A Little Too Much

Chapter Seven

“SO, WHAT KIND of art do you like the best?” Alessandro asks over our salads.

Instead of going to the museum cafeteria, he insisted on this swanky café, complete with a smug maître d’ and hoity-toity waiters. I feel like I’m being judged.

“Is that a trick question?” I ask, stabbing a cherry tomato, which burps a slimy pile of tiny seeds onto the white tablecloth.

His fork stops halfway to his mouth. “You don’t like art at all, do you?”

I shrug. “Not really.”

“I shouldn’t have twisted your arm into coming here.” He keeps his voice neutral, but he can’t hide the disappointment in his eyes, and it makes me wonder about the other girl. The one he loved. Was she into art? Did they curl up in bed on rainy afternoons and have long conversations about things that I don’t even have names for? All I know about art is what I learned watching The Da Vinci Code.

The truth is, if anyone else had asked me to come here, I would have said no. But something deep inside me wanted a reason to see Alessandro again. Curiosity maybe? Part of me wants to hate him, but the truth is, even after everything, I’ve never been able to find hate anywhere in me for either Alessandro or his brother. Anger? Yes. I’ve been seriously pissed off for eight years and my anger has fueled me, made me stronger. But I never hated them. “What kind of art do you like?”

“Impressionism has never been my favorite, but I can appreciate almost anything.” His sharp edges have softened a little since we walked through the doors of the museum, like being here has somehow lifted the weight of the world off his shoulders.

“I remember you always doodling,” I say, tossing my salad with my fork to mix in the ranch dressing. I hate it when it’s all in a glob. “Do you still draw?” I glance up at him when he doesn’t answer right away.

“No. Not for a long time.” His gaze locks with mine and it’s like he’s trying to see into my thoughts. He never missed much, even as a kid, but I didn’t have nearly as much to hide then. I lower my eyes, afraid he’ll see too much.

I have a flash of an image . . . Alessandro in his usual corner of the rec room with his sketch pad, so quiet, watching as Lorenzo and Eric wrestled on the floor. His eyes kept flicking to me, where I sat on the saggy couch, painting my toenails.

That was the day after Lorenzo and I slept together. I didn’t want anyone looking at me, especially Alessandro, who always seemed to see everything, so I turned sideways on the couch with my back to him.

Lorenzo usually ignored me, but Alessandro always sat next to me at dinner. After the first time, when he told me I had a good voice, he never said anything and neither did I, but it wasn’t weird. He put the sketch pad on the table between us that night and I looked at it. The sketch was of a girl in a baggy T-shirt and rolled up jeans, with her frizzy black hair falling in her face. She was perched on the edge of a sagging couch painting her toenails. You could just make out the lines of her face in the shadows of her hair, and there was a tear coursing a crooked path down her cheek.

I hated that he paid enough attention to see that.

The waiter shows up with our food and clears our salads. When Alessandro assures him we don’t need anything else, he leaves.

“There are some things I missed last time I was here,” he says, lowering his eyes to his plate and cutting a wedge off his quiche with the side of his fork. “We could start in the nineteenth-century European section?”

“Yeah, sure,” I say as he chews, ’cause it’s all Greek to me. “You’re going to tell me what’s what, right? Because I’m pretty clueless about this stuff.”

He holds up a finger, and after he swallows, he says, “I’ll tell you as much as I know, but everything’s pretty well labeled.”

“If you say so.” I’m nervous. I’m not sure why, but I don’t want to seem like a total idiot in front of him.

“So, tell me about your sister,” he says and my stomach lurches.

“What about her?”

There’s an edge to my voice, and hearing it, his gaze lifts from his plate and questions me.

“She’s great,” I say, preempting his next question, which would be some version of “What’s wrong?” “She’s married to a great guy and they have two great kids and they’re great.”

“Boys or girls?”

“Boys.”

“And you’re their favorite aunt, I’m sure,” he says with half an amused smile.

Despite the knot in my stomach, I can’t help smiling back. “Something like that.”

“Do you enjoy children?”

“What do you mean?”

He lowers his fork to his plate. “I mean, are you a kid person? Do you want children of your own?”

“Hell, no!” I say, but then amend, “I mean, Henri and Max are fun, and I like hanging out with them, but I don’t want any of my own.”

He tips his head at me. “Why not?”

I shrug. “Some people just aren’t cut out to be parents, you know?”

