A Little Too Much (12 page)

So here I am, way the hell out of my comfort zone.

Nathan is Prince Phillip. Better him than Mike. Mike’s kind of a douche.

We’ve got the scene when Princess Aurora (me) meets Prince Phillip (Nathan) in the woods. Of course, I’m clueless and don’t know I’m a kick-ass princess, so I swoon all over Prince Phillip and he falls in love with me at first sight because I’m so ditzy, and I need a big, strong man to protect me.

By the time Nathan and I are done, I feel like I need a shower.

“Pick something better next week, Quinn,” I grumble when I take my seat next to him.

“That was horrible, Irish,” he says, shaking his head. “Worst I’ve ever seen from you. Utterly uninspired.”

“It’s hard to be inspired when the role
sucks
. The least you could have done was given me the evil fairy. I could have gotten into that.”

“But any great actress figures it out. You needed a challenge, and I handed you one. Instead of rising to it and showing us something softer, you bashed it over the head. Sometime you’ve got to let your softer side show, Irish.” His lips press into a line. “And I’m not just talking about the play.”

I fidget with a hole in my jeans as the next group, Kamara, Vee, and Mike start on their scene from
Hansel and Gretel
.

When everyone is done, Quinn stands. “Next week, Greek tragedies. Pick up your roles on the table.”

I move to the table and see my name on a script for
Antigone
. Mike and I are doing the scene together.

As I’m scanning through my part, Nathan comes up behind me. “Sorry that was so lame.”

I look up and shrug. “We didn’t have much to work with.” I lift my script for next week. “This looks a little more promising.”

“Good.” He scratches the top of his head. “So . . . there’s this—”

“Dude! Tell me I’ve got something better than Hansel,” Mike says, clapping Nathan on the back and cutting him off. He scoops his script up and flashes me a grin full of perfect white teeth. “Looks like we’re together, Irish.”

“Looks that way,” I say, folding my script into my back pocket. “See you guys later.”

But as I walk home through the park, I can’t stop thinking about what Quinn said, because as he said it, I realized something. I walk around every day wearing a face that’s not mine. I’ve hidden my softer, weaker parts behind a character who’s tough and doesn’t need anyone—my comfort zone. But Alessandro brings those parts out in me. Something about being with him pries those softer parts out from under my armor. He brings out that little girl that I was when we met. But I can’t go back to that. Not when I’ve worked so hard to get to where I am.

Sometimes Quinn is wrong.

Chapter Twelve

I
’VE LEFT THREE
voice mails for Brett in the ten days he’s been gone, and he finally called me back at two this morning. He was in a crowd somewhere, but between the loud music, the fact that he was drunk enough that he was seriously slurring, and the woman whining that he should hang up and dance with her, I couldn’t catch where. I’m not even sure what city he’s in.

The thing is, what bothers me about that whole scene isn’t the fact some chick (and probably more than one) is obviously making moves on Brett. What bothers me is that I really don’t care. I wanted to feel angry or upset when I hung up. I even went out to the living room and kicked his couch, but the only thing I felt was a sharp pain in my foot—which still sort of hurts as I walk into the Argo Tea.

I know I really need to stop whatever I’m doing with Alessandro before it turns into something I
can’t
stop. But every time I open my mouth to say something like, “I can’t hang out with you anymore,” something else comes out, like, “Tell me about Rome.” So, as we hop on the A train, which is standing room only at lunchtime on a Saturday, I still haven’t said anything. I justify it by telling myself I’m not taking an insane risk. My secret’s safe and we’re just exploring the city. I’m having fun . . . more than I have in a long time.

It’s amazing how a person can convince themselves of almost anything. Even when that anything could cost them
everything
.

When we get off one stop later, at Forty-second, I take the long way past the bus station, leaving Alessandro wondering if we’re bussing it for a minute, before heading down Eighth Avenue toward Thirty-ninth. When we take the right on Thirty-ninth, he looks at me and smiles. “The flea market.”

I shoot him a glance. “I’ve heard Hell’s Kitchen is the best. Cool vintage stuff.”

His smile pulls wider. “Good choice. I’ve never been.”

It’s warm for late November—almost seventy. After the cold snap we’ve had for the last few weeks, the streets are crowded with people basking in the sun, soaking up the last bits of warmth before winter hits for real. Many are in sweaters or sweatshirts, but there’s the occasional T-shirt or tank top. I picked my favorite light sweater—white with silver threads through it. It’s got an open neck and is snug without being tight. Alessandro is wearing khaki cargo pants, black army boots, and a snug black T-shirt. And those arms are truly spectacular—lean and long and muscular and totally hot. Watching his biceps strain the fabric at the hem of the short sleeve, I can’t deny the little part of me that’s dying to run my fingers over those muscles to see if they feel as solid as they look. I want to trace the veins to where they disappear behind brushed cotton.

