I'd said I should be the one to sleep in his brother's room but he insisted no. The next morning when I was on break at work he'd texted: Now I can wake up to the smell of you. That had put a smile on my face for the rest of the day.

 

If my parents ever found out that I'd slept the night at Angelo's house, yeah, they wouldn't be the happiest bunnies. Even though they liked Angelo they did not permit sleepovers.

 

The only reason I had even been able to stay at his house that night was because my mum and dad had gone to work, and my brother had gone on some school trip for three days or something. It was perfect timing.

 

My semi-siesta into bliss was ruined by a gentle tap on my shoulder telling me to wake up. When I did, my eyes were heavy with sleep and exhaustion, and I thought I could hear myself mumble some nonsense as I familiarised myself again to my surroundings.

It was a good thing I was black or from the duration of time I had been in the sun I would have vaporised into a pile of soot.

 

Gabino tpassed my phone back to me and told me to look what was on it. The page on the screen was on a translation site. I briefly looked at the Spanish translation, and tried to work out what it said I quickly gave up and glanced below for the English translation:

 

I have Aspergers' syndrome.

 

In a split second I felt like – no, I was the worst human in the world. Like if there was a Guiness Record for the worst human I'd be right there on the page like BAM!

 

“Oh my gosh, I'm so sorry Gabino.”

 

Strangely a smile lifted in the corners of his mouth.

 

“It's okay. You not know.”

 

Everything in my head started making sense, the little flickers of strange mannerisms I had witnessed back at Pepito's football match only solidified my suspicions. But in the glaring sun, forget sweat patch, I was a sweat puddle and most likely had some BO going on and I didn't care.

 

I hugged him tight.

 

CHAPTER 5 

Angelo.

Angelo.

Angelo.

That would be the recurring theme for the day. Feet swollen and butt stinging I didn't care – it was my angel's homecoming.

The Almas' were like the best foster parents ever. They were giving me the rest of the day off on the condition that I would be back by breakfast to take the kids to school. Maybe it was just me, but I really thought they were making an effort into making me feel at home.

I'd chosen to extend my contract in Madrid and even though I was okay with my decision, I wasn't okay. My mother had terrified me into not going to Paris and that's the part I wasn't okay with.

I hardly picked up her phone calls. When I did pick up her phone calls, I only gave one-word replies. What pissed me off more was how oblivious she was to how I really did not want to be talking to her. 

Reluctantly, I had told Dominica about me not going earlier in the week after she wouldn't stop pestering me about needing to find an apartment to rent and putting down a deposit, and all that adult stuff that did not sound pleasing to my ears at all.

She'd been highly pissed at me at first, but then she quickly got over it. That's one of the things I liked about her. In less than three days she'd already found an apartment, done everything she needed to do and was set to leave the following week.

I should have been going with her, but instead I let fear get in the way and fell prey to cowardice. I really could only blame myself and leave that in the past, besides I truly enjoyed living in Madrid, it's just that...I wanted more.

When I was done making the kids' meal I left them with their parents playing a game of snakes and ladders – you know the picture perfect family.

Shutting the door close I walked out. Angelo's plane was due to land in about an hour. I was taking the metro to the airport and I'd figured out that we'd be taking the taxi back to his hotel.

The early September air was quite humid so I was more than ecstatic when I felt the first whoosh of the air conditioning as I entered the arrivals about forty minutes later. Excitement stirred and stirred within me and I'm sure by then I was just one cheesy goop inside.

My eyes eagerly looked up and down the screens to see when and if Angelo's plane had landed.

There were more people than I actually expected also waiting; so much activity, cries, laughter, kisses, handshakes- it kind of made the whole saying – distance makes the heart grow fonder come alive. But it was all just like white noise to me.

Where is he? 

I impatiently kept checking the time on my phone and looked at the screens. Angelo's flight had landed. I got even more disheartened when the arrival doors kept sliding open and a passenger that wasn't Angelo would walk through so I texted him but he didn't reply, I figured it was because he was still going through customs and getting his luggage.

I was just about to walk away after about thirty minutes to look at the screens to ensure I hadn't looked at the wrong flight number, when I had to take a double take. There in living colour and in the flesh was Angelo. He looked a little pale and tired, but he was still damn gorgeous to me.

I let him get through the crowds of people at the front before I made myself known to him.

When I called out his name his head quickly snapped to my side. When he saw me, he flashed the brightest of smiles as I upped my pace to him.

I was never a person who was into the whole PDA but I couldn't help but hug him really tight. Feeling his warmth against me there was nothing like it. And I even went as far as giving him a peck on the lips – Angelo swiftly recovered from his shock at me initiating a kiss in public by trying to suck on my bottom lip and that shit I liked too much when he did it but there was a time and place for that.

“Slow down buddy, don't get too ambitious,” I said giggling pulling away.

He was about to say something but then we both heard his name being called out and we simultaneously turned in the direction that it was being called from. Instead of the confused expression I was expecting, Angelo was smiling down at the wavy haired brunette and then loosened his hold on me.

Angelo then proceeded to introduce me to the girl, but I've always had a weak short-term memory so I immediately forgot her name. Before babbling the rest of their conversation in quick-fire Spanish, Angelo told me that they were sat next to each other on the plane and found out that they went to the same elementary school.

How bloody cute.

They'd had over seven hours to have their little reunion party, so I didn't understand why the girl was lingering and their conversation was been extended longer than necessary. After a short while, my patience ran thin and I decided it was about time to break up the reunion party.

“Erm...Angelo, I think we should go get our taxis,” I said putting on a tight smile, turning around not bothering to listen to his response.

It was past eight in the evening already when I came out of the airport there was a warm breeze, my sciatics were playing up a little, which added to why my patience had plummeted.

The reunion party was still undergoing. The girl though was on the phone and Angelo looked on concerned - like deeply concerned. Bitch please.

When she got off the phone, she babbled more stuff to Angelo sounding stressed. The girl was holding her temple, but then Angelo said something which made her face glow in disbelief and then Angelo shrugged his shoulders as if to say ''of course'', before flagging his hands down for a taxi.

My annoyance at the situation was getting harder for me to conceal, and in an effort for my mother's side of me not to make an appearance, I picked up my phone and texted my boyfriend:

Why is she coming with us?

Of course I sat in the front with the driver, whilst the two got all chummy chummy in the back like my name was Sue Storm. The ping to notify Angelo of a new text message could be heard. I turned my head to the window, like I had no care in the world but really I was impatiently waiting for Angelo to reply to my text.

He didn't. For the whole journey right up to when the taxi parked in front of the hotel Angelo and his friend continued to chatter away and laugh every so often like they'd magically developed a funny bone.

Before he could reach into his pockets for his wallet, I'd already handed the money to the driver. Even though I was subtle, my boyfriend knew me well enough to pick on when he really shouldn't test me.

I got out of the taxi and walked into the main doors of the hotel. It was one of them swanky ones, the same one that Angelo had stayed in the last time he came. He said it was because he liked the bathroom. Angelo was very particular on how his bathroom looked like and the cleanness.

The first time I visited him in the hotel, I felt all types of weird - like serious inferior-feeling issues. It was only when Angelo held my hands that I became a little bit more comfortable but all my uneasiness didn't leave because I couldn't help but notice how some of the staff looked at me like I was some sorry-excuse of a black girl staining my colour all over their fine establishment.

This time around though, I was too pissed-off to care and outside was getting just a little bit more chilly, so I just walked in and sat in the lobby and left the BFF's behind hauling their luggage out the taxi, before a bellboy walking past me went to assist them.

It was no fun being a third wheel. Yes I did go to language school to learn Spanish and some would wonder why I couldn't pick out anything that was being said by the dynamic duo, but in my defence, they were talking at like a thousand miles an hour it didn't even sound like they were talking in sentences, just one big long word. Oh and as predicted I hadn't passed the oral exam.

“Hi. My English not good,” the girl started a little shyly making me raise my head up from my phone, “but I want to say sorry for disturbing. I'm going to room now.”

She threw a finger backwards, giggling randomly probably out of nervousness.

She sure was a quirky one.

“It's okay,” not having a choice but to say, “buenas noches.” 

“Buenas noches,” she replied before exchanging more words with Angelo, saying 'gracias' like a thousand times before Angelo hugged her tight.

Of course I wasn't the slightest bit jealous. 

There were a few moments of silence after she left with Angelo just watching me which only made his smirk grow even wider. “Let's go.”

Thankfully, we didn't end up in the same lift as his best bud, but all the way to the lift, in the lift, out the lift and in front of his room, we remained in silence.

Oh there were going to be some serious talks alright.

The room was both modern and classy, it didn't have none of those tacky decorations and furniture that five-star hotels tend to have.

“Let's pray.”

Before I'd even sat on the bed, he'd grabbed hold of my hands.

“Father, I just want to thank You for the safe flight. I want to thank You for using me to help a friend I haven't seen in a long time...”

Oh, you say she's just a friend.

“...I thank You, for Luciana, the biggest blessing of my life aside from You and my family. Dios please touch Luciana's heart and not let her get mad at me for unknown reasons...”

He knew alright.

“And instead let Your unconditional love for us dwell in our hearts for each other. In Jesus name. Amen.”

“Amen.”

Even though I felt connected to him, it was not fair to use God to discount him basically ignoring me for the last hour and I was about to let him know of that fact but as soon as we'd said our amens, he let go of my hands and grabbed onto my face.

His pink, pillowy lips tasted so good. Being in his hold, feeling his touch, spiralled my heart to beat out of control. He sucked on my lower lip, upper lip, I probbed and prodded my tongue in his mouth.

The kiss was messy, the kiss was hot, the kiss was...desperate.

I found myself falling backwards on one of the gigantic single beds.

“Lucy, damn...I've missed you so much,” I heard him say as he unlatched his lips

from mine and started sucking on my neck, I loved it when he swirled his tongue round slowly – it hit that spot.

Loud moans fell from my lips. He was iron and in seconds he had me where he wanted me to be – pressed underneath him.

And this was why we couldn't be bed buddies and why we were checked in a two-single bed room suite. Although looking at the size of the beds it was like two king sized beds.

“Angelo...we have to stop.”

A reluctant groan left his lips. For a moment or two he dropped kisses on my collar bone bordering on my cleavage area and just when I was fully enjoying myself, brushing my hands through his hair back and forth, he lifted himself up from me and climbed off of the bed.

“Okay, so that was...that was great.”

“Yes it was,” I replied, mind a little hazy, recollecting my thought process, “but don't think I'm just going to let pass the situation this evening.”

“Of course not,” now that the holy, hot and heavy part was sorted, he walked over to his suitcase left near the door and zipped it open, “her parents were meant to pick her up but their car broke down on their way to the airport, so I got her a room to stay for the night and I'm gonna drop her home tommorow before I go to my parent's house.” 

“Yes that's cool but what was not cool was you ignoring me the whole time you was with her like I was the Invisible Woman.”

Angelo scrunched his eye at me, before stalking off in the direction of the bathroom without a word like I wasn't opening a line of communication with him.

“It's always some type of bullshit with you,” he kissed his teeth, taking some toiletries in the toilet, “like seriously, what was I supposed to do just leave her and let her sleep in the airport when I'm able to help?”

“That not my issue,” and he knew it, “my issue is that you didn't even try to include me in the conversation.”

“You sound so petty.”

By this time I rose up from the once crispy smooth linen of the bed we'd not even five minutes ago been feasting off of each other's faces on. 

“I'm going to leave before words you say piss me off more. And you can call over your BFF and drink hot chocolate with those little cute marshmallows on top, watch movies until past midnight to finally round of the reunion festivities.”

“Now you're being ridiculous,” I heard him say now out of the bathroom, “you're not leaving.”

I was already putting my shoes back on, when I'd removed them I don't know, I guess things got really heated – fast. “Yes I am.”

“No you're not,” looking at me like a silly child having one of their typical tantrums, he didn't even make moves to stop me.

“Are you going to make me stay?”

“Are you going to make me, make you stay?”

Even though I'd never admit it out loud – I found it so damn hot when he challenged me. It was a tear jerker in the southern regions. His voice held so much promise and threat all at the same time – a potent cocktail – I'd never drank one before, a cocktail I meant talkless of a potent one.

So I backed down.

Pretending not to care that he'd won the battle of the wills yet again, I broke off the intense staring match between us, kissed my teeth and grabbed the 24 hour menu that lay on the dresser. “I'm charging whatever I get to the room.”

This homecoming had not gotten off to a good a start.

Back when I was in the States, Angelo and I had gone to the youth pastor in my church to help guide us with our relationship, because I especially needed it, in terms of praying together, which we continued to do, the pastor also talked about matters respecting one another and matters to do with erm...sex, to put it plainly.

One of the other things the youth pastor said that I took to heart was being honest but kind in our communication with one another, which was easier said than done.

“Stop looking at me like that.”

“Like what?”

“Like you want me.”

“That's a very bold statement,” a stormy expression crossed Angelo's face like he was in a war between God and flesh, “a very bold and true statement.”

“That's too bad, because you're not getting me."

Hearing that, in one millisecond Angelo took the bed covers off himself and sauntered over to my side. “You sure about that?"

“Absolu-”

His lips captured mine before I could end the word. “Ang-”

My voice became all muffled and shit.

I was the one that ended up being the reluctant one to end the kiss. The roles always reversed to put him at a better advantage. It was unfair.

When he let go, he had the victory smile on his stupid face.

