Chapter 19

CHAPTER 19

" W hat does your mom drink?" Erin asked, searching the Italian labels on the cabernet shelf at the liquor store.

"Whiskey."

She did a double take. "Whiskey?"

He nodded. "Tullamore Dew."

"Oh. That's…intense."

He laughed. "Don't worry. She's like a well-oiled machine. We top her off regularly and she doesn't act up."

"What about your dad?"

He reached for a large bottle of Pisano. "He likes anything red."

When they reached the register, he pushed her card out of the way when she tried to pay. "This is my gift to them. Let me pay for it," Erin protested.

"Tough."

The clerk bagged up the large bottle of red and Giovanni held the door.

"What about your Nona? Does she speak any English?"

"She can, but she rarely does." He gave her a warning look. "However, she understands everything , so don't tell any secrets in her presence."

She wrung her hands as he drove, fidgeting in the front seat. Giovanni adored his grandmother, but Erin remembered the little old lady from when she dated Finn. She was small but terrifying. Back then, she'd had jet black hair and blood-red lips. She only wore black. Once she smacked Finn's hand because he tried to steal a cannoli before Sunday dinner. After that, Erin did her best to avoid the woman.

Her stomach churned with uncertainty. "What if they don't like me?"

"They'll love you."

"What if?—"

He grabbed her hand and brought it to his lips, kissing her fingers and then biting her knuckle sweetly. He did that a lot and it had a strange calming effect on her. "It'll be fine. Relax."

The house was simple and constructed of dark red bricks. Snow still covered the lawn, so she couldn't see much as far as landscaping, but she did catch the head of a statue sticking out of the snow by the cement steps.

It was Mary. They had a two-foot statue of Jesus's mother on their lawn.

"Are your parents super religious?" she whispered, sure they were aware that Giovanni slept at her house almost every night.

"We're Catholic." He opened the door, giving no more explanation to the depths of their faith.

The scent of garlic and basil thickened the air and voices carried from the back of the house.

"You need the olive oil to balance out the acidity," a male voice boomed. "Don't argue with me, Mariella. I've been doing this for years."

"Nona, tell him it's got enough oil. He's gonna ruin it."

Giovanni led her into the kitchen where a large pot steamed and another pot boiled, spattering red bubbles on the glass top. Italian Mary shoved Giovanni's father aside.

"You ruin the sauce with too much. It needs'a time." She swatted him away with a stained wooden spoon and he turned, licking the spatter of sauce off his hand. "Giovanni, thank God you're here. I get nothin' but abuse in this house full of women."

Erin clung to his side. "You have a lovely home." She hadn't spoken loud enough or fast enough because no one seemed to hear her.

Mr. Mosconi pulled a jar of what looked like pickled red onions out of the fridge and carried a strainer of rinsed broccoli to the counter. "How you doin', Erin?"

It hadn't occurred to her that Giovanni's parents might remember her from hanging around the McCulloughs.

This time she spoke a little louder. "Thank you for inviting me."

"Sit," he ordered, pointing at a chair.

She looked around for Giovanni's mom but didn't see her. His sister and grandmother bustled around the stove, chopping and stirring ingredients.

"We got you a bottle of red for dinner, Dad." Giovanni set the bagged bottle on the table.

Mr. Mosconi pushed down the wrapper. "Pisano. Nice. Mariella, grab us some glasses."

Three short, skinny juice cups appeared on the table, and Mr. Mosconi twisted off the metal cap and tipped the jug, carefully filling the three cups. He passed one to Erin and one to Giovanni. " Salute ."

It was a dry but sweet red, but Mr. Mosconi seemed to enjoy it as he took a long sip and sighed. "Did you catch that game this afternoon? Brutal."

Giovanni tossed an arm over the back of her chair, totally at ease. "Did you take a beating?"

"Ah," his dad shut his eyes and laughed, the sound slightly pained. "They killed me."

"I told you, you can't bet on soccer. Football and horses are where the money is. Maybe a little basketball here and there."

"Vincenzo will be happy."

Giovanni glanced over his shoulder at Erin and explained, "Vincenzo's our bookie."

She sipped her wine, happy to follow along in silence.

