As I reach for the box I am startled as I feel the warmth of her trembling touch on my bare ribcage. Without a warning, she lifts my right hand up to expose my side of the locket we share, etched on my flesh. She traces her over the healed artwork that rests beneath the scar I wear from my father’s wrath years before. No amount of surrounding ink or wounds to my flesh could ever take away from the sentimental shine of our locket.
The feel of her fingers on my skin eases my worries. She continues moving her delicate fingers overtop my ink, feeling the validation she needs and deserves, while I wait. As delicious as her touch feels, in this moment, I crave her voice.
I know she must have questions, lots of them. How could she not? It’s not every day that you learn your boyfriend, who disappeared without a trace, suddenly reemerged as a bloodthirsty criminal, who will literally burn the fucking world to the Goddamn ground to get you back. That, and I look nothing like I used to. Shit, I’m nothing like I used to be.
I lose track of how many minutes pass as we stand here in silence. Once she finally drops her hand from my torso, I use it as my opportunity to give her the box.
“Here, it’s yours, as am I,mi reina,” I say, handing her the black box with the same elongated skeleton key that I brought her to the brink of ecstasy with just yesterday.
“Thank you,” she says, finally breaking the silence with beautifully glossy eyes from the tears she has cried.
She seats herself in front of the fire, on the floor which creaks as I kneel to join her. We sit together as she inserts the key, twisting it once to finally unlock what I have kept from her all this time.
Bittersweet memories come crashing at us both as she sifts through its contents. Pictures of us, cards from anniversaries, everything I could hold on to before I saw her again, it is all in the box.
“Oh my God, Mama’s earring. I knew I had to have left it in your car when we drove to the cemetery,” she cutely exclaims, as if the pictures of us, the tattoos, all of it weren’t enough evidence.
Then, she pulls out the note I wrote her just before I had her summoned to the city. When I needed a therapeutic release before I could get to her.
“What’s this?” she asks, beginning to unfold the note.
“A letter I wrote you,” I say, suddenly feeling a flush strike my cheeks. Now I know how she felt in the cemetery all those years ago. The vulnerability of having your written thoughts read by another is a fucking trip.
With the paper still in hand, she places the box on the floor as she lifts herself, bringing her lips to mine.
“Read it to me … out loud,” she sweetly demands, handing me the words I wrote for her. A deliciously devious smirk escapes from her mouth and she nudges me. “Payback’s a bitch huh?” she jokes, referring to that night I read her poem out loud.
“For you,mi reina, anything,” I say, playfully obliging her request. It’s the truth, there isn’t a thing in this life, or any life that may exist after, that I wouldn’t do for her. Limitations do not exist when it comes to what I would sacrifice for my rag doll.
My heart thumps in my chest as I clear my throat. But it’s not my nerves I feel that cause my heart to skip a beat, it’s the feeling of absolution I feel in this moment beside her.
Mi Reina,
Life without you is purgatory. My heart a ticking time bomb, locked in a holding cell with bated breath, anticipating the moment my tattered hands will have the privilege of touching your flesh. Life with you will be like a game of Russian roulette: unpredictable and impulsive. Together, we will live on the edge of greatness that our broken souls know nothing of but crave immensely. Through pain, grief, flames, and dust, it’s plain to see that you and I are meant to be.
El que tiene las respuestas
“Fuck,” I blurt, suddenly exasperated as I finish reading.
The man I am claiming to be looks nothing like who she associates with the name that used to be mine. My soul is the same, but my body looks nothing like what she is used to me looking like.
“What happened to you?” she asks, bringing her soft hand to my face. She moves the stray strand of hair that covers my eyes out of my way.
“My father,” I begin.
“Your father?” she asks, confused.
I take a deep breath, finally willing to admit the fucked-up lineage I come from. “My older brother died when I was young. He was my father’s pride and joy. He never wanted kids, he just wanted one son to be able to pass the family business on to. Carmine was that.”
“Carmine?” she asks.
“Yea, that was my brother’s name. He died in a car accident. Except, he wasn’t driving. He got plowed by a drunk driver when he was outside playing one day, and my father blamed my mother. He blamed her because he wasn’t home,” I scoff in disbelief at my father’s antics now and then. “Funny thing is, he was never home. He didn’t give a fuck about anyone but himself, but with Carmine dead, the original plan of my brother taking over on his eighteenth birthday was out the door. So, the fucker waited until my eighteenth birthday to claim what he felt was his, or some fucking bullshit like that.”
“Fuck,” she says, taking a deep breath, processing what I just told her.
“Yea, you’re telling me. He was such a worthless piece of shit. He took out all his rage on my mother, to the point where she knew the only way that I would have a chance at happiness was for her to leave him and escape to my Titi’s house.”
“Oh my God, Titi Rose,” Sienna says, slowly putting the pieces of the puzzle together.