At six am I had ordered a breakfast buffet, because by the time I got to the Almas' it would be time to take the kids to school.

I'd ordered more than I could actually finish but I figured Angelo would eat the rest. Never was I a morning person and having to wake at half five in the morning put me in a less than good mood. What took the piss most at waking up at having such an early start, is waking up next to (in my case a few feet between) your beloved and not being able to get warmed up by their kisses first thing because you weren't on good terms with them.

As was the case between Angelo and I currently.

It nagged me that he didn't even attempt to involve me in the conversation with his friend, and maybe yes, my old insecurities did have play of it a bit but I felt justified- I mean, she was bloody gorgeous, like fangirl gorgeous, and everyone knows that's major gorgeous.

The night before, shortly after ordering all the world's food, Angelo went out of the room, saying he was going to go for a walk and I had barely given a word of acknowledgement.

With the room to myself, I snuggled in my bed putting Gabino on loudspeaker, whilst eating buttered popcorn and mindlessly watching TV. I just needed someone to talk to. I didn't want to talk to Dominica, because it would just compound the fears concerning Angelo and I.

Gabino was a very cool guy overall, and apart from his body odour he gave off a good vibe. An ironic statement, when considering the 'circumstances' of the last time but he was just that.

Whilst talking on the phone, I was flicking through the channels, when I ended up seeing Angelo's mum, Sara, in some show. Taken by surprise and excitement, I screamed like the girl I am, and that worked Gabino up so hard. I didn't mean it, but he got really worried that something had happened to me. After several times of repetitively assuring him that I was indeed fine, he calmed down – I had to explain to him that I had seen someone that I knew on TV.

When he asked who it was, I brushed over the answer saying he wouldn't know and changed topic to both of us meeting up, because Pepito and Manuelo had a football match.

It was during that part of the conversation well over past midnight now that Angelo decided to walk back into the room.

I had felt kinda weird and a little guilty speaking to another guy late in the night, in the presence of my boyfriend, so whilst looking at a tense looking Angelo stalk over to his bed I ended the call with Gabino.

The urge for him to come over and bless me with his kisses and touches was unreal. He felt it and I felt it – but we turned to our sides and slept on it.

What he didn't see though was the tears leaking out my eyes and soaking my pillow, which brought us now to the present.

“Are you going to meet me up for lunch?”

Sipping on the last of my orange juice I replied, “ I can't.”

“Why not?”

“Because I'm busy.”

“Ah c'mon Luce, I didn't travel thousand of miles to argue with you. I could have just done that on Skype.”

“And you think I want to argue?”

His facial expression said it all. “I don't want to argue with you. But I want an apology.”

“An apology for what?”

“For ignoring me whilst talking to your ''friend''.

He huffed seemingly reluctant at first, but finally looking at me he said, “Fine, I'm sorry.”

I don't know if maybe it was his acting skills or because I was too damn eager to kiss and make up but I totally believed in his apology.

“Good,” I said, a smile lighting up my face before I went up to give him a peck on the cheek but he quickly stepped back, giving me the one minute finger.

I honestly don't know who this boy thought he was, about giving me the one minute finger like he was a one minute man. God forbid.

“What?” I asked stupendously annoyed.

“You only ended the call with that guy you was talking to because I came in, correct?”

“False,” the guilty pangs were beating hard in my chest and I struggled to keep eye contact with Angelo. “I have to go now. I'll text you later.”

Before he could say anything else, I flew out the room, like I'd spontaneously grown some wings.

Lord, what was happening? Was the only thing I could think in my head as I sat in the metro at half seven in the morning. Like how was it that the moment he landed we couldn't even manage an hour's worth of love and affection? Something fishy was going on.

I really was free for lunch I was just being difficult, but having time to think I was determined to make peace, I mean I wanted him to be in a good mood for my birthday plus we had less than a week together before he had to go back and who knows until when we'd get to see each other again. With that thought in mind I started typing up a message to Angelo.

I'm free between 11 and 12:30, pick a place for us to meet for lunch. My peace offering.

Then I proceeded to put some corny ass emoji, just to sweeten him up a little bit.

See, one thing I'd gotten to realise about men is that they act like babies. Even though they want to be regarded as gladiators all the time, they still wanted all that good loving, and most importantly the attention.

Like with Angelo he had this overly possessive manner that both scared and excited me at the same time. It scared me in the sense of how easy I always found myself ready to submit to him and many occasions over the past year I did just that. It was almost my guilty pleasure to keep him hungry but fed at the same damn time.

Ten minutes later as I was walking down to the Almas' house from the metro station, I receive a text from Angelo:

I forgot I'm visiting my family, so can't make it.

Not being able to resist an eye roll because I knew he was going to be dropping off his 'friend', giving them more quality bonding time, before going over to his parent's house.

Not having any choice but putting all my crazy thought and issues to the back of my mind, I finally got started with my day.

Several hours later I was sat on the side of the pitch with Gabino, watching Pepito play and his team was currently on a two-goal lead, which basically meant happy days were here again for Pepito.

Whilst I was cheering for Pepito on his third goal, Gabino brought to my attention that my phone was ringing. I picked it up immediately seeing it was Angelo calling, blocking one of my ears from the boisterous sounds around me.

“Chica! How are you darling?”

Without any difficulty a smile immediately surfaced on my lips at the sound of Sara's glimmering voice shining through the phone.

“I'm okay, thank you. How are you?”

“I'm great. I just wanted to wish you a happy birthday in advance and to tell you that we need to see each other very soon. Okay?”

Since I'd been in Spain, I had gone to Angelo's family house a couple of times, but because his parents were all so busy I hadn't had the opportunity to go as much as I would have liked.

“Of course, Sara. No worries.”

“Great, I'll get back to you when I'm free, I'm producing a new telenovela, but it's taking so much of my time.”

I wanted to tell her about seeing her yesterday, but then I held back, knowing Sara she liked to keep a low profile and I felt she'd feel I'd treat her differently because of her fame.

“Okay, chica, I'm going to go now. I'm going to give you your present when we meet up.”

“Oh Sara, you don't have to do that.”

“¡Tonterías! Chica, I'm going to go now. I'll pass the phone to Angelo now.”

“Okay, bye,” then I heard a few clinks before Angelo's voice came through.

I watched as Pepito made an impressive sharp tackle and pass to his teammate, unfortunately the ball was swiftly taken off by his teammate's marker.

“Luciana can you meet me at the hotel lobby at about nine?”

“Yeah, sure.”

“Where are you now?”

“At Pepito's football match.”

“Alright, I'll speak to you later. I love you Lucy.”

Hearing Angelo say those words right into my ear especially since it'd been a while since I'd heard him say it, was like a phantom caress over my body. The other things I wished he could whisper into my ear, damn, his voice had that sexy sleepy tone, rich with his Spanish gusto. Yum.

“I love you too,” I finally replied, “I'll see you later.”

After discontinuing the call, a breath of fresh air left me. Things were going right with my heart and I. Gabino who was fast becoming a big brother figure, looked at me as if to ask if everything was okay, and I just smiled back leaning my head on his shoulders and watched the rest of the matches.

Concerning his odour – he'd basically covered himself with a whole load of perfume. He had admitted to me that he'd been aware of his 'condition' since his late teens and it has been plaguing him til his current age of twenty five. Not that I was used to the smell but I'd say I was better at coping with it.

A few hours later I walked into the hotel lobby wearing a neon pink maxi dress and some black converses, with a thin sweater to shield myself from the light breeze.

Angelo was already there looking as fine as fine can be in a simple white vest top and black yoga pants over black converses and a black bomber jacket.

When he saw me a smile tugged on his lips removing any remnant of nerves on how the night was going to go.

I was running on less than four hours of sleep but Angelo's hand tugging me to follow him out, recharged my strength.

“Ang where are we going?”

“Just a shisha place not too far from here.”

“Oh okay.”

Stars dotted around the navy blue night. The hotel was pretty central so there was still the hustle and bustle around, but it only kept me at comfort, with my heart by my side.

From the outside of the lounge, Arab music could be heard playing in the background, that slow type enchanting music that was so scintillating to the bones. For a weekday there there were quite a lot of people sat outside on the tables sharing the pipe with their friends.

Inside it was like a scene from Arabian Nights, with the curtains, shisha smoke, rugs and gold furnishings and millions of multicoloured cushions scattered all over the couches.

Angelo still holding my hands, led me to an upstairs that was pretty much similar to the downstairs just a little bit more spacious.

Before we came out of the balcony doors we ordered our tea and our individual hookah pipes that two of the staff brought for us out to the balcony, where it was pretty much empty. Getting ourselves comfortable we say down on the couch close to each other with the perfect view of Madrid.

It was a nice warm night with a sneaky breeze flying in here and there but all in all it was good.

For awhile neither of us said anything as we inhaled through our hoses watching life around us.

“These are one of those nights.”

Hearing Angelo's faraway dreamy voice, I sat up, “What d'you mean?”

“These are one of those nights I wish could last a lifetime,” he replied before breathing out melon and cola flavoured smoke into the night.

A grin ready on my lips, “Oh yeah?”

“Of course,” he said smiling in my face,“don't you?”

The night was indeed beautiful. “Damn right I do.”

“So why are we constantly arguing over nothing?”

“It's just our thing. It's what we do.”

“No it's what you do.”

“Fine, it's what I do,” sighing heavily I knew the conversation was reaching a bridge I didn't want to cross, “I'm just scared of everything.”

I placed the hose on the table for the moment, no longer feeling like smoking it and finding myself sitting up more upright to face Angelo's side profile and he had to turn around to look at me.

Seeing the intensity in his eyes and feeling the intimacy of the dark night, I felt locked in but yet free to disclose all my fears at once.

“I'm scared of everything Angelo. We're both so young. We're living in different continents. You, you're so ambitious, you have so many dreams, you work so hard,” at this point I had to take a deep breath cos I could feel my voice breaking, “and honestly I love you so much for it. I thank God everyday for your life and for having you in my life. Before I met you, I never really thought I had passion for anything or had much confidence or motivation for doing anything, I was just okay with doing what others wanted of me. Being with you this past year now has made me realise how much more there is to life and all of a sudden I have dreams that I want to fulfil. And what I'm most scared about is that we'll end up giving in to the demand of what it takes to fulfil our dreams that we'll end up giving up on each other.”

I heard him softly sigh, before inhaling out the mouthpiece of the pipe. “I don't know how many times I can tell you this Luciana. You can't control what's out of your control, all we can do is take each day as it comes.”

I turned my face away, I wiped the tears falling from my eyes and picked up my cold tea.

“Yeah, you're right.”

 

 

CHAPTER 6

 

I think I was having a mid-life crisis at the age of twenty. How that was even possible I didn’t know but I’ll say this, waking up knowing that I was a whole year older certainly did not put a smile on my face. I was finally out of my teenage years but still figuring out why I was lurking around on planet Earth.

Staring at the ceiling as I lay in bed I wondered what I’d done with my life so far. Well I did still have a healthy five figure sum in my bank account, but that wasn’t the point. I mean at the age of twenty people already have a mortgage, have become CEOs, married and have at least two baby fathers or mothers.

The previous night I had been on the phone to Angelo – I’d like to take this moment to just appreciate how awesomingly refreshing it was being on the same time zone as my boyfriend – it felt spectacular.

Unfortunately, we didn't talk for long because he was studying and me being the awesome girlfriend that I was didn't want to disturb him. But I still wanted someone to talk to, Dominica was off in Paris and from past experience I knew not to call her past midnight, because that girl would turn to Michael Jackson in the thriller video if I did.

So I turned to Gabino instead. He and I spoke for hours until the early hours of the morning and that's why when I woke up three hours later a sharp throbbing headache pulsated from the centre of my temple, as I had to wake up to get the kids ready for school and make their breakfast. It was my birthday but it was work as usual.

The Almas' totally surprised me with a winter fur jacket that they gave me. I wasn't even expecting a gift from them, but as I said before – best foster parents ever. They came in very handy as summer would soon be ending and I hadn't really expected to have been in Madrid for the winter so I hadn't packed for that. They’d also given me another night and next day off too (they were just spoiling me!) so they could spend some good quality time with their kids and I could spend some good quality time with my boyfriend.

Earlier in the morning, Angelo had called me wishing me a happy birthday but he’d sounded real tired so we’d made brief plans to see each other back at the hotel later on, before telling him to get some sleep. After all, he was leaving in two days, and then he would be fully busy with med school, and the one hundred and one things going on whilst I got my hands full with two kids and planning my tour of Europe.

The situation between me and Angelo – urgh. Actually I didn't want to call it a situation because I don't know if it was a situation – yet. But I was feeling some type of way, like he was just dismissing me and not taking my concerns seriously. I don't know, either way I was feeling some type of way.

Anyways after I got the kids to school, I headed over to meet up with Sara on set after promising to do so the last time we spoke on the phone.

Entering into a full production studio, I was overwhelmed with the chaos of activity. Seeing Sara high up sat in her director's chair and megaphone at hand looked so befitting for her.

Angelo had told me that she was directing and producing a comedy telenovela set in Moorish Spain. Not wanting to act the dumb ass in front of my boyfriend's mother I thought it was best to educate myself beforehand just so she would be impressed by me.

Having a smart-ass boyfriend definitely had its perks but it also meant that I had to step up on my game and know my shit too, lest he think that I was brainless.

I jumped out of shock hearing Sara scream into the megaphone, I guessed it had to do with the guy holding the boom mike. He was holding it too low and she could see it in the shot frame as the camera was infront of her.