The front door opened and a woman yelled, "Is anyone gonna help me with these bags?"

"Go help your mother," his father ordered and Giovanni disappeared without a word. Erin moved to follow, but Mr. Mosconi grabbed her hand, stilling her. "You relax. You're a guest."

"All that meat has to go in the big freezer in the garage," Mrs. Mosconi yelled as she entered the kitchen. "Hi, Erin."

"Thank you for having me," she repeated.

"Any time." Giovanni's mom moved to the stove and lowered her voice, whispering to Italian Mary, "Ma, they didn't have the prunes you like, but I got you these."

Erin found Mr. Mosconi watching her with a smirk. She looked at him in question, but he only chuckled and topped off her wine.

"So, you like my son? What's the matter? Is there a shortage of able-bodied men I don't know about?" He made the comment in an affectionate tone, but Erin didn't find the joke funny.

"Giovanni's been really good to me."

"He better be," his mother snapped from the other side of the kitchen, amid another conversation. "I raised him to be a gentleman. Mariella, throw this seasoning in the butter and mix it for the bread."

"What are you going to do when he goes back to Jersey?" Mr. Mosconi asked.

The question struck like a bomb disturbing a peaceful dawn. Giovanni returned before she could answer.

Was he going back to New Jersey? He said he gave up his apartment because he was traveling. But he wasn't traveling now. She didn't want to think about it.

She offered to help and Mariella handed her a stack of plates. She and Giovanni's sister set the table in the dining room, but the other woman didn't say much. The longer the silence lasted, the more uncomfortable Erin grew. Mariella was younger, so she didn't recall ever hanging out in the same circles, but the girl most likely heard rumors about Erin.

"I like your nails," Erin complimented, noticing the ombre fade of the paint.

"Thanks. I got them done at the new salon in town." She returned to the kitchen leaving Erin standing alone in the dining room.

Rather than rush back, she took a moment to collect herself.

Voices carried from the kitchen. The Mosconis were loud for a family of five and a grandmother who barely spoke. Erin's muscles were already tired from the slow tension that came with socializing and she wondered how long after dinner they would have to stay.

"Hey." Giovanni entered the dining room. "You okay?"

She leaned into him, shutting her eyes and borrowing a bit of his strength. He hugged her and pressed a kiss to the top of her head.

"How about a tour?"

"Sure."

He showed her the house, which was simple and small. The living room shelves were filled with old DVD cases that wore about ten years of dust and the furniture was made for comfort more than style. Little glass figurines decorated a table in the hall, mostly posed in prayer and dressed like saints.

A wooden cross hung on the living room wall with a brass crucifix. She also spotted rosaries hanging off some picture frame corners. She hadn't realized his family was so religious.

"This is my old room."

He opened the door and waited for her to enter. The bed was small and the furniture handmade. Finn had a similar set and she couldn't stop the memory from invading.

There were no adult touches to the décor. "How long ago did you move out?"

"After two years of community college, I left."

His yearbook sat on a shelf next to a copy of The Grapes of Wrath. She brushed a finger along the spine. "I never got a yearbook."

"No?"

Her father had refused to pay for any of the extra stuff not covered by their tax dollars.

He pulled it off the shelf and the spine creaked when he opened the stiff, laminated cover. "You can look at it if you want."

Signatures scattered around the cover page. If she had gotten a yearbook, would anyone have signed hers?

She recognized the names and skimmed through the pictures. The sight of familiar halls and gymnasiums made her smile.

"I used to love school," she admitted. "My teachers were so nice to me."

He wrapped his arms around her waist, resting his chin on her shoulder as she turned the pages. She laughed when they got to the M's.

There was Finn, followed by Luke, both looking incredibly handsome and baby-faced. On the next page, she found Giovanni.

He whistled. "Ain't he a looker?"

"You look like such a player."

"How about this beauty?" He dragged his finger over to her picture. "Erin Montgomery. I'll be sure to write. " he read the quote and looked at her in question.

She flushed, feeling foolish and unsuccessful where any dreams were concerned. She was supposed to leave after graduation but something always kept her and her plans never worked out.

The smile she wore in the photo sat like glass on her face, fragile and transparent. She recalled how much she dreaded the end of senior year, never sure what would happen to her after graduation.