We cross Ninth Avenue and the market is laid out in front of us. There’s an old metal Coke sign hanging from the canopy over a booth just ahead with a wooden rocking horse below it, and in the booth across the row, I see vintage clothes hanging on racks. Suddenly I feel like a kid in a candy shop. I’m not much of a shopper, but for some reason, vintage stuff gets me all giddy.

We walk all the way to the end to get a feel for the place, and it’s packed full of people wending between the booths, same as we are.

“So I guess this isn’t exactly undiscovered either,” I say, lifting a vintage black fedora off a hat rack and trying it on.

“But you are discovering new things,” Alessandro says, gesturing to the hat.

“Old things,” I counter, looking at myself in the mirror on a table next to the rack.

He moves behind me and smiles into the mirror from over my shoulder. “Old things that are new to you.” He gives the back rim a flick and it drops over my eyes.

And I realize that’s him—something old, from before, that I’m discovering all over again. I lift the hat off my head and drop it on his, taking the opportunity to really look at him. My eyes devour his face; from the dimple at the tip of his chin, over his full red lips and his straight nose, up the curve of his cheekbones to those amazing gray eyes, where my gaze stalls. He’s so similar to the boy I knew, but so different.

When I realize we’re just standing here staring at each other, I clear my throat. “The gangster look works for you.”

I lower my eyes away from his to the table and they fall on a pair of white silk gloves—the kind they used to wear that go up past your elbows. “Oh my God. These are so cool.”

Alessandro pulls the hat off and puts it back on the rack. “Try them on.”

I slip one glove on and turn my arm side to side, admiring how the white silk pops against my mocha skin. “I have to have these.”

“Then you should buy them,” he says with a smile.

I bring them over to the vendor, a woman with tattoo sleeves. “Nice ink,” I tell her when I notice the pattern is mostly vines and butterflies.

“Thanks,” she says. “Back at ya. Does that go all the way around?” she asks, looking at the butterflies at my left collarbone.

I lift the hem of my sweater, exposing the trail of butterflies over my right hip. “To here,” I say, pointing lower, at the front of my hip under my jeans. I flick a glance at Alessandro and see him looking at my ink. There’s something in his gaze, like he wants to reach out and touch the butterflies on my hip, that sends a pulsing ache through my belly. Will I ever tell him what they mean? That he was the inspiration? Probably not. I force myself to breathe. “So, how much for these?” I ask, holding up the gloves.

“Twenty,” she says.

Stick my hand in my bag and fish for money. I come out with a fistful of bills and count them. “I’ll give you thirteen.”

She looks like she wants to counter, but after a beat she smiles. “I like you, so okay.”

I hand her money and slip the gloves into my bag. “Thanks.”

“You come on back. We’re here every week,” she says, pocketing the cash.

I can’t stop the smile. “I will.”

Alessandro grasps my elbow and veers us toward a hot-dog cart. “Do you still eat hot dogs?”

“Sure,” I say a little warily. Did I eat hot dogs before? There’s the tickle of a memory, but I can’t get a grasp on it.

He buys two hot dogs and two Diet Cokes and we go to the condiment counter, where he loads one with mustard and relish, then hands it to me. As I watch him squirt catsup on his, the tickle is there again, and then it all comes back in a rush. It was a few weeks after Alessandro and I’d started sleeping together.

“That is just wrong in so many ways,” I said as he sat next to me at the dinner table, the catsup bottle making farting sounds as he squeezed the last of it onto his hot dog.

He looked up at me and a smile curved half his mouth. “Don’t knock it till you try it.”

I scrunched my face at him. “I am never trying
that
. Catsup on hot dogs is gross.”

“
You’re
gross,” a whiny female voice said from across the table.

I looked up, and the white girl, Trisha or Hannah, was glaring at me. She was pressed into Lorenzo’s side, and I couldn’t see what her hand was doing, but it was moving in his lap. Lorenzo smirked and tore a hunk off his hot dog with his teeth, then chucked the rest at Alessandro. “You want my leftovers, bro, take them.”

Shame nearly choked me.

But then, so subtly that no one else noticed, Alessandro wove his fingers into mine under the table and made everything okay.

“Hilary?” he says, pulling me back to the present. He’s moved away from the counter toward a bench. “Would you like to sit?”

I nod and move with him, sinking into the seat before my knees give out. “Thanks . . . for the hot dog.”

He nods slowly. “Are you okay?”

I shake off the memory and try to pretend I haven’t lost my appetite. “Yeah. This is fun.”

His eyes scan the market. “It is. We’ll have to put this on our list for re-dos.”

“Re-dos?”

His gaze finds mine and he smiles. “For when we’ve seen everything else.”

“Re-dos,” I say with a nod. “Sounds like a plan.”

His eyes slip to the open collar of my sweater. “Tell me about your tattoos.”

I take a bite of my hot dog. “What about them?”

“I couldn’t help noticing the other night that there are a lot of them. Do they have some significance?”

At the memory of him slipping on my jacket on opening night, I shudder. “They just remind me to stay free . . . to follow my own path.”