It took a little while before she even noticed that I was there but when she did notice, her face instantly broke into a smile and I felt a little proud of myself that I had been the cause of it.

“Hello chica, mija Happy Birthday!”

Then she proceeded to grab the megaphone and announce to all approximately hundred people on set that it was my birthday (like they cared or knew me) and demanded they sing happy birthday.

Even though it was pretty much embarrassing having strangers singing happy birthday to me in Spanish I couldn't stop laughing at how enthusiastic she looked.

I watched her climb off her majesty the director's chair.

“Oh chica, I've missed you so much,” she said as she climbed off her majesty the director's chair before hugging me tightly.

Again, I jumped out of my skin when out of nowhere, I heard her shout in the microphone.

I presumed she told everyone to take a break as everyone went crowding around the buffet area set up.

“So how are you?”

“I'm good, thank you Sara, and you?”

“Oh I'm okay chica, it's just this show is a lot of work, but everyone is so wonderful and working hard to make it a success.”

“Yeah it does look like hard work but I'm sure you will do the best job and I can't wait to watch it. The Moorish history and impact is something that I don't believe has been appreciated enough, and I just can't wait to see the angle you're going to take on it.”

“Oh how did you know it was the Moors the show was based on?”

I didn't want to tell her that Angelo had been the one to tell me, I just wanted to sound smart and shit.

“Well y'know just the whole set design.”

Turning to one of her assistants lingering beside her she said, “Remind me to tell Marco what a great job he did.”

Grabbing a red lipstick, and compact mirror she started applying the cosmetic on her lips. “One of my extras had diarrhoea and had to go home. We need to desperately wrap this scene up,” and that's when Sara's eyes bored into mine.

My heart was beating really fast as I knew where Sara was going to go with this.

“Would you mind playing one of the concubines? You only have like five words to say.”

“Sarah really I'm not an actress and I just was not prepared for this. I'm sure you can find somewhere else.” I answered, feeling squirmish over the idea of my face being put on camera.

“Please chica. You'd be doing me the biggest favour,” she said pleading with her eyes that were already compelling me to give in to her.

It was obvious to anyone who was close enough to see the interaction between Sara and I that I did not want to do it. Even Sara’s assistant looked like she felt sorry for me.

“Sara I can't.”

“Why not chica?”

I almost laughed at the expression on her face as Angelo had the same face when he didn't have things his own way. What can I say? Like mother, like son.

Just because I had gotten a little better at handling my insecurities, did not mean I was a pro or that I walked around like I was a Nubian princess or some shit.

To be honest I had gotten better at managing my body image insecurities because I barely had time to mope around doing nothing. In between taking care of the kids, going to language school, figuring out my next steps, I was pretty busy but this - appearing on living colour television (I didn't even own a single photo of myself on my phone) playing an extra that could potentially be seen by millions, no, this was way out of my comfort zone and into another galaxy.

It was just too much for me.

“I’m just not comfortable.”

When push came to shove, Sara had thrust me in front of the bulls.

“Chica, you’d be fine. We’re going to have you wearing a beautiful silk gold dress and a white headwrap, we'll get your make up done too and all you have to say is 'sir, you're drink', of course in Arabic.”

I sighed knowing that no matter what I said, she’d find something else to try and convince me – it was Sara – she always won.

“Fine, I’ll do-“

“Perfect,” her eyes shone in glee as she turned to her assistant and spoke to her in rapid Spanish.

“Clara is going to take care of you. She’ll give you a script and Arabic translator is going to be there to help you practise your lines whilst getting ready. It’s going to be wonderful chica, thank you so much for doing this!”

Without being able to reply, I was whisked away. Now that I’d decided to do this, I really wanted to make sure that I did it right. Sara had faith in me and I didin’t want to disappoint her.

With all these racking nerves, I could feel myself getting anxious and I really wished Angelo was there to help me calm down.

What had I gotten myself into?

I tried to think of any and everything to convince myself that I would be fine, including it’d make a pretty good story to tell the grandkids or anyone for that matter.

There was thousands of wannabe actors and actresses working as waiters, bussing tables in Hollywood waiting for their ‘big break’ – and here was me basically given the opportunity unasked and I was shying away from it.

I’d never taken any acting classes, my only acting credentials was back in second grade when I’d been one of the shepherds in the nativity play. Now just how long ago was that?

“Cinco minutos antes de comenzar a filmar!”

I’d been able to pick on the key words and realised that Sara had just announced that there was only five minutes before everyone had to go back on set…including me.

Oh God help.

Scrambling, I set my eyes on the page of the script where my line had been highlighted with a green marker.

'Oh my gosh, what am I doing? Oh God, please help me,' I kept chanting in my head as the man assigned to help me pronounce the words in Arabic properly infront of me whilst the make-up artist applied some concealer and foundation on the teabags underneath my eyes – let’s just say I needed quite a bit.

Never in my life did I think that my face could end up on TV. This shit didn’t happen to someone like me.

What felt like ten seconds later, and Sara was back on the megaphone, calling people to position on set.

I joined the cast, they’d all mostly gone into character mode, as Sara gave a few instructions.

The set design was actually pretty impressive, no one would ever guess that we weren’t actually in a palace but instead a studio.

“Acción!”

That jolted me back to reality or in this case, fiction. The cameras were rolling, my nerves were touching the roof. My hands as usual whenever I got nervous was sweating, pretty badly, so embarrassing. I really did not want to wipe it on the dress I was wearing in case it smudged and Sara could see it. And I know she'd see it cos that woman had eyes of an eagle.

I was supposed to come on to the scene after the chief ruler person sent some message to the guards or something - shows how much I’d read from the script.

I was worried that my sweat would also make me drop my prop which was a silver platter that carried the empty goblet.

“Where is my concubine?!”

I almost dropped the cup as Sara shouted into the microphone and I hurried onto the set, but I was too late.

“Cut!”

“I’m sorry, Sara,” I said feeling myself getting flush with embarrassment, as the other actors had nailed their part, but I ruined it and they’d have to do it again because of me.

I wasn't used to this shit.

“Chica, you have to pay more attention.”

It took five tries before I got my part, just about right. Surprisingly the other actors were pretty nice but I’m sure they were thinking how I could possibly have been qualified as an actress with all the silly mistakes I was making. A little bit of cronyism could get you anywhere, my friends as it's said, who you know is better than what you now.

Now I had au-pair and actress to add to my resume.

But boy was I glad when I left the set. Before I could rush off to change, Sara grabbed me by the arm, hugging me tight saying what a wonderful job I did, despite the fact that by the fourth take, I thought she was going to leap out of her chair to strangle me so it was just as well that I got it right the last time.

Then she proceeded to hand me my present in a light pink bulky box. I opened it and it was a really nice watch that I know would have cost some really nice money too.

“Thank you Sara, but you really didn’t have to,” I said putting the watch back in its case. I’d instantly become a watch person with this present.

“Ah don’t worry about it. ”

Half an hour late and I was back in the car going home to prepare dinner, before I went to pick the kids up from school. It was totally crazy how the day had gone. And there I was driving casually like I hadn’t just played a small role in something big, literally.

The contrast in the day was almost mind-blowing.

But as it was, that is really what happened that yours truly had become a little actress.

By the time, I got back to the house, I had put the events of earlier to the back of my mind as I fully got stuck in to the task at hand.

Both Pepito and Candela had been sweet to me. Little Miss Diva to save me her last cookie that she'd made at kindergarten. When I took it out the paper bag, I could see she’d bitten a huge chunk out of the chocolate chip cookie, and so when I asked her why there was only one third left out of my supposedly “birthday gift” she said that she was hungry.

I could only laugh at her, she was ever so adorable.

Time passed quickly and by the time I knew it, it was time for me to head over to meet up Angelo at the hotel.

The sciatic theatrics had begun again so instead of taking the metro as I’d intended to, I booked for a taxi to pick me up.

Comfort over cost, I say.

I was actually pretty tired out by the time I knocked on his room door. When Angelo opened the door, my face instantly lit up. This guy has really got me good.

“Happy birthday, darling,” and before hearing my reply he’d dragged me by the wrist inside and slammed me on the door before kissing the life out of me.

His soft hands ran over my body, and I instantly cowered to his tender touch. I knew if I let it get any further, I’d be having another birthday gift.

“Ang, we need to slow down.”

In between locked lips and moans, I heard him say, “Oh we'll slow it down, we'll go at your pace.”

And then he proceeded to take off my jacket painfully slow, kissing my exposed arm inch by inch, when I just wanted him to rip it off me.

Angelo was undoing me.

“I want you so much,” Angelo said as he went back up gently sucking the side of my neck and I raked my hands through his soft hair.

His lips and hands kept wandering all over my submissive body. And everywhere he was touching was catching heat.

“Ang…hm, we have to stop.”

“Or do we?”

At his question, our eyes met. It took a while before I could answer as I was floating between arousal and reason.

 

 

 

CHAPTER 6 Pt.2

 

“Of course we do.”

“Urgh you're no fun,” Angelo said as I gently pushed him away chuckling at the pout on his face.

“Please, I'm plenty fun.”

Angelo snorted at this and rightly so.“Speaking of fun, for your birthday I got us some fun times on the racing track.”

“Wait, what? For my birthday we're going on a racing track? Are you sure this 'birthday gift' is for me or for you.”

“It's all for you baby,” he said with a smirk, “but it doesn't hurt if I'm enjoying myself too.”

I wasn't totally convinced with the “it's all for you baby”, sugar speech. I knew Angelo to be a real Formula One addict, I mean back when I was in the States, the boy would actually set the alarm to wake up to watch it at like four in the morning. Who does that?

“So let me get this straight, your birthday gift to me is to drive around a racing track?”

“Yes.”

Embracing him, I left a kiss on his cheek. “What can I say? You know me so well.”

The look on Angelo's face was confused and almost downright offended that I didn't seem that excited about my 'birthday gift', it was actually adorable.“Why do I think you're being sarcastic?”

“Because you know me so well.”

“Wait, so you don't like it?”

“I'm sure...I'm going to like it. But I really don't care as long as I'm spending time with you,” I said before leaning in for a kiss to take his mind off it, the last thing I needed was an argument.

Truth be told I really didn't care what we were doing it's just that when Angelo made me watch the Grand Prix with him all I saw was people driving around in circles, and it drove me to intense boredom - like how is that even fun to watch? It was like watching paint dry.

“Okay fine,” he said smiling and at first I thought he was going to close in again on the gap between our lips but instead he whispered an offer I couldn't refuse in my ear. “How does a back massage sound?”

There was no way I could fake the happiness and Angelo seeing it on my face chuckled. “Oh you like that don't you?”

“Uh-huh.”

“How's your sciatics?”At this Angelo's hands started caressing my ass and damn did it feel so good.

“It's getting better,” I said both of us knowing what I meant by that statement.

“Go get undressed and I'll get the room ready.”

Doing as I was told, I found myself in the bathroom. After I took off my clothes, I decided that taking a nice hot shower would be best due to my very all-over-the-place day. I wanted to smell good for my baby.

Half an hour later I was back in the room with a large white towel fastened around me. I looked around the room and gone were Angelo's big chunky books with medical words written on them, and gone were the piles of paper with highlighted texts scattered all over the bed and gone were the post it notes stuck all over the walls of the room. In its place was a dimly lit room, laid bed and coconut mango milk scented candles dotted all over and Angelo standing by his bed.

“Babe come and lie down here.”

Feeling totally domesticated by his bedroom voice, I did as I was told.

“Turn around,” I said as showing certain body parts was not part of the itinerary for me.

Coyly smiling he did as he was told and I quickly lowered my towel to my hips, before lying on the bed.

“Okay, I'm done,” I said propping my arms on the pillows before resting my head on them.

“Cool. I'm just going to put some baby oil on you, okay?”

Having Angelo's hands on my skin – damn. He was just too good to be true. Starting with my shoulder pads he sunk his fingers into my pressure points almost immediately eliciting a moan from me.

“You like that Luce?”

My words didn't even come out coherent. It was doing wonders for my sciatic as I felt him press down on both his thumbs on each side of my spine all the way to the end of my back, I don't know what they were teaching him in med school but they were teaching him good.

“Babe?”

“Yes?”

“If you want me to get to the sciatic nerve, you're going to have to let me see your ass.”

Okay that definitely was not part of the agenda and I knew he could feel my hesitation, “Just pretend I'm your doctor, I'll treat you like a patient.”

“Angelo, this better not be some foreplay shit you're trying to con me into.”

“Don't worry about it, I'm not going to try anything.”

I was totally into it, but I realised that him doing so and me allowing him to do so was crossing some dangerous borders, but truth be told, I really cared about my butt's health and I just wanted the stinging to stop so I could carry on with life as normal.

Not saying anything I pushed down my towel right down to the bottom of my butt, and just as soon I felt Angelo rub some oil on it and it felt wonderful.

“Your ass is gorgeous”, I heard him almost in a whisper instantly getting me hot in the face.

“Thank you.”

“Tell me what you did today.”

Oh gosh, was this boy being serious? I was in the middle of one of the greatest pleasures I've ever had and the boy was asking me for story time, like seriously?

“You want me to tell you what I did today?”

“Yes.”

Sighing, I finally obliged him.

“Sara made me act as an extra in her film,” I said in almost a dream like way as Angelo was just doing wonders to my body and it was making me feel both drowsy and turned on.

I heard him silently chuckle. “How did you find it?”

