Mia’s a few shades paler now, clutching the pack of papers. “Thank you,” she says, quietly.
Goddamn it, Maria. I narrow my eyes at her to let her know I’m not pleased, but she feigns innocence, takes our breakfast dishes, and leaves us to the fallout.
I can see from the pained look on Mia’s face that she’s thinking of Vince now. It pisses me off—she’s been in a good mood this morning and I was enjoying it. Before she can sink into a hole of guilt, I distract her. “Do you enjoy school?”
Her gaze lingers on the folder for a moment as she flips it open. “I like learning things,” she answers. “I wouldn’t say I like school.”
“Do you plan to go to college?”
“Do they have college in Heaven?” she shoots back, raising an innocent eyebrow. “You’re going to have killed me by then, right?”
“Think of all the money I’m saving you on tuition,” I tell her, eyes still on my laptop. Since we’re talking about it, I open up a tab and bring up the site for Northwestern. “What are your grades like?”
I already know what her grades are since Adrian already gave me all her files, but it’s not a normal thing to know, so I ask anyway. She rattles off her GPA, the classes she’s in, the classes she hates, and the classes she likes. She tells me about someone named Lena. I think that’s her shitty friend. Adrian said he didn’t like her, so I adopt his opinion of the girl. Not that they would’ve likely remained friends anyway, but if she couldn’t handle Mia with Vince, she certainly wouldn’t be able to handle Mia with me. They’re not going to be friends anymore regardless.
I mean, if I kept her. I’m not going to, but if I did, Lena would be kicked off Mia’s friendship team first thing.
“You’re in AP biology?”
She nods. “I’m not a big fan, but I was trying to do anything I could to see if I might be able to qualify for scholarships. I did qualify for some, but not enough. I don’t think I’ll be able to go—unless I get the Heaven University tuition rate, naturally.”
I smile faintly, scrolling down the page. “Naturally.”
“At least the campus is sure to be beautiful,” she says. “Pearly gates. Gorgeous courtyard. I’m gonna study out there all the time.”
“It sounds like a nice time.”
“I bet no one ever gets bad grades at Heaven University, either. Even if you don’t do the work and you just nap in the clouds all day long, you still pass with flying colors.”
“Seems reasonable. Too bad I can’t get in; I’d definitely give you a good excuse to skip classes.”
Now she smiles at me. “Yeah, barring some pretty significant changes to your lifestyle, I don’t think they’re gonna let you in.”
“Maybe you should transfer to Hell University. I can visit you there.”
Mia rolls her eyes, drawing a stapled pack of papers from her folder. “Due to my involvement with this family, I probably already have. Heaven University probably yanked my acceptance letter as soon as I walked through your front door.”
“Eh, Hell University has better extracurriculars anyway.”
“Why didn’t you go to college?” she asks.
I regard her, raising an eyebrow. “What makes you think I didn’t?”
“Vince said you didn’t. You seem like someone who definitely should have gone to college.”
“My father went to college. Had an actual career before he got sucked into the family business. When he was younger, he rejected it, insisted he wouldn’t run things, that his younger brother Ben could do it in his stead. It’s not that simple, though. It’s not a choice in my family. If you’re the eldest son, your path is set. That’s the way it’s always been done, and at least in that, my family doesn’t break tradition.”
Mia nods her understanding. “Right, I’ve heard you guys are pretty traditional.”
I nod my head. “My grandfather let my father get his degrees and start his career, allowed him distance from the family business. He thought maybe he’d outgrow it. Only, my grandfather had a heart attack. Died on the table for a minute, but they managed to resuscitate him.”
“Oh, wow, that’s scary,” she remarks, sympathetically.
“I imagine so. After he recovered, he was more aware of his own mortality. He told my father it was time to stop pretending to be something he wasn’t and accept his role as head of the family. My father declined. Still wasn’t interested. So, my grandfather got a little more aggressive, my father tried to leave, and a woman got involved. As women tend to do, she complicated things.”
Mia scoffs. “Women don’t complicate things. Morelli men complicate things. You’re the king of complications, so I’m sure your father was, too.”
He was more like Vince than me, but I don’t want to bring him up, so I don’t tell her that. “Well, anyway, the long story short is that he fell in love with her, but she didn’t fall in love with him. His father used her to control him, to get him into the position he rejected until he bent to fit it. His path was… full of wrong turns and unhappy destinations, though. He didn’t just bend to fit his role; he broke apart and put the broken pieces back together in that mold. I’m told my father wasn’t always evil, but he certainly turned out that way. At any rate, when I came of age, he saw no point in sending me to college where I might get idiotic ideas of some other life path I wanted to follow. He didn’t expect me to take to the business side of things so well, but I think he was concerned that given a traditional background, I would realize I could be successful without his legacy and build something of my own. My brother would’ve run the family then, and he would’ve enjoyed the role, but my father thought a little too much. He was worried Dante would push him out to take over before his time.”