He nods. “I struggle with that. I’m not convinced I’d make a good father, but I can’t deny the part of me that desperately wants a family—children of my own. Lots of them.”

I look down at my plate and twirl my pasta. “You need to find someone who feels the same way for that.”

“This is true.” He picks up his fork and his eyes study my face as he takes another bite. “Were you were happy living with your sister and her family?”

I relax a little. “Yeah. I was really happy there.”

“How long did you live with them?”

“I moved out about three years ago, when I was nineteen.”

“Did you go to college?”

What is this, twenty questions? “No,” I say a little defensively.

His gaze finds mine again. “Why not?”

“Because . . . I don’t know. I didn’t want to go right out of high school. I took a couple of community-college classes to keep Mallory off my back, but I really just wanted to act. And then American Idol happened and I started getting auditions and moved into the city and . . . I just never wanted to go.”

He holds my gaze. “No judgment, Hilary. I’m just curious.”

I look down as I twirl my pasta on my fork.

When we’re done and Alessandro pays, he leads me up to the second floor. There’s a long gallery with paintings on the walls and statues on pedestals. At each one, we stop and read the plaque that tells us what it is. Occasionally, he tells me things that aren’t on the plaque—like how the artist died, or who he trained with. He seems even more relaxed here than he did over lunch, and I realize, what walking in the rain does for me, art does for him.

About halfway down, we come to a painting that looks different from the others. It’s of a woman in a gold-yellow dress with black curly hair, sitting there staring off the canvas at us. She’s pretty in a sort of unique way and she looks like she wouldn’t take crap from anyone.

“Henri Regnault’s Salomé,” Alessandro says. “It’s one of the signature pieces of the Romantic movement.”

“I like it. She looks like she has her shit together.” My eyes flick to the plaque next to the painting and I run a finger under the artist’s name. “Henri . . . It’s spelled the same as my nephew. They named him after Jeff’s dad.”

“It’s the traditional French spelling, pronounced ehn-reh.”

“That sounded very French.”

“Oui, mademoiselle,” he says with a smile.

“That sounded very French too.”

“I lived in France after I left here,” he says, and that’s when I realize I don’t even know where Corsica is.

“So you speak French?”

“I do.”

“But I remember you had an accent before.” And, wow. I only just remembered that as I said it. But he did, just a little. It was the way certain words rolled off his tongue.

“I may have,” he says with a little bit of a cringe, like it embarrasses him. “Italian was my first language. My father was in the military and we lived in Italy until I was six. He spoke Italian to us in the home even after we came back to New York.”

“So you speak French and Italian. What else?”

He smiles. “English.”

I roll my eyes at him. “I mean what else?”

His smile turns to more of a smirk and he lifts his eyebrows at me. “That’s not enough?”

I shrug. “I guess. Say something in Italian.”

“Come sei bella,” he says, his smile softening.

“What did you say?”

“You are beautiful.”

I just stare at him for way too long before turning back to Salomé. “Why did you stop drawing?”

I hear him blow out a sigh, but I don’t turn away from the painting. “Things changed. I just didn’t feel . . . inspired. I lost my love of it, I suppose.”

“That’s too bad. You were good.” He saw things that others missed. He saw everything. And then he managed to put it on paper in a way that made it more real than it had been in the moment. Or, at least it felt that way.

The memory that flashes in my head makes me smile.

“What?” Alessandro asks, giving me a curious look.

“Do you remember that day in the park? It was right before you . . .” left, but I can’t make myself say it. “You were drawing me and I grabbed your sketch pad and ran away, and I ran into that totally lame mime guy near the fountain, who kept doing—”

“—trapped in a box,” he finishes for me with a smile and a small shake of his head.

“Yeah. And he got pissed and started cussing me out and then all those little orange-and-black butterflies came, and like, swarmed us.”

“We never did figure out what kind of butterflies those were,” he muses with distant eyes, still smiling.

“It was pretty cool, though. I’d never seen more than one or two butterflies in the park before that.” I remember Alessandro pulling me against him and laughing as they fluttered all around us. And I remember feeling free in a way I never had before, like I was one of them, fluttering above the ground, light as air. I could go anywhere. Be anything. The feeling made me dizzy. Alessandro made me dizzy. I think that’s the second I knew I loved him, because in anybody else’s arms, I felt trapped, but in his, I felt free.