The answer got stuck on my lips as I felt Angelo's fingers tracing my stretchmarks up and down and it was then that I really thought this whole massage thing was a bad idea, I'd totally forgetten too about my cellulite festered butt. I tried to swat his fingers away but I was in an awkward position to successfully do so..

“Baby, I'm right here, calm down. ”

A statement as ridiculous as that really shouldn't have helped calm my defences – but for some reason it did.

Still feeling a little uncomfortable, he continued to massage, and I must say he was pretty professional about it - well that was until he stopped. I was in the least pleased about that.

“What's wrong? Why did you stop?”

“I told you to tell me about your day.”

“I told you your mum got me to -”

“No start from the beginning.”

Rolling my eyes, glad that he couldn't see me, I did as I was told so he could get on with pleasuring me. After recounting the mundane parts of my day I told him about what his mother made me do.

“Ha should I get an autograph now before I have to pay for one?”

“That wouldn't be such a bad idea,” I jokingly answered but a this point I could feel myself forcing to keep my eyes open but before I knew it I'd fallen asleep.

 

“Happy birthday to you, happy birthday to you, happy birthday to Lucy, happy birthday to YOU!!!!”

I rubbed my eyes slowly, as I brewed in annoyance at having been woken up by singing – one of my strongest pet peeves.

I rubbed my eyes thankful that at least the curtains to the room were closed or else I would have punched my boyfriend in the face.

Still-half asleep, I saw Angelo standing by my bedside with a small round cake with a single candle lit in the middle fully dressed in blue jeans and plain grey top.

A reluctant smile blossomed on my lip before turning into a full blown giggle at his over the top singing reminding of Sara.

“My birthday was yesterday.”

“Yeah, but you never got a birthday cake.”

He was so sweet. Even though I was pretty much out of it, I raised myself to an erect position on the bed as he brought the cake over to me. I really must have been tired because I briefly remember Angelo waking me up in after the massage to put my pyjamas on and then falling asleep again the next second.

“I got you your favourite.”

“Red velvet?”

“Uh-huh.”

Eating something with such a high sugar content was never advisable at seven am in the morning – but whatever it was for my birthday.

“Blow your candle baby,” I did as I was told, and then after that he plucked the candle out, “d'you want a slice?”

“Yes plea-”

Sticky cold mess was slammed on to my face and not only that he held it in place for a few seconds making sure it smothered my whole face whilst crying with laughter.

“Oh my gosh Angelo!”

Too shocked for words, I got up off the bed and chased him round the room whilst he laughed finding the look of my face morning entertainment for himself- the boy even had the audacity to take several pictures with his phone.

Grabbing scoops of cake from my face, I began throwing it over to him, but he expertly dodge the hits and managed to escape the room.

Damn that Buttbag.

 

 

CHAPTER 6 Pt. 3 (But really it's a bonus chapter to compensate for my long-absence)

 

I was too lazy to be chasing after him so I just sat on the bed licking the cake off of my face with my tongue. For a second I was tempted to smear his passport with the icing and then he wouldn't be able to travel. That would serve him right.

Besides my obviously good-natured personality, the last time I'd received a birthday cake was a long time ago, so I'd be damned if I couldn't have my cake and eat it too. But when my face started getting all itchy with the all the sugar I decided it'd be wiser for me to have my bath. Half an hour later just as I was putting my foot into my black boots the Buttbag finally made an appearance with a smirk on his face.

“Why did you wipe it off? I think the icing on the cake really enhanced your features.”

Giving him a dirty look I said nothing as I threw the other boot in his direction and he once again dodged it whilst laughing to himself.

“Why do you have to be so violent?”

“You love it,” I replied back sticking my tongue out at him as he threw back the other pair of boots for me to catch.

“Oh I do now?”

“Absolutely. You're a sadomasochist.”

To this he just snorted at me, whilst I laughed at myself like I'd spontaneously grown a funny bone.

Fifteen minutes later, we were in the rental car heading in the direction of my so-called 'birthday present' when in reality it was my boyfriend's playground.

“Did you ever join any after school clubs or did any extra-curricular activities?” Angelo asked about five minutes into the journey breaking the comfortable silence between us.

My mind came up blank. “No.”

“Nothing at all?”

“You got yourself a pretty boring girlfriend. Nothing at all. I always had to rush to pick my brother up from school. It left no time for anything.”

“Ah I see,” he said with a thoughtful expression on his face but I was enjoying the peaceful moment between us so I didn't bother asking why he'd asked me that question.

When we finally arrived at the racing track it felt for a second like I was sitting next to Pepito before a football match but instead it was my twenty-three year old boyfriend. He was barely able to apply the clutches properly before jumping out of the car.

We had an instructor who gave a long talk to us about the health and safety protocols - basically the boring part and that took just over an hour. I can't lie though, the news of us getting to ride a Ferrari and Mercedes did spur a little excitement in me. It's funny that I felt that, because here was me who up until six weeks ago did have a sports car to call my own but instead I sold it because of the fear I always had of owning such a valuable thing but now I was missing it.

Oh well.

Near the end of the health and safety session a former F1 driver made an appearance. I didn't know who it was, and I must have been the only one who didn't know who it was as everyone else had given him a standing ovation when he came into the room.

Realising this Angelo gave me like a ten second history as to why I should be excited and honoured to be breathing in the same oxygen as the man, and that was after I had lagged a few seconds to get up and awkwardly join in the clapping.

It was things like this that stressed how different both of us were. I loved how passionate he got about things but sometimes I could see his frustration that he tried to hide when I didn't match his enthusiasm. And I sort of knew already that that was why he'd asked me the question back in the car; I was just like the wind floating here and there seeing where I could fit in.

It actually bothered me.

Determined to not let such things get to me, especially because it would be our last full day before he'd be going back to the States, I paid attention to what was going on.

After the tutorial, we each got helmets and protective clothing which I had to rent – Angelo had come with his own and I was pleased to see he'd brought along the one I bought him for his birthday, which was just as well because racing gear did not come cheap.

On the back of the helmet, I had gotten the people at the shop where I bought the helmet from to write in cursive writing, “Pièce de Résistance” because I knew Angelo would appreciate that and indeed he had. Of course he did, it's Angelo I'm talking about. Angelo was Angelo's biggest fan.

After getting ready, we were driven around for several laps to familiarise ourselves with the race course. After doing that, we had some real nice lunch, but Angelo was too excited about getting back on the racing track and hurried me to eat. When we got back, we got to choose what F1 cars to race in I called first dibs on the Ferrari so Angelo had to go with the Mercedes, seeing as I was the birthday girl, he had no choice in the matter.

I got to say though, the feeling of being under the influence of speed - car speed I'm talking about, don't be getting the wrong idea now - was pure ecstasy ( the emotion, I'm referring to). It was just at those moments when I was behind the wheel, I felt like a pilot accelerating, before flying. My mind was blank, and I was being fueled by adrenaline and all my anxieties and worries were in my rear view mirror – behind me.

After about ten thrilling rounds in the cars, we had another break but for some reason Angelo left about half way through saying he needed to go to the toilet but he didn't return till it was time for us to be transferred to the proper F1 single seater cars. I found that weird since he'd taken over thirty minutes, but I decided to let it go.

He was super excited telling me about the brake horsepower, and generally stuff I had to pretend to understand and be excited over - to be honest it kinda was sexy how passionate he was about this whole Formula Uno palaver.

It would be our last set of laps for the day and Angelo decided that we should have a race. For some reason he was really adamant about this but I was pretty confident in my fast and furious driving skills so I just knew my boyfriend wouldn't have anything on me. I was doing it for the win.

“Okay, so three laps. If I win you'll pay for dinner, but if you win I'll pay.”

“Fine then,” I said cockily, “I don't even like lobster but you're going to be paying for one tonight.”

Angelo chuckled as he faced the road ahead, but for a moment before he inserted his head into his helmet, I thought I saw a glimmer of nervousness shadow his face. Giddy with excitement that I'd got my boyfriend shook, I put my own helmet on.

The horn was blown.

With everything in me I pressed my foot down on the gas pedal and set off.

Fifteen minutes later and the results were in – no free lobster for me.

I was close but not close enough.

No one could imagine how greatly surprised I was to have a hombre like Angelo beat me. This was the same guy who always complained about me driving too fast. The same guy who's sluggish driving drove me crazy – he made a normal hour's drive somewhere, an hour AND a hundred and twenty minutes.

In some ways I felt betrayed because Angelo failing to admit just what a beast he was behind the wheels was like an athlete winning medals with the help of performance enhancing drugs or going against a 300lb opponent in the boxing ring when I was just under 200lb – clearly that's not fair competition.

The finishing line was finally in my vision but instead of speeding up to sooner throttle my boyfriend over his borderline cheating, I felt myself slow down noticing my name on the big pole flag along with some other words I couldn't properly see.

A few people standing around, including the former F1 driver, were holding bottles and glasses filled with champagne, looking at me eagerly to come out of the car, but at that moment I couldn't.

Minor detail: Angelo was kneeling down on one leg.

 

 

CHAPTER 7

Pepito was having a tantrum. A tantrumming Pepito was never good. A tantrumming Pepito meant he was going to make life extra tiresome for anyone in his vicinity.

The catalyst: The match had been cancelled.

His team were about to step on to the pitch when one of the referees made the announcement that due to the weather forecast the round robinmatch will not continue.

To be honest, I had been pretty glad about the announcement as I'm sure a lot of the parents were too as we were all getting wetter and wetter by the minute from the heavy downfall of rain. Luckily for me I had brought an umbrella, but not so many of the other parents had and so they were hurrying to get their kids to leave as soon aspossible.

Of course, Pepito took his time to go to the changing rooms to get his things, and when he came out he was still lingering around the pitch until I walked on over to him to say we needed to go.

"Pepito you need to dry yourself, or you're going to get a cold," I said handing him his towel whilst trying to shelter the both of us with the umbrella in my other hand, but he was making it hard to because of the snail's pace he was walking at.

"Leave me alone!"

Boy, if that was Bobby talking to me like that, he'd get checked real quick. I had to really put that professional cloak on properly and remember I was on the job. Nevertheless, it was about time that Pepito, or 'Pepe' as he was being notoriously known as now, got a handle on his emotions before it landed him in a whole world of trouble as he got older.

Crouching down, I levelled my gaze with his, "You're eleven years old Pepito. Anytime you don't get your way, you're always having tantrums and it's not going to get you anywhere it just makes you look silly. There's going to be plenty more matches, so stop sulking and dry yourself before you catch a cold."

Begrudgingly, he did as he was told, using the towel to dry the curly mop on his head and face, before entering the car.

Just as I was opening the door to the driver's side, my eye caught a very wet looking Manuelo making his way outside the football grounds towards the bus stop. Telling Pepito that I'd be right back, I quickly walked over to Manuelo, who was pretty much in his own world and was oblivious to the fact that someone was running after him.

"Hola Manuelo!"

His brown eyes looked up at me in mild surprise and familiarity. My heart broke realising just how drenched he was. He wasn't even wearing a jacket to shield him from the wind and rain. His soggy, wet hairstuck to his forehead, his nose had gone rosey pink and his lips were subtly trembling.

My heart cried for this boy.

"Casa?"I asked, flinging back my thumb towards the car.

For such a young boy, he held so much intensity in his eyes that rivalled that of an old sage, who feared nothing.

"Gracias," he said quietly, before walking along side me towards the direction of the car.

As soon as we got into the car, I blasted the heater on – there'll be no sick children on my watch.

"Pepito, can you ask Manuelo if Gabino brought him here today?"

Still mildly annoyed at me for my earlier reprimand, he wore a frown but repeated in Spanish to Manuelo what I'd asked him to ask.

"He said he came on his own."

I was so pissed off at Gabino. My text to him from a few days back to ask if his brother was also coming to the now cancelled match was met with no reply. He could have at least let me know and I would have offered to pick his brother and drop him off home afterwards, instead he let his brother battle the cold and rain without wearing appropriate clothing.

I'd been so preoccupied with keeping myself warm and dry under the umbrella during the game, that it didn't even cross my mind to check for Manuelo on the field.

Looking through the rear view at the boys, Manuelo appeared to be totally unaffected as he now engaged in conversation with Mr. Pepe himself, but of course they were children it was easier for them to get over things, but me being the adult this was something I just couldn't get over like that and I'd be having some serious words with Gabino.

Seeing that I still had over two hours left before I picked up Little Miss Diva from her ballet classes I thought best to take the boys out to get something to eat.

I made sure that both boys drank and ate something hot, so when Pepe asked to get ice cream he was answered with a resounding no.

They'd been out in the rain for so long they needed some proper insulating food, not some damn gelato.

After having lunch and getting a takeout for Candela we went to pick her up, who all of a sudden decided she didn't want to sit in her booster seat and when I told her she had to she started blowing raspberries at me and sticking her tongue out and then started kicking her brother's seat in the front.

Pepito being definitely not in the mood, slapped her legs away, pretty hard I must say which I was sure was going to bruise soon enough, which resolutely made her start crying. And this was all while Manuelo was trying to give me directions to his house with the aid of Pepito's translating, but his sister deciding to be an annoying brat made it difficult to do so.

I was reaching the end of my tether, and honestly the part of me that was my mother was desperate to make an opening act but that would only get me fired and possibly in jail.

It was hard enough driving as Pepito kept telling Candela to shut up over her unneccessary loud wailing, but somehow I managed.

By the time we reached Manuelo's apartment block I had developed a pounding headache.

