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To be sure, I text him under the table.
Me
You said your parents’ restaurant is Romano’s?
Papirri
Yup
Oh. I give him a heads-up so he knows that’s where I am with the girls, but for some reason, that text doesn’t get through. Or he’s busy with something and he’s not reading it.
“Who you texting?” JT asks across the table from me.
Or rather, she shouts. Between opera music in the background and the fact that patrons at every table seem to think they’re on their own, it’s impossible to even hear my own thoughts here.
“No one,” I respond at a high decibel, despite checking my phone again. Still no answer.
“Here are the menus.” A middle-aged man shows up beside our table out of the blue, dumping well-worn menus encased in stained plastic on our table. “I’ll be back later.”
From experience, I know it will take him a good while to remember we exist. But as he moves on to another nearby table, I try to sneak in a good look. The man wears a shirt with sleeves rolled all the way up to his elbows. An apron that has seen better days is tied around a thick waist. He has the same dark hair with the slightest wave that Max has. Could this be his dad?
“Dude, where’s the bread?” JT also stares at the man, as if willing him to read her mind. “I need bread. Right yesterday.”
“Me too. You can’t hear it, but my stomach’s rumbling.” Chelsea rubs the flat plane of her stomach. On cue, mine roars like a lion.
I open the menu, and not a second later, the waiter shouts. “My son!”
If I were a better actress, I’d glue my eyes to the pictures of delicious plates on the menu. But no. I whirl around and?—
That’s not Max Cassiano. Instead, his cousin Leo walks through the door. A few customers must be regulars, because they recognize him, and he makes detours to greet people here and there like some sort of celebrity.
“Wait a second,” Brit whispers as much as someone can in all this chaos. “Is that who I think it is?”
The other two shift their attention from the menus to the guy.
“Oh shit. It’s the Bulldog Cassiano.” Chelsea makes a face as if she’s smelled something gross.
“Ugh.” JT winces. “I don’t know what’s worse, a Bulldog Cassiano or a Bolt Cassiano.”
“This one,” I say firmly. When they give me funny looks, I add, “At least the other one’s in our school, you know?”
Vague murmurs of agreement.
Brit speaks while looking at her menu again. “I guess. And if he weren’t an obnoxious Bolt, I’d find him a little hot too,” she says, echoing a similar conversation we had not long ago.
“A little? Try a lotta.” Chelsea snorts. “I still can’t get over how he carried you on his shirtless freaking back, looking like some Greek Olympian carved from marble. Didn’t you feel anything that time?”
I’m not entirely sure if she means in my heart or in my loins, but either admission would be too problematic to share.
“I was too drunk.” I bury my face in the menu.
“Sit here, boy!” The waiter sounds very close by. From the corner of my eye, I catch Leo Cassiano sitting at the table right by my side.
He glances at us and smirks. “Oh, I like this table.”
“Get lost, Bulldog,” JT tells him with a sweet smile that looks pretty metal on her.
The waiter glares at her. I debate whether to kick her under the table, but pass. Something about Leo Cassiano rubs me the wrong way. It’s like when I first met Max and felt the constant need to prove myself to him, except worse. Max doesn’t have an ounce of the creepiness this guy oozes from his pores.