We spend the next two hours in the European painting galleries, looking at super old paintings that seem to be mostly Italian and French, and Alessandro answers all my questions. He gets pretty excited when I ask something, his hands working as he answers, so without even meaning to, I find myself asking a lot. I love watching those hands. But it’s more than that. It’s like his enthusiasm is contagious, because I’m surprisingly non-bored.

We find ourselves in the main stairwell at the end of the rambling galleries and he looks at me a long moment. “You’ve had enough, haven’t you?”

I glance back over my shoulder. “That was actually pretty cool.”

He smiles softly and guides me to the staircase with a hand on my back. “I can see this really isn’t your thing. What do you like to do?”

I shrug as we start slowly down the stairs. “I don’t know. Nothing, really.”

He flashes me a glance. “You must have a favorite place in the city . . . somewhere that’s special to you.”

I shrug again. “I kind of like Central Park . . . and I went to Coney Island once when I was a kid.” Mallory’s dad took pity on me once and brought me with them.

“Coney Island,” he repeats. “What about the Statue of Liberty, or the Empire State Building?”

“Never been,” I answer.

“The Museum of Natural History?” he says with a wave toward the park as we reach the ground floor.

“Nope?”

He stops walking and just stares at me. “We need to fix this.”

“I’m not broken.”

His mouth presses into a line. “I didn’t say you, I said this. You’re off on Thursdays?”

“Usually.”

“So, Thursday will be our day to discover the city.”

“I’m pretty sure the city’s already been discovered by the, you know, eight million people who live here.”

“So, here’s the challenge. Every Thursday we’ll find someplace that most of them don’t know about.”

I lift my eyebrows at him. “The undiscovered New York City?”

He nods. “The gems that no one else sees.” He turns and starts walking toward the main doors. “And it’s your turn.”

“I don’t think this counts as undiscovered,” I say, gesturing at the hundreds of people milling around the exhibits.

We shrug on our jackets and I pull my gloves from my pocket as he holds open the door for me. Cold air slaps me in the face as I brush past him on my way out. And mmm . . . he smells like that tangy, spicy cologne that I remember from Club 69.

“Maybe not, but it’s still your turn,” he says in my ear as I pass. His accent is so faint, but it’s there, making his voice purr.

He catches up and we start across the park.

I watch my breath billow in white clouds that break up when I walk through them, and think about where I want to go. “So, I can choose anything?”

He nods. “Anything you haven’t seen already.”

“Well, that doesn’t rule much out . . . unless you had your heart set on the Theater District or Coney Island.”

He smiles. “I’ve already been.”

“Anything,” I say again. I look up as we weave through a group of kids in costumes, moving toward Fifth Avenue. And that’s when I remember it’s Halloween. “Shit!” I yank my phone out of my pocket and check the time. Five.

“What is it?” Alessandro asks, alarmed.

“It’s Halloween. I promised to take Henri and Max trick-or-treating. I’ve got to go!” I bolt across the park for the nearest subway stop, leaving him standing there, staring after me.

I’D PROMISED TO be here by six, but it’s after seven when I sprint up Mallory’s front steps. I ring and Mallory comes to the door with a big smile and a bowl of candy. Her red mane is pulled back in a sloppy ponytail and she’s got a headband on with black cat’s ears. There are messy whiskers drawn on her face with eyeliner. Henri’s handiwork, no doubt.

“Are they ready?” I pant.

Mallory’s smile vanishes the second she sees me. “They’ve been ready for over an hour, Hilary. They’ve been waiting. Jeff just got home from work and took them.”

“Damn!” I’ve been looking forward to this for a month and I blew it.

Mallory moves out of the way and I step through the door. “Don’t worry. They’re used to it,” she says, setting the candy bowl on the hall table and moving into the family room. She drops onto the couch and clicks the TiVo button.

“What’s that supposed to mean?” It pisses me off when she says stuff like that.

Her eyes flick to me. “You’re not the most reliable person, Hilary.”

“I was at the Met and I forgot it was Halloween.”

Her eyebrows shoot into her hairline. “You? At the Met? Who were you with?”

I shrug. “Just a guy.”

A slow smile curves her lips. “A guy got you to go to the Met? I want to meet this guy.”

No, she doesn’t. I move to the kitchen and pull a Diet Coke out of the fridge. “You want anything?” I ask from the door.

“Yeah,” she says as the doorbell rings. “Grab me one of those.”