Thei rapartment block faced a basketball court but upon closer look, the net was missing. The surrounding walls of the court had several words sprayed in angry red and black graffiti paint.

There were several cracks in the ground and just generally the neighbourhood looked pretty rundown. And no, I wasn't becoming bougie– far from being it, I mean my neighbourhood back home wasn't the highest improvement to this.

Barely even saying a bye to us, Manuelo flung out of the car (I don't blame him with the borderline traumatising ride) but instead of going into his house as I'd expected, he jogged briefly down the street to meet up with a group of boys all similarly aged.

There were about seven or eight of them in total, a few of them sitting on their bikes. Now I know they said, one shouldn't judge a book by its cover but when I saw two of the older looking kids bring out several cans of beer out of a bag, I went to overprotective mode and before I knew it I had flung out of the car and was pacing down to meet them.

All the other kids noticed my presence before Manuelo who was justcradling a ball between his legs, as the beer cans were being passed out like Christmas presents from Santa.

"Manuelo, key, casa?" I asked doing weird key hand signals/don't you have the key to your house?"

"No, sólo mi madre y Gabino tienen la clave."

"¿Dóndetu madre erm...Gabino?"

I was getting frustrated with my bad Spanish I was just grateful that Manuelo could still get the gist of what I was asking.

"Trabajo."

(TRANSLATION:Work.)

Now I was doubly pissed off at Gabino and their mother that they could just leave this young child to be wandering around these worryingly unsafe streets, and not even think that giving him a spare key would be the better option.

I knew that in Europe drinking legally was set to a pretty young age but still, it was a major culture shock for me. Plus, I didn't want a gifted boy such as Manuelo to ruin his chances as a football star because he's compromised his liver.

Feeling helpless that I couldn't exactly force Manuelo back in the car or I'll be the one who would look like a child kidnapper I told him in awkward Spanish, that I'll wait until his brother or mother arrived before walking back to the car.

Little Miss Diva was fast asleep with tear marks staining her face - thank God for that, but her sleeping now would mean trouble to get her back to sleep during the night.

But honestly I was tired and I needed a break from her – I think everyone did, so I just let her have her siesta.

Moments later, a previously brooding Pepito who had barely spoken to me out of free will (because of course it was my fault that the match had been cancelled) asked if he could go and join Manuelo who was currently playing football on the wet street with the other kids.

On one side I thought it was dangerous seeing that a car could drive through anytime or they could accidentally kick the ball in one of the apartment windows and get in trouble. But the other side of me that was a kid and admired the innocent, carefree attitude of the children, that fades in adoloscence and is mostly completely lost in adulthood, said yes.

Without even hearing another word from me, he sped down the short distance to meet the rest of the kids.

In no time I observed how ''Pepe" acquianted himself with everyone there with a quick introduction done by Manuelo.

I still had a little anxiety at saying yes being that if anything happened it would be my fault, but the streets was where football was invented so really these kids were just taking it back to basics, but nonetheless my gaze never wavered from Pepito and Manuelo.

It would be the first time in the day that I could have some silence and it finally gave me time to think – about everything. About everything to do with my engagement. Yes I was engaged. It still hadn't hit me, but that was true. Yours truly, engaged.

A smile tickled my lips and as much as I tried I couldn't resist hiding it any longer. Never did I think that such a thing would happen -that a man would want to spend the rest of his life with me. It was something I never even entertained the idea of. How did it even happen?

Both Angelo and I agreed not to tell our families until I went back to the States for Christmas. The ring – it was so beautiful, it was a cushion cut diamond centre and it pained me to hide because I would just love to show it off and be like one of those newly engaged girls who treated their hand with purpose and made sure every action with their hand, whether they were drinking coffee or washing the dishes was to parade that they were taken.

It had been a week since Angelo flew back and saying that I was 'missing him' would be the biggest understatement. And the way to deal with it, was for me to keep being busy all the time, which was relatively easy and hard due to my schedule but the thing is that we'd spent over a year being in once place and at the most twenty minutes distance away from each other.

I missed saying things like, "I'll leave the door open for when you come."

Or, "I'm on my way to your house."

We couldn't exactly say those things any longer because there was a big ol' ocean separating our closeness.

And it really just made me miss him more. I got a little inappropriately hot thinking about our conversation on Skype a few days ago after I'd asked him why he'd asked to marry me and the conversation had turned something sexy:

Angelo:You know how in the Bible it says, "It's better to marry than to burn,well yeah, I've been burning for you for the last year."

Me:Oh so you're only marrying me so we can have sex?

Angelo:Yes and no, but mostly no, and don't pretend, you don't want it as badly as I do.

Me:I'm actually pretty tame!

Angelo:You know our naked bodies are meant to touch, it's deeper than sex.

Angelo:I want to know the deeper parts of you.

Me:I thought you'd mastered your lust.

Angelo:How can I have mastered my lust when I have a gorgeous girlfriend and your ass..damn...

Me:Lol,okay the temptation is there but you know how to handle it.

Angelo:I don't know how to handle it, I'm always horny.

Angelo:Isn't it attractive, that I have lots of sexual energy built up inside of me, like really powerful energy?

Let me just say I wasn't feeling as innocent anymore and I had become more eager to get married after that conversation.

But a phonecall that I had with Dominica last few days ago was making me feel all types of ways. When I burst with excitement about me being engaged she didn't have the reaction I'd anticipated, instead she questioned my decision to get married at such a young age and believed that I was being naïve since she knows Angelo is the first guy I've ever been in a relationship with.

I let out a deep sigh as I watched the group of kids trail after one another in the empty basketball court to continue playing.

Despite our many challenges I was sure of the love between Angelo and I, but I couldn't help but think that Dominica had a valid point.

 

CHAPTER 8

What I've been trying to avoid has become the unavoidable: Sara was offering me a recurring role in her telenovela.

I told her I needed time to think about it, but there was nothing to think about – I didn't want it. The only thing to think about was how I was going to strategically turn down Sara.

It was giving me major anxiety just thinking about how it was going to go, especially because she had called me the day before, in true Sara-style, brimming with child-like excitement.

I just didn't understand what the woman saw in me.

I couldn't even talk to Angelo about it because from the moment he landed back on US soil, a month and a half ago, he was touch and go. Trying to get through to him was like trying to get through to the President.

Sleep-deprivation was something that became the norm for me because I'd have to set my alarm at two or three in the morning (because of the time difference), as that was the only time he had time for me.

The conversation would end up with me feeling guilty seeing his tired face that was always edging on crashing. We hardly even prayed together anymore.

One night out of frustration, instead of waking up at a God-forsaken hour to log on Skype and see him yawning in my face every five seconds like I was boring him or something, I had sent him an essay-length text message. I'd told him how unimpressed I was with the current state of our relationship, and insisted on us having at least one hour of uninterrupted conversation every Saturday evening.

The only thing that abated my anger was the reminder that he had been the one to take an eight-hour journey to come and see me twice in the space of two months.

Everything had been going fine up until the last two weeks when he gave one excuse or another that had to do with him studying for upcoming tests. Apparently Angelo thinks that spending one hour with his fiancee instead of studying would be detrimental to his exam results.

What a farce.

For three days, I hadn't spoken to him, not even to reply to his 'good morning' texts. Even though I wasn't happy with him, I still expected him to send me them because I'd become so used to them over the last year that if he stopped sending them that would mean our relationship was in a real state of emergency.

He knew I was pissed off, and as I should be. I'd been understanding enough as a partner. And our conversation six weeks before in that shisha place, rung louder in my head plus the things that Dominica had said to me. Angelo's actions in the last few weeks didn't help temper down my doubts.

He'd sent me a message two days before saying that he was working hard now so our children won't have to.

Boy please, sit down. Angelo could live pretty comfortably off his parents' wealth if he wanted to.

Though he was met with no reply, I did think he'd made a pretty convincing case for himself. My heart warmed and my womb tingled at the thought of carrying Dr. Henriquez's bebes.

Nevertheless, I needed him to realise that we couldn't carry on this path of awkward and irregular communication if we are to be married.

Sighing softly, I locked the front door having spent the morning dropping the kids to school, practising my Spanish for a bit whilst the cleaning lady did her chores, and now that I'd seen her off, I was making my way over to meet up with Gabino.

He was the only one I felt like I could talk to. Dominica was too blunt for me, I needed someone like him who would soften the blow.

The last time I'd seen Gabino was just before my birthday and that was over a month ago, due to his very busy work schedule, we'd only been able to keep in contact via phone call and texting.

Thoughts of the incident that happened last time when I went out with Gabino crept into my mind, but I brushed it away knowing I'd be better at handling it if it were to happen again.

We decided to meet at a cafe in downtown Madrid. I was glad I could now walk without my sciatics playing up. Weirdly, ever since that day Angelo had massaged my back, the pain had remarkably reduced.

Not that I would tell him (that would be a possibility if we were talking) or he would ask being that he had such a busy schedule to remember such trivial matters as his girlfriend suffering from nerve pains.

Not wanting to be riled up again with thoughts of my boyfriend who I sorely missed but was pissing the life out of me, I looked up to the sky thankful for the mid-October sun.

I was the first one to arrive so after taking my seat near the window I ordered myself a strawberry milshake and blueberry muffin. Because I was such a dipper, I ended up taking a chunk out of the muffin and dabbing it lightly on the surface of my fruity milkshake, and just when I was about to dunk it into my crater-sized mouth, I heard Gabino's voice.

“Mi Dios, what you doing, man? That's disgusting.”

I clearly must have been too caught up in my gustatory experiment to have noticed him walk in to the cafe.

Smiling guiltily at him before quickly putting it into my mouth I watched his face screw up in disgust again. If he hadn't been there I would have closed my eyes in pleasure at the berry taste combination.

“Honestly, you should try it, es buon.”

“No gracias, I'm fine,” he said irking away holding his hands up to decline, as he sat on the seat opposite me.

He had a fresh shave round the sides of his top knot and damn was the hombre looking good. He was wearing a mud green bomber jacket despite the warm temperature outside. In any case, it suited his lanky frame.

From where I sat, I could smell his aftershave and I knew this was to cover up the stench that unfortunately I could still smell, albeit, to a lower degree.

“Wait, I get no hugs?” I said playfully outstretching my arms in question.

“I don't want you to smell me,” he said as his cheeks reddened in embarassment.

Ignoring what he said I rose up from my seat and before he'd caught on to what my intentions were I'd already wrapped as much as I could of him in a big bear hug.

I'd come to accept that part of him as a friend. Though I did think about asking him if he could seek medical help, but I was worried that would just make him more self-conscious than he already was.

Finally obliging, he put his arms around my waist a little awkwardly as he was still sitting down. He gave nice hugs. And upon these thoughts, came thoughts that should never have entered my mental space. Thoughts of how I missed being so close to a full-blooded man.

I just wanted closeness, comfort, affection yet all I'd been getting from Angelo lately was distance, unavailability and excuses.

In some ways, I blame Angelo – actually in all ways I blame Angelo.

Growing up, my dad was always the one smothering me with goodnight kisses and attack me in bear-hugs, whereas my mum was the complete opposite. I could probably count the number of times my mum had hugged me in the last ten years.

So when Angelo finally came into my life, and Angelo was totally a touchy-feely guy, it took some time before I came out of my shell to feel comfortable to initiate kisses, or hold his hands in public, or feel so comfortable to be vulnerable to text him messages to say I missed him.

“Luciana, are you sitting down?” I heard Gabino ask breaking into my thoughts.

The thought of Angelo seeing me hug a guy this long was enough for the guilty feelings to creep into my conscious so after releasing my grasp around Gabino, I walked back to my seat.

“Only because you asked nicely,” I said sticking my tongue out at him but I only received a confused expression from Gabino, clearly not getting the humour.

Ah, the langauge barrier – Lord have mercy!

And because of his cute expression, I laughed again as I slurped on my milkshake, before changing topic.

“So, how's work?”

At my question the thought did occur to me how his colleagues or even previous colleagues had managed to cope with the smell. But I thought it safe not to speak anything on that matter.

“Ah, you know, work is work,” he said with a shrug of his shoulders not really divulging much.

Several attempts at trying to meet up with Gabino were thwarted after the day that I had dropped off Manuelo at their house.

I had called verbally upset over the phone that Manuelo had to withstand the biting cold temperatures, attend a football match with none of his family members supporting him, make his way home alone with no sensible jacket to shield him from the rain and if I had not been there the boy would surely have gone hungry – which was totally unacceptable.

Midway shouting down the phone at Gabino, he had hung up the phone on me – the audacity! Boiling with anger, I had called again but he refused to pick up the phone.

I don't know, I guess my anger stemmed from me thinking of Bobby and how I would do anything to make sure my brother was comfortable at all times.

Another thing that pissed me off is the fact that when Manuelo and Gabino's mother finally came (two hours later), she didn't utter anything that was even close to ''thank you”. If anything she gave me a mistrustful look, before pushing her son in through the door.

She had a skinny frame, shoulder length dark blonde curly hair, and a face that had passed its youthful age - their mother just looked tired.

It sort of reminded me of my mother back when my dad was still in prison - always tired, always working, always grumpy.

The next day, after I'd calmed down I texted Gabino and he'd said he had seized up at having me shouting at him and he didn't know how to handle it. And for the next couple of days he could not handle talking to me on the phone.

Curious as to his seemingly enigmatic behaviour, I did my little reasearch to the condition he'd told me he had and realised it was part of the traits of someone with Aspergers to be easily emotionally overwhelmed.

