Total pages in book: 86
Estimated words: 81375 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 407(@200wpm)___ 326(@250wpm)___ 271(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 81375 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 407(@200wpm)___ 326(@250wpm)___ 271(@300wpm)
Dad recovers first. He’s not angry, but he does grasp the back of his hair with both hands. Anger is different than being worked up, isn’t it? “Have you touched my daughter—”
“Dad!” I shoot out of the chair and rush over, setting my hands on his shoulders. I’m ready to dig my feet into the floor to hold him back if that’s what it’s going to take. “This is a mutual decision that we’ve thought out and talked over as adults. Let’s just take a few breaths.” I do realize that sounds worse. “And the answer to that is no. Luca’s been nothing but respectful. I would have lost my head, but he didn’t let that happen.”
Luca groans. To him, those might as well be fighting words. Gas on the fire. Sugar on top of the pie.
Dad cups my face tenderly. It hurts to see the heartbreak there. Luca was his friend. He was the light and life of this bakery, but he’s not right for me. “You’re young and beautiful, and you carry the whole sun inside you. You’re my angel.”
“We just baked a pie together, and I felt the magic you talked about. I didn’t think it existed, but I get it now,” I say, imploring both my parents to listen. “There was a piece always missing here. Luca completes it, even if he was never meant to stay, and he can’t stay now. He completes what was missing in me too.”
Bombshell, meet the room.
The pie bakes on happily in the oven behind my dad, the light illuminating the increasingly golden crust.
“You’ve known each other for a few days!” Dad splutters. “How can you say something like that?”
“With hope and some trepidation,” I reply.
“You can’t talk about being complete when you’re blinded by infatuation. That’s not real.”
Mom stands up and walks over to us. She goes quiet when she needs time to think. Dad gets emotional and a little hot-headed, but not Mom. Her silence is worrying. Her saying something would be less cause for anxiety, even if she were going in the same direction.
She takes my dad’s hand, acting as the calming force that she’s always been for him. I know I can leave him in her hands and go to stand beside Luca. But I don’t touch him. Being on this side of the room doesn’t draw lines. It’s not dividing us and my parents.
“I know you can’t fall for someone in a few days, but you can want to know them. That’s what we’d like to do. We’d like to continue to get to know each other. I know this seems messy. Logistically, it must not make any sense to you.” It doesn’t. I’ve never seen my parents appear so lost. It’s an emotional night, and I’ve blown the contained sense of homecoming wide open. “I came prepared to have this conversation, and I’m still at a loss, but there’s one thing that’s certain. Luca has never hurt me or used me. He’s always been honest. I was the one who was desperate enough to lie to him at the beginning. I caused him pain. Neither of us chased the other. We’re just standing here like two magnets with all that energy working between us. It feels inevitable that we’ll be pulled together because that’s how we were made.”
“You’re both not magnets. You’re both human beings, and this can’t happen.” Dad shuffles his feet like he can stomp this out before it starts.
“You live across the country,” Mom points out quietly. “You both have separate lives. He’s much more experienced than you are, and you are still young.”
“I know. That’s hard, but it doesn’t change my mind. There are plenty of ways to see each other, especially if you’re talking about retiring. I’d stay and help you here for as long as you like, but if you both wanted me to be out in the world, and you prepared me for that, then you’ll have to let me make my own decisions. I’ll miss you if I move, but I’m not choosing Luca over you or you over him. It’s my choice and my life to live.”
My parents exchange looks, and Luca’s breathing has an edge to it. Is shouty-breathing a thing? Breathing in flashing neon lights? Right, that’s what near hyperventilation sounds like.
“If you ever hurt my—” Dad grunts.
“Dad, stop.” I can’t keep the sharp edge from my tone. “That’s not fair. I’m not going into this thinking it’s a fairytale. It’s life, and it takes work. Sometimes, things get messy, and it hurts. But you can’t put that on him.”
“You live like a hermit. My daughter has dreams. She’s the sun. You’re going to stuff her into your darkness so she can’t live?”
“That’s not what I want,” Luca chokes.
Fuck, there might as well be arrows sticking out of him after my dad fired those shots. I can’t believe he went there. I never in my life could have imagined he’d be so… rude. And horrible.