Total pages in book: 99
Estimated words: 96170 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 481(@200wpm)___ 385(@250wpm)___ 321(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 96170 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 481(@200wpm)___ 385(@250wpm)___ 321(@300wpm)
“Elisa.” I look back at her. “Please.”
“Right.” She clamps both hands over her mouth.
I turn back to the counter.
Three little sticks. Each like a chain slithering around my wrists and my ankles. Each like a man ready to throw me into a hole. Each like the closing door of a panic room. Each like thirst clawing at my dry throat, like days spent jammed into a closet with my sister reeking like urine and sweat, each like my car getting crushed to scrap metal.
“Oh my god, I can’t believe you’re pregnant,” Elisa blurts out finally.
Only thirty seconds this time.
I sweep the positive tests into a plastic bag and shove them into a drawer. I slam the bathroom door shut, lock it, and grab my sister by the shoulders. She stares into my face, looking afraid.
“You can’t tell anyone,” I say seriously.
She nods, blinking. “Right. Okay.”
“I mean it, Elisa. If Luca finds out, he won’t let me go. He’ll hunt me down forever. This is his baby, and he’s not the kind of man that’ll let his child disappear. You can’t tell anyone.”
Her eyes go wide. “Fio, seriously?”
“Please, just—”
She wriggles out of my grip and backs away. “You can’t still be thinking about running away.”
I spread my hands. Panic makes them tremble. “We’ll raise the baby together. It’ll be hard at first, but—”
“Fio, come on, think. You want to deprive your own child of their family? They’ll never meet Raf or any of the cousins.”
“The cousins are all murderous fucking assholes. Raf’s only slightly better.”
“What about Luca? What about that baby’s father?”
An ugly sob rips from my chest. I collapse down onto the edge of the tub and wrap my arms around myself, trying to hold my guts inside. I don’t remember the last time I cried so much, but ever since Luca came into my life, it’s like I’m making up for lost time.
“You don’t understand,” I say, barely able to speak. She sinks down next to me and rubs my back. “I can’t stay trapped here forever. You know what it was like. You were there. I just can’t.”
“You’re not trapped,” she says softly, hugging me tight against her. “We’re not in that room anymore, Fio. We haven’t been for a really long time.”
I can’t tell her that I never left it. Maybe she found ways to cope and moved on, but I’ve been stuck. I’ve been trapped. And ever since, all I’ve ever dreamed about is freedom. Long stretches of open highway. A little shitty house with lots of land all over. Maybe even a van parked at some remote campsite. Nothing but quiet and birds and four wheels fully gassed up and ready to drive.
“I can’t stay,” I tell her as I finally begin to calm down. “I just can’t.”
“But what if you have to?”
“No, no, this doesn’t change anything.” I wipe my face with both hands and stand up. Now I’m the one pacing. “It’s more complicated, but I can deal with it. I’ll just take more money. That’ll solve things, right? More money? We’ll go further away, maybe somewhere in Southeast Asia, somewhere deep in the jungle away from people—”
“Fio, stop it. You’d rather raise your kid in with monkeys and poison frogs than here?”
I glare at her. “Damn straight.”
“You’re wrong,” she says with more venom than I thought she had in her. I stare, surprised at her sudden anger. She gets to her feet, shaking her head. “I won’t be a part of this.”
“Elisa—”
“I’ll keep your secret because I love you and I think you’ll do the right thing in the end, but I’m not going to enable this crazy fantasy anymore. You’re married, Fio. You’re pregnant. This is your place. Maybe you don’t stay with Luca forever, but your family is here. Your family loves you.”
“My family forgot about me,” I say, nearly screaming it at her. “They forgot about both of us! For five days!”
Elisa’s face twitches. “I remember.”
“You seriously want to talk about family? They shoved us into a fucking closet for five fucking days and forgot we were there. We were peeing into a jug. We ran out of water. If they hadn’t finally opened the door, we would’ve died in there!”
My heart’s racing and my fingers are tingling. My tongue feels numb at the very tip. Elisa hugs herself and turns her back on me, her shoulder shaking lightly, and I realize she’s crying.
And then I understand. I just screamed our deepest, blackest trauma right into her face. She’s been hurting over it just like me, except she’s been better about keeping herself together.
Now I’m unraveling and I’m such a selfish bitch that I’m trying to take her with me.
“I’m sorry,” I say, going over to her.
She flinches when I touch her. “It’s fine,” she says, wiping her face. “It’s fine, okay? I know it happened. I think about it all the time too. I dream about it.”