Knowing this but knowing that I had to address the issue, I braced myself for the worst. “I texted you a few days before the match and you could have told me that you were working so I could have picked Manuelo up and dropped him off home.”

“I am sorry I didn't reply, I forgot. I have job to make violins now. On weekends I have job at a cafeteria. It's exhausting man.”

Just hearing him say that, exhausted me, and it was then that I could see the dark moon under his eyes.

“So why don't you make Manuelo a key so he doesn't have to be waiting outside? The kids he was hanging out with were drinking beer.”

I could tell that it disturbed Gabino a great lot at the worrying circumstances his brother could be caught up in and it was the perfect reaction that I was hoping for – I needed it to be a wake-up call.

“Okay, okay, I understand, I do key for Manuelo.”

I don't know why he and his mother had not thought of it earlier but I didn't say anything further as I could sense he was becoming a little agitated with my reprimand. The most important thing was that I'd gotten the results that I wanted.

There was momentary silence between us before he rose up from his seat saying he was going to order something to drink. Nodding my head in acknowledgement I watched him go, as I chewed on what was left of my muffin.

He returned back few moments later with a large cup of strong-smelling coffee. Urgh. “What do people see in that thing?”

“Caffeine?” he said chuckling at my facial expression as he took a short sip.

“You're going work later?”

“No, but I feel a little tired,” he said stretching his neck side to side.

Truly seeing how visibly tired he was, I couldn't help but feel deep compassion for him. During those times when not having enough money was the norm for me, I would have been more than keen to support my mother just like Gabino was doing, if not because I had to look after Bobby. Despite whatever feelings I may have for my mother concerning how she treated me when my father was away, I couldn't fault her for how hard she worked to ensure me and my brother's basic needs were met.

“Do you have work tomorrow?”

“No, but I am going somewhere.”

His lack of details of where he was going wasn't helping the curious cat in me, the expression on his face and how he'd said it just sounded real cryptic to me.

“Where?” I knew I was pushing it but it didn't hurt to try.

“I go church to see my priest, you say?” He asked and with a nod of myhead he continued, “I'm thinking about being a – I don't know how you say in English, a monje.”

After doing a quick translation search on my phone, I realised it meant monk.

To say that I was shocked, would be one of the biggest understatements of life. My first thought was (when not considering the body odour) how could such a fine guy such as Gabino cope with chastity? He would just burn himself up.

As hard as I tried to mask my surprise, I just couldn't. More proof of my incompetence as an actress.

“And why are you considering this option?”

Leaning back in his chair, an amused smile on his lips, he answered back coolly. “Have you seen the world? There is nothing in it.”

The conversation had taken a swim into the deep side real quick. Even though I'd always sensed that he was a reserved, introspective guy, I never witnessed the depths of it.

“What do you mean by that?”

“Everything is about pleasure in the temporary. People think to grow up and change the world or think that one day everyone will unite and there will be a happily ever after – there is no happily ever after until Paraíso – we live in a war zone – it's the natural order of things.”

His voice had gotten louder as he talked and though his words had given me food for thought I observed quietly as he bounced his leg up and down and punched his thighs several times, he didn't even seem aware of his actions.

“Remember I tell you before I was working in Ibiza this summer?”

“Ooh that must have been fun and yes I do.”

“Wait, listen.”

“Okay,” I said slowly, a bit thrown off by his sharp command but not letting it get to me, knowing this was just how he was.

“There were some British girls who came over to bar and ask me to give them free drinks and I say no. Not too long after, some guys come over to bar– they were about five. Y'know what happened? They said to the girls that if they suck their penis each of them would get two free drinks from each guy. I didn't know when, but they went to the toilet, and started engaging in those acts and they didn't care that people were recording them on their phones doing it.”

I was beyond speechless - it was just crazy to me that a girl would debase herself like that..

“Did they get the free drinks?”

Gabino looked shocked that I'd emphasised the point that was besides the point he was making. “Yes they did.”

If I ever was out of my mind to do something like that and word flew to my mother, I just know to never set foot in my mother's house again or I would not come back out alive.

“Was that one of the reasons that made you decide to be a monk?”

“Si pero no, it's something I've been thinking about for a long time. If not that, I like making violins, it's relaxing and it'd good for someone like me.”

I thought that should be the likely option but I respected his choices, and I admired his sage soul so when he changed the topic asking me what I was up to with my life, I was bursting at the seams to tell him.

“Oh my gosh Gabe I thought you'd never ask,” and with a dramatic flop on the chair (or was I an au naturel actress?!) I said, “I've been offered a lead role on a telenovela and I don't know how to tell my boyfriend's mother, who is basically heading the whole thing that I don't want the part.”

Instead of excited bulging eyes and disbelief that I had been given such a seemingly incredible opportunity and I was looking for ways to turn it down, he nodded his head gently and the blunt stare identical to his brother made me a little uncomfy.

“Why do you want to turn it down?”

“Because I don't see myself as an actress. I've never thought of being one. I don't want people looking at me. I just don't want to do it.”

“Okay what's the telenovela about?”

“It's centred on the history of The Moors and their impact in Spanish civilization but it's basically about a married king or something falling in love with one of his concubines...that's where I come in.”

“The Moors?” the way he'd asked I know I'd really perked his interest.

“Yeah, you know about them?”

“Of course.”

“So what if you haven't ever thought of being an actress, life is about experimenting.”

I remembered back at the studio and how awkward and inferior I'd felt because I knew I didn't have the necessary skills but was riding on the luck of knowing the boss.

“And moreover, the Moors history in Spain and in Europe is so important and undermined. Wouldn't you like to fill the part that educates?”

“You have a point there mister.”

“Of course I do. Exhala and see what happens.”

And at that moment, my phone started vibrating on the table. It was Sara calling.

“Oh my gosh Gabino my boyfriend's mum is calling me.”

“Calma, calma Luciana,” Gabino responded.

I was close to hyperventilating at the fact that this face and body that I was ashamed of for many years was about to be available for scrutiny for anyone who owns a televison in Spain.

CHAPTER 9

 

Can we talk please?

Instead of replying to his text message, I scrolled to the top of my contact list and pressed call.

He barely let his phone ring once before he answered.

“Hey.”

“Hey.”

“How are you?”

“I'm okay.”

There was an awkward pause. I heard him sigh.

My heart ached to be close to him but a quick reminder of the complacency he was treating our relationship with, intensified the nonchalant attitude I needed to get through our conversation.

“You're still mad at me.”

“Obviously.”

“How can I fix this?”

“You know how you just don't want to.”

“Okay.”

His one-word response was not a good way to keep me unpissed. “Okay?!”

“I'm not about to get into an argument with you Luciana. I don't purposely not talk to you when you want me to but I have a lot going on, that's something you're going to have to accept for this relationship to work.”

“I only required one hour of your time Angelo and you're acting as if I tried to steal all of your time away.”

His voice this time seemed rather impatient with me. “You can't expect me to be at your beck and call whenever you want to talk to me.”

At this point, I'd had it.

“Are you kidding me right now? You have the gall to act like you're doing me a favour when you choose to talk to me. I'm sorry Mr. President, since talking to me is such an inconvenience I'll let you carry on with the more important things on your agenda. Have a great night.”

“It's always one thing or another with you, honestly you need to get over your daddy issues.”

My thumb froze on the “End Call' button as Angelo's words drilled a deeper hole into my heart.

For a second silence was heard on both ends. He was about to witness the strength of an angry black woman.

“Don't you ever out of your fucking mouth talk about my father again. I don't want to marry a dickhead such as yourself. Since you love yourself so much you should go fuck yourself too.”

Without waiting to hear a response I ended the call and subsequently blocked Angelo Leo Henriquez's phone number and deleted him off Skype.

My blood was boiling. My actions were a little to the extreme and dramatic but in that moment I was possessed by ravaging heat.

After throwing my phone at a random direction on my bed I stared at the wooden closet a little distance from me, too numb to do anything.

It was in total confidence I had admitted it to him about my father's past after his uncle presumed Angelo already knew and had made a random remark to him about my father being the one to inspire him to hire ex-prisoners to help them reintegrate back into society.

I never really wanted Angelo to know because I never, if it ever came to it (and it obviously did), want him to punch my weakness.

The conversation had gone in a direction, I never ever expected it to go. Looking down on my legging-clad laps, through blurred vision slow drops of tears were landing on my thighs.

Angelo was the last person I thought would hurt me like this.

Flashbacks to all those times I rushed back home from school and locked myself in my bedroom because that was my only escape route out of this world, appeared in my mind.

Back to all those years when my father was incarcerated, I remember how several times when I looked at Bobby innocently playing alone on the floor with his toys I cried because he was growing up without a father and he had become a statistic.

I cried because my mother had practically become a single mother, and she too was a statistic. She was dealing with the mess my father left her with, working back to back for weeks on end, and never having time to enjoy life.

I cried because I had no friends.

I cried because all the joy and simplicity of my childhood was suddenly ripped away without an adjustment period.

It was just: Luciana we're moving. You have to change schools. You can't see your father. You can't go on that school trip who's going to take care of Bobby.

From the little known facts I knew of my father's money laundering charges, apparently he'd lied to my mother about being done with it, and my mother believed him until the police were at the door with a warrant for my father's arrest.

My mother had punished him by moving us away purposely, but also because we needed to downsize from the house we lived in.

I cried because my father had become a statistic too. My whole family had been a statistic of a broken African-American family, and I could only say it is by God's grace that we got a second chance of being a family again.

Thinking of that time in my first year of highschool when in desperate need of attention, I had worn an unflattering mini-skirt and turtle-neck crop-top, and walked through the halls of my school, people had openly laughed at the way my thighs rubbed together, and the way my visible belly danced over my top.

For the whole day I suffocated in embarassment - actually that's a lie. I didn't make it to lunch before I ran home crying.

And because the relationship between my mother and I had been barely tolerable, and our communication non-existent, I couldn't open up to her.

And for those several years I resented my father. Right at the time I needed him, he couldn't help. Being a teenager during that time in true teenage rebellion spirit, I wrote sporadic letters to him and basically distanced myself until the memory of him was fading day by day.

And because in those early years my mother held much resentment for my father's actions she didn't encourage me to keep in regular contact either.

So I was alone - except for that one time in my second year of highschool.

Wiping my nose with the back of my hand, I grabbed my phone from where I threw it to tell Dominica I was not going out clubbing later as we'd planned previously.

Knowing that if I called her, there was a high chance I'd break down in tears I sent her a quick message instead to tell her I had period pains.

Bitch, you are crazy. You are coming out tonight. I didn't come all the way from Paris for you to not go out with me.

That was Dominica's reply. I was in no mood to be in a place full of sweaty drunk people, indulging in a few moments of pleasure.

I felt empty. I tried to speak to God but I couldn't. All I could do was replay Angelo's vicious words until it was time to pick up Pepito and Candela from school.

Thankfully on the car ride back home they didn't cause much trouble. Seeing their interaction only made me miss my brother even more.

My parents were still refusing to give Bobby a phone because they believed he was too young even though there were new-born babies walking around with tablets.

I was tempted to get Bobby a phone for Christmas and make him keep it a secret.

Shortly after we got home and the kids had ate and done their homework, their parents returned from work and I was finally relieved.

All I wanted to do was just curl up in my bed and cry some more but at about nine in the evening, the kids' mother told me there was someone downstairs asking for me.

It was Dominica.

She was pretty intimidating when she was determined to get something done so when she gave me five minutes to pick a dress and meet her back in the taxi I didn't put up a fight.

It was phantom energy I was using to operate because I was completely numb inside out and I needed UV rays to defrost me.

Sensing that I was not in a talking mood, the ride to her house was a quiet one. I felt partly bad that I hadn't seen her in two months and I was in a shitty mood.

Talking about what happened to Dom meant admitting that she was right. And I didn't need that. She wasn't exactly supporting of my long-distance relationship.

My phone started vibrating and I reached into my bag to fish it out. Seeing an unknown caller ID I dropped my phone back into my bag.

When we reached Dom's apartment, her family were present. A modest three-bedroom apartment which she shared with her two younger sisters, her female cousin, her aunt and her mother, so there was a lot of feminine energy floating about.

The Cape Verdeans, as per all Africans, are very lively people. The way they spat their Creole – Portuguese at each other was borderline intimidating and it was clear to see why Dominica was such a feisty character.

After Dom introduced me to her family, both her mother and aunt each took turns to give me hugs that really did the trick to release some much needed oxytocin.

Dom had to drag me away from them, not that I was really complaining they seemed like genuine people but Dom was eager to get her night out started.

Following her into her room that she shared with her sisters, she told me to make myself comfortable. The only place in the room not covered by clothes or other junk was the chair infront of the dresser so I sat there.

She closed the door and when I looked into her dominating gaze I could tell she was going to start her interrogation.

“This night is supposed to be fun. I cannot have fun if you're face looks like that. What is going on? And period pains is obviously not the truth.”

“I don't want to talk about it.”

“Is it your boyfriend?”

“I said, I don't want to talk about it Dominica, it's none of your business!”

As soon as the words left my mouth, I regretted the harshness in my tone. She was just doing what a friend does but her pushiness I had no patience for.

Taking a deep sigh, watching her face contort into a unholy scowl, I pressed quick with my apology. “I'm sorry Dom but if I'm going to talk about it, I'm going to start crying and me crying means us not going out.”