"I was so scared," she whispered, remembering the heavy weightlessness of that moment, the thought that she could simply drift away and never return, anchored by the fear that she might never leave due to the sense of obligation she felt to stay.

"Why?"

Her father refused to help her with college and she needed to find a job if she wanted to move out, but she had no real training. For years, she made pathetic wages, which was why she never made it out of Jasper Falls. "I was supposed to leave."

"Where did you want to go?"

"It didn't matter. I just wanted to go away."

That was when her life started spiraling. Finn decided he was going to take over the lumberyard, which meant he was never going to move out of Jasper Falls. If she left, they would have no future. It was the beginning of their end.

Summers had always been awful, because she spent more time at home. When school ended, her life became an endless summer.

"What are you thinking about?"

She shut the book. "Nothing good."

He turned her to face him and looped his arms around her shoulders, pressing his forehead against hers. "It's in the past, Erin. None of us were totally happy then. And I don't know anyone who's doing everything they thought they'd be doing now."

"You are. You're following your dreams and perusing a comedy career."

"I bombed my last show."

She frowned, guilt slicing through her. "At O'Malley's?"

"No. A show I did in the Bronx."

"When were you in New York?"

"Last week."

"You left?" The steadiness she usually found in his arms disappeared as a sense of having the rug pulled out from under her left her emotionally flailing for reassurance.

Panic welled in her. He'd left the state without even telling her? He hadn't even said goodbye.

"Only for two days. The show didn't go well."

"You were gone for two days and didn't tell me. What if the show had gone well? Would you have stayed?"

"If they offered me another gig, I probably would've taken the job. This is how I make a living, Erin."

Just like that, he would have left. No goodbye, no note.

A knock came from the door. "Dinner's ready," Mariella called.

Erin turned to leave and he grabbed her arm. "Hey, what's wrong?"

"You just left."

"For a job. I came back."

Her mind flashed to a forgotten memory and she was standing in her father's bedroom staring down at her mother's empty drawers. Then she was crying on the front porch watching Harrison drive away. "I can't have this discussion here."

"What discussion? Erin, I'm a little confused?"

"Me too." She left his bedroom and visited the powder room to wash her hands before dinner.

As she stared in the mirror at her reflection, she noticed how shaken she appeared. She needed to pull herself together. His family was out there, and it would be nice if she didn't make a bad impression for a change.

Blowing out a breath, she stuffed down all her insecurities and tried not to worry about how much time she and Giovanni had left before he moved on. She didn't say much at dinner, but there was never an awkward silence. The food was delicious, but she didn't have much of an appetite.

On the drive home, Giovanni kept looking at her, his easygoing expression morphing into a straight scowl by the time they reached her house.

She went straight to her room and changed into a T-shirt for bed. Giovanni watched her from the doorway, his fist still gripping his keys.

"Do you want to explain what I did that was so damn wrong?"

"Nothing."

"Oh, bullshit, Erin. You're pissed and I have no idea why."

"I'm not pissed." She was upset. All the pressure she'd been carrying in her chest lately started to swell and her body felt like it was going to burst open. She wanted to scream and cry or throw something, but she couldn't explain what the hell she was feeling or why her insides shook with the force of a hurricane.

She pushed past him to go brush her teeth and he caught her arm, forcing her full attention. "Talk to me."

He caged her in with his body, but this wasn't sexual. His eyes wore lines of worry as he looked at her with desperate intensity.

She opened her mouth, but her words refused to form.

"I don't want to fight with you," he rasped, hugging her close.

She stiffened, afraid to get distracted by the way he made her feel, terrified that he'd eventually blindside her and take his affection away. She couldn't depend on something so fragile. "Why are you still here?"

"What?"

"In Jasper Falls, why are you still here? You said you were leaving a month ago."

"You know why I'm here."

He was there for her, but he couldn't stay forever. She knew the reality. But what could she offer long term to make him stay? Everyone eventually left her. It was only a matter of time before he followed the same pattern.

His childhood home only offered a bedroom for a boy. Nothing she saw tonight spoke of permanence or an intention to move back home for good. He didn't live in Jasper Falls anymore, and people didn't like to move backward. His life was on the road, following his dreams forward.