She pushes the TiVo button again, pausing the TV, then goes to the door while I bring her Coke to the family room and sit. I hear talking and giggling at the door as she hands the candy out. A minute later, she’s back, flopping onto the other side of the couch. “So, is this guy . . . I mean, what’s going on with you and Brett?”

Damn. I was hoping we’d changed the subject. “Brett and I are the same. He’s just a guy I know.”

“Who is he?” she presses.

I blow out a sigh. “No one, Mallory.”

Her face changes in a split second from suggestively amused to wary.

“What?”

“Who is he?” She’s not joking around anymore. She’s always been overprotective, and that hasn’t changed just because I moved out.

“Someone from before.”

“Before?” she says slowly.

I take a sip of Diet Coke and reach for the remote, unpausing the TV. “He’s from the group home.”

For a long time, Mallory says nothing. I don’t look at her. Finally, she clears her throat and says. “I don’t think you should spend time with him. I don’t think it’s good for you.”

I still don’t look at her as all my insides pull into a tight knot. “I’m fine, Mallory. It’s really not a big deal.”

She tugs my arm, forcing me to look at her. She just stares into my eyes for a really long time before saying, “Is he the one?”

“It doesn’t matter. He’s dif—”

“Of course it matters!” she erupts. “You can’t be around those people. I forbid you to see him anymore.”

I bark out a bitter laugh and spring out of the couch, spilling my Diet Coke. “Are you serious? I’m twenty-two years old. You don’t get to tell me what to do anymore.”

I go to the kitchen for a paper towel, leaving her stewing on the couch. When I come back and start soaking the few drops of Coke out of the carpet, she says, “I’m sorry, Hilary. I just . . . you don’t think he wants back into your life?”

“He has some major guilt issues. He wanted to apologize.”

She blows out a laugh. “Like he could ever apologize.”

I sit back down. “I think he means it. He’s changed. A lot.”

Her lips purse. “I still don’t like it.”

The door bursts open and Henri comes charging through in a Transformers costume with a weighted-down pillowcase in his hand. Max trails behind with his dad, wearing some green costume that doesn’t look even remotely familiar to me.

“Hey, guys!”

“Auntie!” Henri squeals and launches himself at me. “I’m Maximus Prime!”

“Are there any Decepticons out there?” I ask, tickling his side.

“Don’t worry, Auntie! I’ll protect you,” he giggles, pulling away and puffing out his chest.

“I’m counting on it, buddy,” I tell him. “Hi, Jeff,” I say as he gives Henri’s black mop a ruffle on his way past.

“Sorry we left without you,” he says, and unlike Mallory, there’s no accusation in his tone. “The boys were chomping at the bit.”

Henri drops to the floor and dumps the contents of his pillowcase onto the carpet while Max climbs onto the couch between his parents and opens his.

“Anything good in there?” I ask, coming over and peeking in.

“You want a Charleston Chew?” he asks, pulling one out.

“Sure,” I say, taking it from his hand. “What’s your costume?”

“A Creeper,” he answers, digging in his bag again.

The doorbell rings and Mallory goes to get it. I look the question at Jeff.

“From Minecraft,” he clarifies. “Creepers are one of the monsters in the game.”

“They’re made out of TNT! They hiss and explode!” Henri volunteers through a mouthful of something blue.

Max hands Jeff a fun-sized Snickers, which he tears open as Mallory comes back into the family room. “Hilary was late because she was out with someone,” she tells Jeff, “from before.” The way she says the word leaves no doubt what “before” she’s referring to. Her lips purse and her eyes tighten a little when Jeff doesn’t respond by dragging me off to the bedroom and lecturing me. “I told her I didn’t think it was a good idea,” she presses.

Jeff splits a glance between us. “She’s all grown up, Mallory. I don’t think we have any say in who she sees.”

I totally love Jeff. If he wasn’t already married to my sister, I might actually consider marrying him.

Henri hops up and climbs into Mallory’s lap with a candy necklace in his hand. He loops it over her head and I can tell he’s already been sucking on it by the way it sticks to her hair. “You look pretty, Mommy,” he tells her, admiring the necklace.

She pulls him close and kisses his forehead. “Thank you, baby.” He squirms, trying to get back to his stash on the carpet, but she doesn’t let him go right away. “I don’t like it,” she says, her eyes locked on me. And I know this isn’t the end of the discussion.