Chapter 207

Chapter 207
ANGELO

I stared at Don Luca, "Sir, I didn't..."

"Get out now."

I ran out of the study, out of the house, across the grounds to the guest house. I burst through the door and the nurses looked up startled.

My mother was in bed, awake, staring at the ceiling. I collapsed into the chair beside her and buried my face in my hands.

She turned her head slowly and looked at me. Her eyes were cloudy and confused.

"Are you alright?" Her voice was soft, uncertain.

"No, Mama, I'm not alright."

"What's wrong?"

"Everything, everything is wrong and I don't know how to fix it."

She reached out and touched my hair with trembling fingers. "Poor boy, you seem so sad."

She stroke my hair gently and we sat in silence for a moment and then she spoke again, her voice small and lost.

"What's your name boy?"

My chest cracked open and bled. "Angelo mama, I'm your son." I will not get tired of telling her who I am, to etch myself in her memory.

"Angelo." She repeated the name like she was tasting it. "That's a nice name."

"You gave it to me."

She smiled vaguely. "How thoughtful of me."

I laid my head on the edge of her bed and she kept stroking my hair. She didn't remember me but her hand was gentle and for just this moment it was enough.

"Don't cry," she whispered. "Whatever is wrong, it will be okay."

But it wouldn't be okay, nothing would ever be okay again.

That night I didn't go back to the main house. I slept in the chair beside my mother's bed. The nurses tried to make me leave but I refused. Finally they brought me a blanket and let me stay.

I woke up several times during the night to the sound of my mother calling out in her sleep. Each time I took her hand and she'd calm down, settling back into sleep without ever knowing it was me holding her.

In the morning Emilio found me still in the chair. My neck ached and my back was stiff.

"Kid, you slept here?” He asked in a surprise tone.

"I needed to spend time with the only family I have”. My voice was stiff and his gaze snapped to me.

"Don Luca is your family and he genuinely loves you”.

I gritted my teeth in anger, "Don Luca can go to hell."

Emilio's eyebrows rose. "Why don't you give him a chance? He cares about you, you know”.

“If he cares about me, he wouldn't have sent my mother away in the first place, he wouldn’t isolate her from the main house, all Don Luca cares about is his pretty wife and kids…he is damn selfish”.

“Gelo!” Emilio snapped.

“You are on his side, even when you know that I am saying the truth, you'll still side with him”.

Emilio grabbed my shoulders and forced me to look at him. His eyes were fierce.

"This is not about taking sides, someone has to make you understand, you know I got you”.

I swallowed and clenched my teeth hard to push back the emotions that was trying to choke me.

“I'm sorry….I just feel…” I paused not knowing how to put it in words.

Emilio nodded, “I understand Gelo but you also have to understand that you are not alone. I am here and believe it or not, Don Luca is here for you. Do you understand me?"

I wanted to believe him, wanted it so badly my chest ached with wanting, but I'd wanted too many things that didn't come true.

"I understand." I replied even though I didn't.

Emilio pulled me into a hug and I let him, let myself be held for just a minute before the walls came back up and I pulled away.

That afternoon I went back to the main house to get clean clothes. The hallway was empty but I heard voices coming from the living room. Don Luca and Kiera talking in low tones.

I should have kept walking, should have gone straight to my room, but I heard my name and stopped.

"He's destroying himself over this." Kiera's voice was thick with worry. "Sleeping in that guest house and barely eating.

"I know, but bringing Allegra to the main house isn't the answer. It would only make things worse for both of them."

"So what do we do? Just watch him fall apart?"

"We give him time and space to grieve."

I stood there in the hallway with my clean clothes forgotten and felt something twist inside me. They were talking about me like I was a broken object that needed fixing.

But I wasn't broken, I was just alone.

I turned and went back outside without getting my clothes. Went back to the guest house where my mother was having lunch. She looked up when I entered and her face brightened.

"Erasmus! You're back!"

I stopped in the doorway and looked at her, really looked at her. She was sitting there smiling at me and calling me by a dead man's name.

And I realized with crushing reality that she was never coming back. The mother I knew was already gone. This was just her body, her shell, waiting to catch up with the rest of her.

I turned and walked out without saying a word.

I walked until I reached the edge of the property where the fence met the woods. Sat down in the dirt with my back against the metal and stared at nothing.

My phone buzzed, a text from Emilio asking where I was but I turned it off.

The sun moved across the sky. My stomach growled but I ignored it. Birds called to each other in the trees. The world kept turning like nothing was wrong, like my entire life wasn't crumbling into dust.

When it got dark I finally stood up and walked back, not to the main house, not to the guest house, but to the garage where Emilio kept his tools.

I found what I was looking for in the back corner. A punching bag Emilio had hung up months ago for training.

I hit it once, then again, then again and again until my knuckles split and bled and my shoulders burned and my lungs screamed for air.

I hit it until I couldn't lift my arms anymore, until I collapsed on the concrete floor gasping and shaking.

And lying there in the dark with blood on my hands and pain radiating through every muscle, I finally felt something other than grief.

I felt rage. Pure, clean and sharp.

And rage was so much easier to carry.