Her displeased expression eased a little at my explanation and thankfully for me she had already put the matter behind her, as she pointed in the overnight bag on my lap.

“Let me see what you're wearing.”

Dominica ended up voiding the two choices of outfits I'd taken along. Honestly if it was left up to me I'd probably end up dressed in pyjamas and turn up to the club with no shame.

Luckily we both were similar build so I could fit into her peach coloured jumpsuit. It was a little tighter for me around the waist, and my feminine features were definitely more prominent i.e. breasts, butt, and dare I say it, a very faint outline of camel toe showing.

I did not feel comfortable wearing it and I let Dom know this but she waved me off as she grabbed her purse for us to leave.

“Mami, trust me you look good. I'm going to be on cock-blocking duty tonight.”

CHAPTER 11

For the next three nights I had Self-Sabotage on the Rocks. That was a cocktail of nitrogen gas and my first taste of brandy. It tasted vile, but it did good on its job on numbing me the fuck out.

The nights were a blur.

At five am I'd return to the Almas' and head straight to the bathroom before anyone could smell the shame on me. I would take a hot shower then make myself a double espresso to get me through the next few hours of getting the kids ready for school before dropping them off.

I'd skipped my Spanish classes and instead returned home just when the caffeine was wearing off and I'd fall into a deep sleep until it was time to pick the kids up from school.

After getting the kids to do their homework and have their dinner, their parents would spend time with them before I got them to go to bed.

And that's when I'd get ready to go out and start the process again.

But four days was all I could take before I called it quits. Though the kids parents' hadn't said anything I knew what I was doing was in the least bit professional.

Dom's pest-promoter was so enarmoured by her that on Dom's last night before she went back to Paris he got us a table in the VIP area and free drinks.

We ended up finding out that he was actually a partner in the nightclub, no wonder he was taking such extravagant liberties. Dom had finally given in and they'd exchanged numbers - they were a different situation entirely.

I, on the other hand, was not okay.

Getting high and drunk every night was not the way forward. It was just that the good thing I had was gone, so my logic was to cause more damage to do damage control.

How could I be so stupid?

Luckily for me, the next day was a Saturday and the Almas' wanted to watch Pepito play football, so I'd had most of the day to recover.

As soon the chores were done, I went to sleep.

My body was so tired, sleeping didn't even feel like the final solution. So I popped a couple of advils to silence my pain.

When I woke up it was late in the afternoon. For about half an hour I stared at the ceiling contemplating my life.

The next thing I remember is having the itinerary details for my flight back to the US.

I needed to see him.

In the week after our fatal argument, I'd received series of apologies but with my non-acceptance it turned into aggression that ended in shouting matches.

Where was the love that we once spoke of?

The week that followed I went through the motions. The children had a mid-semester holiday and their parents had asked me to take them to the Santa's Grotto at the mall.

I couldn't help notice the eager tone in Mrs. Almas as she told me where to take the kids, plus the subtle bedroom eyes Mr.Almas kept giving his wife as he pretended to read his morning newspaper. Not something I exactly wanted to see.

Either way, they wanted me to take their kids out for a couple of hours and that was what I was being paid for.

But not for long.

The day I'd booked my ticket back to the US, I'd made the decision to terminate my contract two weeks earlier than agreed.

I needed to go home. I needed to get my head together.

Sara had been calling me incessantly but I had not picked up her phone calls. I'd changed my mind once again. I did not want to go on TV. I was not an actress.

Plus, as the overprotective mother to my soon-to-be-ex boyfriend I coudn't imagine her wanting to still be all friendly with me.

It made me so sad thinking about it. Sara was one of my favourite people and I'd gone and messed myself over because my emotions (hormones?) had gotten the best of me.

When we arrived at the shopping mall, Little Miss Diva dragged my hand towards the direction of the grotto where a queue to infinity was forming. Pepito sluggishly walked behind us putting up a front like the chidish fantasy of Christmas no longer affected him.

Then Candela pointed to the direction of the candy store.

Memories. Memories. Memories.

The last place I wanted to be going but Candela and Pepito weren't exactly asking for permission as I found myself following their lead.

At the sight of the many different shapes, colours, flavours of candy, Candela let go of my hand. As they helped themselves to the paper bags I let them know they could only fill up one bag.

They were both bundles of energies as it is, I didn't need these bundles with sugar shock.

I was having a pretty good time just watching them have a good time, when a couple holding hands walking past me forced memories of Angelo and I going on our first Christmas shopping trip together.

I just wanted that time back when everything was just so damn simple. When an ocean didn't break us. Or time-differences didn't create distance. Work obligations didn't cause resentment.

And to top it all of, the candy store chose that exact moment to play Mariah Carey's “All I Want for Christmas” song. That's when I officially lost it.

For the first time in two weeks since I broke off my engagement I cried. In the middle of the jelly bean aisle.

They were quiet sobs but still pretty dramatic. Mariah's otherwise flawless voice was a stab to my heart as she repeated my wish.

All I wanted was Angelo – to forgive me.

From the corner of my eye I could see Candela walking up to me with her brimming bag and I turned to the side quickly dabbing my eyes with a used tissue I'd found at the bottom of my bag.

Luckily she didn't notice. She said she finished. I sniffled a bit before saying okay and asked for Pepito. She pointed at her brother saying he wasn't done picking sweets.

Candela too impatient waiting for her brother, out of nowhere, threw a lollipop that landed on Pepito's shoulder and I assumed told him to hurry up in Spanish. Pepito in quick retaliation turned around and threw a few gold coins back in her direction but she only giggled back.

We were in a near empty aisle so pretty much nobody saw the dramatics.

“Stop that,” I said snatching the bag out of Candela's hands before she threw some more sweets back at her brother.

She pouted and reached out her hands to grab her bag back, but my arms hid them behind my back.

Dealing with a five year old like Candela was always a task. Grabbing her hands and calling for Pepito the Indecisive One to hurry up I headed towards the till.

At least it provided a distraction from my inner shit.

And yes, there was the situation with Dominica. She'd drugged me. Technically she didn't but technically she did.

The Remar situation had made Dominica be more protective of me. I still didn't have the heart to tell her that Angelo and I had unofficially officially broken up because I did not want to believe it myself. Though she'd already drawn her conclusions as to what had inevitably happened that night. I was a high mess.

Remar had been unapologetic about kissing a “taken” woman, and because of this Dom had nearly scratched out his eyeballs, which was unneccessary being that I was a more than willing participant.

Luckily after that night I hadn't seen him again.

To be honest I can't say that I remember how he even looked like and I'm damn sure it would be the same for him.That's why clubs are dark – so no one can remember the face of their sin the next day.

And as for Dom, I hadn't returned her calls and texts since she'd returned to Paris.

I just needed to be on my own to figure my shit out.

Looking at the children as we headed towards the grotto knowing I was spending my last few weeks with them, I couldn't help but feel immense sadness.

But I needed to be with my own family too.

 

CHAPTER 12

Angelo's POV

I grabbed my phone, wallet and keys and locked the house door behind me. Practise papers could wait later.

I'd been doing a lot of driving lately something about the sound of my car engine clearing my mind.

All my impulses were jumping at the thought of flying over to her. But as if there wasn't enough space between us, we let the silence do the talking.

My words to her were pretty messed up, I know. But I was grieving and she didn't know it and that wasn't her fault.

Sylvester had been like second father to me. Heart attack. He'd died of an heart attack. Whilst we were playing pool.

We talked about everything. We talked about Jesus. He'd said he believed in Him. We played videogames together, and he would give me life advice.

He didn't always do good things – but who did? He was a good man. Over the last two years of volunteering at the centre, the change in him was undeniable. He was basically the Godfather. Everyone came to him with their problems.

But I was probably the only person he talked to when something was bothering him. Sylvester often spoke about the daughter he'd left when she was three years old. He was young and stupid. He spent his whole life admitting that. Had even missed her birth.

Whenever he spoke about his daughter his voice was always in the tone reserved to speak of things one regrets. He'd said the last time he'd seen his daughter was five years ago.

At 23, she was a mother and a wife to a man with a stable job. She'd shown him a picture of his granddaughter. And he was happy that she lived a humble life.

Their meeting had gone well until he asked after her mother. His daughter had said that he had no right to ask about her mother especially after leaving her to take care of what should have also been his responsibility. Their meeting had spiralled out of control to the point where she said she never wanted to see him ever again.

Sylvester had carried this pain with him and it'd sparked another dark period in his life that led him to being homeless. It was by my encouragement that I asked Sylvester to reach out to his daughter again. And though reluctant at first they'd been making steady progress.

Over the last year, they'd been sending letters to each other. And I'd even taught him how to set up an email address, send emails and check his inbox.

But he always preferred the letters because he could hold them in his hand and have them as company. It was always proof that there was someone out there who hadn't given up on him.

He always said his daughter was the only thing he'd gotten right in his life.

They'd been planning to meet up within the weeks leading up to Christmas and Sylvester had been excited.

We'd gone Christmas shopping for gifts for his daughter who was expecting again and his grandchild.

But this was life.

She came to the funeral a week ago. With her daughter and husband.

I'm sure she now had regrets of her own with how things could have been different with her father.

I'd never experienced such loss. But seeing life leave infront of me - it changed shit.

For about a week I could barely talk to anyone. My mother asked me if I wanted to go to therapy, I said no. I'm sure I would get over it. I had no choice.

The lights turned green and my phone started ringing. I put the call on loudspeaker subconsciosly knowing Luciana would approve, before setting motion again.

"Yo Angelo."

"Remar. What's up?

"Can't complain man. Life's good. Where you at?"

I had no idea where I was going but at Remar's question I decided to take a spontaneous left turn. "Just going out to eat."

"With your girl?"

"Nah on my own. I told you she's in Europe," I said trying to edge away the irritation in my voice, "what are you up to?"

"I'm just chilling, going to hit the gym soon. I don't remember but did I tell you I'm coming to the US for Christmas?"

"Nah you didn't."

"Ah I must have forgot. I'm going to be there from the 20th for about about two weeks. The whole family is going to my grandparents house. My cousins from Trinidad are coming too. We should meet up."

"Yeah definitely."

Socialising was the least of my priorities. Christmas was less than three weeks away and usually I'd be excited but this year I wasn't feeling anything just stressed.

"I'll let you know when I arrive."

"That's cool."

And just when I was about to say bye to him I hear him come through the speakers again.

"Bro the craziest shit happened to me two weeks ago."

"What happened?"

"I met a girl. Dark, curvy, fat ass haha. We actually talked. I was feeling this girl, man, but she's engaged."

"Remar man, you're going to get yourself in trouble one day."

"Yeah I know but she was feeling me too."

I feared that since Remar had lost weight it'd made him over-compensate for the times in school when he used to be friendzoned by girls mostly due to his weight.

He was a funny guy, but girls never wanted to be more than friendly with him. Now his weight loss had gone over his head and he lost respect for women, he didn't care to cross boundaries.

But hombre needed to chill before he caught something. Knowing him though, he would rather catch STDs than feelings.

"Okay Romeo where did you two leave things?"

I could hear him laugh on the other end of the phone. "We kissed but then her friend comes up screaming at us saying the girl, Luciana, is already taken and basically drags her away fr-"

"Wait, what did you say?"

"I said her friend dragged her away from me."

"What did you say her name was?"

"Luciana," and as if Remar caught up to something he asked, "You think you know her?"

"Nah. I don't."

Or rather, I hoped, prayed, desperately hoped that it was not the same Luciana Carter he was talking about.

 

CHAPTER 14

My mother at work, my father out with the car and Bobby over at a friend's house left me all alone in the house.

It was raining heavily outside but I had the biggest need to get out of the house, which six months ago, would have been so unlike me, but at that moment in time, being inside was suffocating.

Within minutes I got myself ready and called for a taxi.

Fifteen minutes later I found myself infront of the tapas restaurant Angelo had taken me to after our first break-up make up. Damn, that had been nearly two years ago.

Once I entered it was like I'd stepped back into Spain.

The borderline-tacky decorations gave it the Christmas “oomph” but Spanish music still played and so my mood was resolutely made better for it.

A waitress approached me and sat me down in the further end of the restaurant where it was quieter.

I already knew what I was going to order so I told the waitress before she left.

Okay I admit looking at all the couples huddled close together in intimate conversations made me jealous. I needed someone to talk to so I picked up my phone to Skype Gabino.

My default choice would have been Angelo. He was always so reassuring. His voice always soothing. And I missed that.

Only he really knew how to calm me down in my worst days.

But me going to Spain changed everything. Even my family felt somewhat distant to me.

Like there were so many things I couldn't relate to them because they just wouldn't get it. And my brother who was a major part of the reason why I wanted to come home for Christmas made me feel almost as if I was just a tenant in the house that he had to unfortunately oblige.

Six months changed things real quick.

I didn't feel at home in my home.

And my parents weren't helping matters at all. My plane had barely touched ground and they'd already pestered me over and over again on what I was going to do next.

So yes I wanted to unload on someone but me still pretty much jet-lagged and having forgotten the eight-hour time difference I got pissed off that Gabino did not pick up.

And it must have been a shortwhile that I sat idly preoccupied with my own thoughts and people-watching because the next thing I know my food was being brought out – by him.

My heart stalled.

By him I meant the coon who took away the last bit of self esteem I had and that I've spent the last nearly seven years trying to build back up.

The time it took for him to walk all the way to me couldn't have been more than ten seconds or five lifetimes – I couldn't tell.