He fixes me in his intense gaze. “I’ve been doing a lot of thinking about my path over the last year. It’s not always as clear as you hope it’s going to be. I feel like I’ve spent my whole life adrift.”

I nod, ’cause not too many people know that better than me.

He stares at his hot dog for a minute. “When our grandparents brought us to Corsica, Lorenzo was all I had left. We were supposed to look out for each other . . . have each other’s backs.” He rakes a hand through his hair and his gaze drifts out over the vendors. “I let him down. When he needed me, I wasn’t there for him.”

“You can’t blame yourself that he got himself killed, Alessandro.”

His tormented eyes find mine. “I can. I do. I could have stopped him. If I’d stuck by his side . . . if I’d had his back . . .”

“You’d be dead too,” I finish for him. “You weren’t going to change him. Lorenzo did what he wanted to whoever he wanted and didn’t give two shits about anyone else.”

His hard expression cracks and he drops his forehead into his hand. “But I’m just like him. I thought the Church could save me. Surrendering my life to the priesthood . . . it was my sacrifice . . . my way of atoning for past sins. But then I met Lexie, and she turned everything on its head. She brought out all my impulsiveness—my lack of self-control. No matter how hard I tried to pretend that everything was fine and I belonged in the priesthood, when I saw how easily I was drawn off course, I couldn’t deny the truth. I was there for the wrong reasons. I thought if I wrapped the beast in God’s clothing, maybe that would tame it. I was wrong. It’s still here, deep inside me. Nothing has changed.”

“You’re not a beast, Alessandro.” I know this for a fact. He might not have always lived on the straight and narrow, but he was kind and tender, and he cared about other people. He cared about
me
in a way no one ever had before. “Have you at least forgiven yourself for me?”

His gaze burns through me. “No.”

I lower my lashes. “Why not?”

I hear him take a deep breath. “No matter what I convinced myself I felt, there is no excuse for what my brother and I did to you. You were a child.”

I lift my eyes back to him and see him supporting his head in one hand, elbow on his knee. “So were you, Alessandro. And are you hearing yourself? What Lorenzo did or didn’t do is not yours to feel responsible for. You can’t carry his guilt on your shoulders too. That’s too much for one person.”

His head snaps out of his hand. “But it
is
my guilt. All of it. I never once stood up to him, or told him what he was doing was wrong. I never once tried to stop him from doing any of it.”

“Because he would have beaten the shit out of you if you tried. Lorenzo wasn’t a good person. You are. I get that he’s dead, and I’m sorry, but just because he isn’t here to make amends, don’t put it all on yourself. Don’t make his burden yours. Because, unless he changed way more than you did, I can tell you, if he was still here, he wouldn’t be losing sleep over any of it.”

His face crumples and he lowers it into his hand again. “I’m not a good person, Hilary. I’m not who you thought I was. I knew what he did to you. He bragged about it to Eric and me. I saw you cry. And instead of helping you, I . . .” He lifts his tortured face and looks at me. “I’m no better than he was.”

I stand and throw my trash in the can next to the bench, then look down at him with my hands balled on my hips. “If you want to sit there feeling sorry for yourself, there’s nothing I can do about it, but I suggest you get over yourself and see things how they really were. You want perspective? I’ll give you mine. You
did
help me. You helped me finally feel something after years of being numb. You helped me find happiness in the middle of my own personal hell. You helped me understand what lo—” I cut off mid-rant when I realize what I was about to say. “I think if you really look back on all the wrong you believe you did, you’re going to realize it was Lorenzo who did it. And until you can let go of his, you’re never going to be able to forgive yourself for yours.”

I turn and march back toward the flea market, but Alessandro has my arm before I get five feet. “Hilary, wait.”

I spin. “For what? For you to finally decide you’re not the devil incarnate? That could take a while.”

He breathes a sigh. “I know some of what you’re saying is true. I just need to sort through some things. But thank you.”

“For what?”

“For everything you just said. Knowing how you feel helps.”

I feel all my frustration and anger run off me like melting ice. “The only thing I couldn’t forgive you for was leaving me, Alessandro. As far as I’m concerned, nothing you did while you were here needs forgiving.”

He closes his eyes and when he opens them, they’re moist. “Thank you.”

We just stand here staring at each other for a few long heartbeats, then I loop my arm through his elbow and start toward the booths. “Come on. Treasures await.”

We wind back through the market toward the subway, but just as we get toward the end, a coffee table in a booth with beat-up furniture catches my eye. It’s huge and clunky, all thick legs and a solid top, and totally ugly, with nicks in the wood and cigarette burns in the dark, chipped finish. But maybe because of all that, it has so much character that it almost seems alive, like it will just start talking any minute and tell us its life story. And just looking at it, I know there is one and it’s super interesting.

“How much for the table?” I ask the long-haired guy at the booth.

He eyes Alessandro and then me, sizing us up, no doubt. “Sixty,” he finally says.

I scrunch my face at him. “You’re joking, right? ’Cause it’s worth, like, five.”

He barks out a laugh. “This is antique. It’s worth hundreds.”