"When's your next show?"

Did he have something booked? Was he keeping details from her to avoid the inevitable?

"I have a gig in Atlantic City next Tuesday."

The fact that he'd booked something and not mentioned it stung like a betrayal. "How long have you known about it?"

"Two weeks."

She refused to cry over her own stupidity. "So, when you said all that stuff about being open about things, you really weren't talking about yourself."

"Erin…"

She shook her head. "I knew this would happen."

"What? Nothing's happening."

"You don't live here, Giovanni. You travel for your job, and I know you're running out of money."

"Don't worry about my finances. I'm fine."

But he wasn't. There was a reason he hadn't booked a room at the Brick Hotel and eventually checked out of the Motor Inn.

She had a meeting with her father's attorney next week. Until then, she wouldn't know what kind of financial situation she was in. Maybe she could support them for a while, but Giovanni would eventually have to go back to work. They both would, and she had no intention of working at the hardware store. That meant finding another job, possibly something outside of Jasper Falls if the house sold.

They were getting so close and comfortable with each other, but circumstances seemed set on eventually tearing them apart. She mentally calculated how much time they had left, unsure how desperate Giovanni was to find work.

Her meager savings was running low since the funeral and she couldn't bring herself to return to the store, unsure how she would even cut herself a paycheck when her father had always been so secretive about the banking.

The realtor seemed to think the house would sell quickly, but half of that money would go to Harrison, and any outstanding loans her father might have had. Erin had nothing as far as a nest egg of her own.

"Have you been turning down work?"

His lips firmed and he pushed away from the wall, pacing her room. "It's not easy to get booked. And it's not worth traveling out of state if the gig doesn't pay well."

"You didn't answer my question."

He looked at her and she had her answer. "Giovanni."

"A few hundred dollars, Erin. So what?"

"It's more than the money. You've said it yourself, it's the exposure."

"What is this? Don't you want to spend time with me? I feel like your chasing me away."

"I'm not." Her lungs tightened. The last thing she wanted was to see him go, but he was only postponing the inevitable. If she interfered with his career, he'd eventually resent her, and she couldn't bear that.

He crossed the room and kissed her softly, holding her face in his hands. "I don't want to change anything about what we have."

"Me neither, but you have to work."

"I know."

She considered how quickly her doubts could gang up on her in his absence. One day apart and she'd start thinking his feelings had changed. One text showing he'd read it but not bothered to respond, and she'd start putting up walls. She didn't know if she could manage a long distance relationship without screwing it up with her damn insecurities.

"You have to communicate with me."

"I do. I will. I'm sorry I didn't mention the gig in the Bronx or the one in A.C."

They got ready for bed, both uncharacteristically silent and lost in their own heads. He didn't make love to her, but he held her all night as if afraid she might suddenly slip out of reach and disappear. In a way, she needed to be held like that, anchored and secure.

For the next few days, they spent every second together. Giovanni ran through his act with her, but he was nervous due to his last performance.

She didn't like his jokes about sleeping with other women. "Why don't you tell some stories about your family?"

"That stuff's not funny. It's just ordinary family crap."

"But people love that. They'll relate to it."

He mumbled a line, repeating the sentence from his script in various ways, trying to figure out which word needed emphasis to make the joke land. The more she heard him talk about all his past female conquests the more disinterested she became.

"I'm taking a shower." She needed some time to herself, but when she returned from the shower, he was still scribbling notes and running through lines.

She didn't know if it was her own jealousy or the jokes, but the material about women simply wasn't funny to her.

The night before he left for Atlantic City, she was moody and tense. She wanted him to do well, but if he had a good show he'd likely get booked for a repeat performance and that meant more time apart.

She considered asking if she could go with him, but she had the appointment with the attorney and she didn't want to add more pressure when Giovanni already seemed tense.

It was strange seeing him stressed out because she was typically the high strung one in their relationship. The night before he left, she did her best to ease his tension, but even in bed, he seemed distracted.

When he left the following day, a gaping sense of emptiness took hold, and no matter how she tried to fill it, nothing replaced the hollowness that occupied her in his absence.