My hands went all clammy. And I could feel my eyes tearing up, at that moment I really had to go to Therapy 101 and get into my happy thoughts but my cognitive wasn't responding and instead it brought up all the bad memories conjured up by that coon.

When the coon placed my plate of prawn and chicken paella infront of me my facial expression was as impenetrable as pearls.

He barely even glanced at me.

Well thanks to you, I wanted to say, I've completely lost my appetite.

But my mother raised me better than that and I was not about to waste ten dollars worth of food, especially over a coon.

So I had no choice but to force myself to eat it.

He'd shown no evidence of having recognized me.

You're ugly and fat – double whammy – you should be happy that a guy even wants to touch you.

Words I remember saying to myself as I winced in pain at what he was doing to me.

I became increasingly angry and pissed as I watched him attend to another customer. He'd walked away like he didn't know me – I was just an invisible – like I'd always been.

With all these thoughts raging through my mind I chomped on my food, the very taste of it making me sick to my stomach.

There was no way I was going to have the red velvet cake dessert I'd planned on having.

Even now the thought of Angelo insanely pissed me off. The last thing he'd said to me was that we'd talk once I got back to the U.S.

I was angry at how things had gotten because to be honest if it wasn't because of the situation with Angelo, I probably would have remained in Madrid. But I just had to trust that the Lord knew what He was doing.

I finish my food and a wild guess at what was coming towards me to clear my table?Yes, the coon.

Without a word or glance at me he bent over forward grabbed my plate and started moving away to the direction of the kitchen.

Ah, he was about to experience the wrath of a scorned woman.

“Liam!”

At the mention of his name, he was forced to turn around.

He turned around and raised one eyebrow at me still not saying anything.

“Aren't you forgetting something?”

“Like what?”

“Well for one you seemed to have forgotten my name and secondly an apology.”

“Your name. An apology,” he repeated back at me as if he was reading a shopping list, “ I don't even know you.”

Yet the tick in his jaw said a different story.

Oh my ratchet thermometer turned real hot at that moment.

“You don't rememeber us seven years ago? You don't remember what we used to do? You don't remember us texting all night only for you to ignore me when we saw each other in the morning at school?”

By this time I was receiving attention. Curious ears and eyes nearby were concluding their conversation to listen in on the situation that was developing.

And Liam's face, who was still holding onto my plate, was red as the cherry he tried to take from me. “Luciana get out, you're causing a scene.”

Well I could care less, this shit might as well have been a telenovela.

“Oh so now you remember my name. But about two minutes ago you were not man enough to look me in my fucking eyeballs.”

“I'm not dealing with this shit.”

In my heated angry trance, I'd noticed that in true typical, millenial living fashion certain individuals had their smart phones raised recording the whole thing.

I didn't even realise how quiet the restaurant had become, I could even hear my palpitating heart.

His non-responsivesness was pissing me off and when he started to squeeze his way out between tables it only infuriated me further.

“Ooh make way for the fuckboy, fuckboy coming through.”

I fought hard to not let the tears fall. At the thought that I was so giving to a stupid fucking boy who could never appreciate my worth or respect me, even if I sold my soul to him, yet like a girl hypnotised I had let him play me until it was game over for my self-esteem. Because for a while he made me feel like I was a girl that a guy could be attracted to.

“Yes go on with your stupid coon ass self Liam.”

All of a sudden he turned around and for a second I thought he was going to hit me, but instead he opened his mouth.

“You're such a bitch. How dare you come to my place of work making a fool of yourself and embarrassing me like this.”

“I'm embarassing you fuck boy? I'm embarassing you?! You basically forced me to suck your dick. When I told you two fingers hurt, you put in three fingers. Three fingers! And you watched me cry and said me crying turned you on, until you jacked off and left me on the bed bleeding.

It made me feel like shit, so worthless, a belief I've carried on me for the last seven fucking years of my life. A belief I allowed to destroy my relationship with the only guy worth counting in my life who knew how to appreciate me as a woman. A belief that has meant all odds at me reconciling with that guy are slim to none because I ended up cheating on him.

And you want to talk about embarassing you? Go fuck yourself Liam.”

The whole restaurant was in stunned silence. “Y'know what, we should do a toast.”

And without permission I grabbed a champagne flute from the table nearby and raised it up to the attention of everyone.

“Everybody raise your glasses in honour of Liam's parents for raising such a solid man. To the realest fuckboy.”

And with that I proceeded to pour the contents of the glass on the coon's face.

Like a play, on cue everyone gasped and hollered. I didn't even feel a shred of fear as he came forward and his fists headed straight for me but was quickly averted by one of his colleagues.

“Let me go. I'm not dealing with this shit,” he repeated to his colleague as he loosened his grip, giving me a dirty look as he untied his apron and dumped it on the table.

“Everybody say goodnight to the realest fuck boy you'll ever meet in your life.”

For a moment we all watched in silence as he strutted away, his body hunched trying to retain his shamed pride, as he continued down the busy street.

“Okay you've done enough damage for the day.”

It didn't occur to me until my body was being guided in the forward direction that I was being escorted out by security.

My adrenaline was running over speed limits.

I wasn't thinking clearly. I couldn't have been thinking clearly.

The restaurant manager wasn't even worried that I hadn't even paid the bill. He just wanted me out of his establishment.

Which I totally understand why.

At a glance at people's faces in the restaurant – a few off them had piteous looks at me, but the rest looked at me as if I was the Hulk and they stayed wary as I walked past their tables.

Because apparently I was just an (heartbroken) angry, black, mad, woman, especially as I needed two security guards to handle little ol' me.

But I didn't have it in me to care. And as the cold wind caressed my pores, I couldn't help but feel as light as the air I breathed.

Because after ten years, my heart was truly healing.

 

CHAPTER 14

 

The sound of the rain hitting my window put a lazy smile on my face and had me curling tighter into a foetal position. My body was light as a leaf.

Outside was gloomy but I felt spectacular inside - that is until I reached for my phone.

This wasn't a drill.

Right infront of my eyes were inbox notifications from Facebook and Twitter.

I scrolled and scrolled through my notifications in utter surrealness. Yawning and stretching my limbs I dropped my phone back on the pillow, nothing much registering in my semi-sleepy state.

I realised that it had been the vibration of my phone going off in notifications that had woke me up in the first place, so reluctantly I unlocked my phone to see what was really going on.

I tried to log into my social media accounts but then realised that I had forgotten my password. God knows how long I'd even logged on it – probably a year or more ago just to post a 'good riddance' graduation photo.

After I went through that ordeal - and boy was it an ordeal to reset my password, I saw exactly what had caused the disruption to my morning.

“No, no, no, no, no.”

Someone had posted a video of the whole thing that had gone down in the restaurant and the footage had gone viral.

And when I say viral, I mean there were already memes of me.

It was just too much to take in. My phone buzzed again. It was a text message from Angelo along with a cropped clip of me admitting to cheating on him.

We need to talk, the message read.

I know. I'm coming over, I replied.

My house was empty once again – not the homecoming I expected at all but I was more than happy about it because I didn't need my parents pissing me off with their probing questions.

I didn't even remember getting dressed but half an hour later the taxi was dropping me off infront of Angelo's house.

Honestly, it felt weird to be at his house. It had almost become a part of my distant memory and that made me sad. Six months changed shit.

Whispering a silent prayer, I rang the doorbell. I waited.

Each second that went by in anticipation of him opening the door was complete torture.

When his door finally did open, he stood watching me with an expressionless face. It was him, myself, and Tension.

My body's natural response was to hug him and it took so much of my self – discipline to not do just that.

“Hey,” I said beyond awkward.

“Hey.”

He stepped back making way for me so that could enter.

I loved him.

So much had changed. Had we grown apart?

Tears started glossing my eyes. “I love you Angelo.”

We were in his kitchen, he had opened his fridge and grabbed a bottle of water out of it.

“You have a funny way of showing it.”

He was angry. He was hurt. I could tell, but so was I. The last time we were together we were happy, engaged.

Angelo was avoiding my gaze. I didn't even know how to start or what I was planning to achieving.

“I have a question for you,” he said finally looking at me standing on the other side of the counter.

“Okay.”

“How do you expect me to act when I go over to Remar's house on Christmas knowing my fiance cheated on me with him? And before you ask, he knows now that I know.”

At that moment it felt like the blood had completely drained out of my body.

“Yeah it's a small world.”

I didn't know what I could say.

“Angelo I didn't know. I never meant for that to happen.”

“Of course you didn't.”

How stupid could I be? And of all people it was Angelo's friend that I decided to act the whore on.

I didn't know if it was possible to detest another human being as much as I detested Dominica in that moment. But I knew that I had to accept full responsibility for everything that happened.

“Angelo you have to believe me when I say I was under the influence.”

“Under the influence? You don't drink. Or at least from what I remember of you.”

His words hurt more than I let on.

“I didn't drink that night. I inhaled laughing gas, thinking it was just helium.And that shit made me feel – I just wanted to forget about the fact that I'd called our engagement off. And...and then Remar came and we talked, and out of nowhere he kissed me.”

“And you kissed back.”

I did. And that's what hurt the most. Because under normal circumstances I knew I never would have.

“You hurt me Angelo.”

“And now you've you got me back. Well done.”

“No!” I screamed back, tears now flooding my face, “you have to look at this from both sides.”

“So you just assume, and make everything about you?!”

His anger was fully unleashed now. “Somebody close to me passed away, I'm studying for my finals, and you think you telling me I'm not giving you any attention is going to make me feel better, and so you break up with me – over the phone?”

At that moment I sobered up. “Somebody close to you died and you didn't feel comfortable enough to tell me what was going on?”

“It has nothing to do with us. I just deal with grief differently Luciana. I don't like talking about it.”

“Angelo that's not how a partnership works.”

“You're one to talk about partnerships.”

I was tired. I was tired of it all.

The tears wouldm't stop. Bringing out the black velvet box, I slid it over the counter. “I'm sorry for not understanding you. I'm sorry for wasting two years of your life. I'm sorry.”

I started bawling and through blurry eyes I made my way towards my exit. But before I could I felt his warm embrace.

“Shit Luciana,” he said cursing silently, “you do this to me.”

He held me close and all my problems seemed to melt all at once.

Through blurry eyes I looked at the velvet box sitting lonely on the kitchen counter wishing we could return to the way things were six months ago.

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CHAPTER 15

@lucianacarter girrrrrlll you is epic #restaurantgate #lucyissaratchet

@lucianacarter are you still with your man?

@lucianacarter when you threw the champagne glass on his face crying laughing emoji

@lucianacarter i've been in your situation and I just want to say I'm so glad you've finally seen the light. you're an inspiration for us women out here

@lucianacarter you don't deserve your boyfriend. You said he was the best guy for you yet you acted the ho actions speak louder #restaurantgate

@lucianacarter you went soft on that coon, I woulda did worse. You should have told your parents and reported his rapist ass to the police #restaurantgate

@lucianacarter hey Luciana, we're a women's empowerment group, and we'd love to interview you about your experience. Send us an email at for further discussion

@lucianacarter after seeing the video, it gave me the courage to leave the unhealthy situation I was in. and though im still heartbroken I know ill be okay, so thank you

I was so grateful to God that my parents were pretty much Luddites and they didn't have much of a clue of what was going on. But I had to tell them.

Their daughter was now Twitter famous, Instagram famous, Facebook famous. The unphotogenic girl of yesteryear was now on everybody's timeline.

All they knew though was that there was a footage of me online that didn't show me in the best light – and that was just putting it mildly.

No matter how much I cringed watching myself I couldn't stop pressing the play button over and over again. It was like a scene from Cheaters. I was the Mad Black Woman v2.0.

I sat in the taxi on my way home my eyes glued to the screen of my phone. My fingertips were burning from tapping and my thumb ached from scrolling through my notifications. It was safe to say that Christmas was a drag. But everything that happened around it was the opposite.

The outpouring of women from all over saying how grateful they were to me for standing up for emotional abuse was overwhelming.

Liam had received several violent threats from people online, and I had to publicly tell people to stop. Was this even real life? People were actually paying attention to what I had to say.

And then there was the other issue, the biggest issue - my heart.

Angelo wanted time. He wanted space. Sure, I'd said to him, I could give him that.

In the meantime I had to deal with the aftermath of Restaurant-Gate where even though I had overwhelming support of people, there were other very opionated keyboard warriors who had typed some very choice words at me, attributing me to a whore.

As someone who'd never been in a position before to be publicly scrutinised over a very personal issue, I had several ways to feel about it. I was heartbroken. I wanted my happy ending to only be with Angelo, yet everything was hanging in balance.

And to have people I didn't even know attack me I'd felt lonely as fuck. Yet Sara was the last person I'd expected to reach out to me.

Apparently Angelo had told her everything. And still she was very forgiving about how everything had turned out, especially when my last weeks in Madrid I'd been avoiding her texts and calls and not bothered to get back to her once I got to the States.

Part of the reason had been because I was scared she was going to convince me to get casted for the telenovela.

She's said she missed me and wanted to meet up. I was no doubt in panic as I settled on a date with her on the phone.

My head was still reeling from the meeting. She said she knew people that could help put me in the right direction to present me with the right opportunities. Then she started mentioning book deals, speaking engagements, brand endorsements, blogging, and I just couldn't help but smile thinking how typical it was of Sara to make a lemonade out my lemon of situation.

It was what Phoenixes do.

And I couldn't help but think that maybe it was my turn to let my story known.

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