“We do stuff together sometimes,” I protested, but without much conviction. They weren’t any better off financially than I was, so most of our free time together was spent at each other’s homes watching Netflix. They did date sometimes, though, something I’d done very little of since high school.
Okay, it was something I’d not done at all since high school.
The thing about socializing with men was that they tended to desire women who’d spend real, significant amounts of time with them. I often picked up shifts at the bistro for the extra cash, which meant my time stayed limited.
I had dated a bit during my senior year, even managing to attract a boyfriend or two. But after they realized I frequently worked seven days a week, things would fall apart. While I enjoyed going out to dinner or the movies with them, I felt obligated to help my mom and dad more. And honestly, none of those boys had offered me much reason to change my mind.
I don’t know why, but every member of the male species I’d dated had been fixated on what I could do for them. They’d seem interested in my attention, sometimes even going out of their way to get it. And then, they tended to become obsessed by the prospect of something sexual happening between us.
But I didn’t like sexual things. They didn’t appeal to me.
I’d kissed a few of my dates only for nothing to happen on my end. And I mean nothing. No fireworks, no craving, no need for more. I’d heard other women talk about pleasure and even ecstasy, but I’d never felt even a smidgen of that.
Those same boys had fondled me whenever they got a chance, and a couple of them had tried to push me to go further, but I’d stopped them cold. I wasn’t interested.
I’d never felt that spark, that thing I thought I was supposed to feel. Not with any of them. And I didn’t feel attracted to girls, either. Sometimes, I wondered if all that talk about passion and lovemaking was a lie. Something manufactured and false. But then, sometimes, I wondered if it was just me. Why couldn’t I enjoy something other girls talked about all the time?
If it was so important to others, why didn’t it feel important to me?
Was something wrong with my body? With who I was as a woman?
This fear, along with my busy schedule, had caused me to put dating on a permanent hiatus at the ripe old age of eighteen. It’d been five years since I’d done anything but flirt with customers in the hopes of getting a decent tip. I’d decided that having a romantic life was overrated. That it must be more trouble than it was worth.
Lunch hour over, David and I hurried back off to our jobs. Running late, I jogged out of the park, anxious to make up the time.
On my way I passed an elderly couple holding hands, a young couple attempting to swallow each other’s tongues right there in front of everybody, and a family with three small children meandering down the path, laughing at their dog as he chased his tail.
Though I’d never admit it, seeing people as happy, impassioned, and content as this made me ache. It made me want more. Made me envy them. To feel jealous of them.
Nonetheless, I tried to ignore these feelings. The truth was I didn’t have time for any of that. I had too many other responsibilities. Too many drains on my energy already.
And if I often woke in the middle of the night feeling lonely, I didn’t have to admit that to anyone.
Especially not to myself.
2
Marco
I woke up the second I turned over on my back.
Son of a bitch.
I did this often in my sleep, despite the immediate press of tight pain that made me flip right back over on my stomach. It’d been nine months since Roman Petrella, former runner for the Varasso mafia family, had betrayed us by torching our mansion, leaving it nothing but a huge pile of smoking embers and ash.
My brothers had made sure he’d vanished off the face of the earth, never to be seen again, but there was no undoing what he’d done. There was no bringing our housekeeper back to life, nor was there a way to take away the permanent limp or burn scars my eldest brother Luca had been saddled with due to that fire.
Just like there was no pretending the third degree burns on my back and shoulders caused by that same blaze hadn’t left me in so much agony I’d wanted to die.
It’d been the worst physical torment I’d ever experienced, bar none. And considering that I’d suffered through being shot, that was saying something.
When the fire had happened, my six-foot frame had weighed two hundred twenty pounds. I’d been what my brothers liked to call beefy, and I’d spent lots of time in our gym lifting weights. Bodybuilding had been my favorite hobby. My brawn had allowed me to carry Luca around like a sack of potatoes that horrendous night.
Since then, though, I’d lost much of my bulk.
Those horrific burns had meant I’d been incapable of working out like I once had. The stretching and pulling of my injured skin had been excruciating, impossible, so I’d dropped forty pounds of muscle. I’d only managed to get back on the treadmill a few weeks ago.
At least that was something. But even after all these months of surgeries and treatments, the burns weren’t fully healed. At the beginning, I’d asked how long it’d take for the wounds to turn into scars, only to be told each case had to be considered on an individual basis. Third degree burns were different than other burns because the damage went so deep.