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“What?” I pull back. I can’t believe it—she doesn’t look pregnant.
“I know, right? I’m twenty weeks now. When I was this far along with Ella I looked like I was six months.” She shrugs. “Everything looks good as far as my OB is concerned. I’m just grateful I finally stopped throwing up.”
I am not at all jealous all the women around me are having babies seconds after getting married. Okay, maybe a little bit, but it’s about the babies, not the married. “Congrats on the baby and on not throwing up anymore.”
“Thanks. As great as you already look, let’s get you wow for Enzo. His mood is always better for a beautiful woman.”
“I got a warning from Dante on him already. What’s your take?”
She shakes her head as she takes a dress off the rail. There are only four, and they all look gorgeous. “I miss the Enzo before he got married. He was a genuinely nice, charming guy. He could be reserved until he was comfortable with you then once he was, you felt this warmth from him same as Dante. Ella adored him, and he handled her and Matteo like he’d been doing it for years. Now that guy is gone. He’ll pick up Ella, Matteo, and Sophia when they want him to, but he only plays with them for a few minutes before he hands them back. It’s sad to see the difference. If you met him now you would probably shrug and say another rich jerk, only it’s not who he really is.”
Sympathy wells up; I understand completely. It’s gotten to the point where every time I see a woman holding a baby, I ache with so much longing I look away. For him to be surrounded by children he longed for but couldn’t have is a different kind of hell. “Poor guy.”
Lydia studies me. “You are the only person who would ever say that about him. It’s also not what I would have expected from you of all people.”
I shrug. Okay, I don’t hate men the way everyone seems to think. I’ve simply come across so many men who were a disappointment in the way they treated me or believed I should be or behave, I gave up expecting anything different. I was too fat, I was too independent, I worked too much, I was too serious. Until I was sick and tired of hearing it. “Most people look at him and see a gorgeous guy with a bank account they can only dream of. You’re already ahead, let’s get you farther. Try this one first, it’s my favorite one.”
I pull on the dress. I love it. It’s a sheath dress, the sleeves in black lace with a built-in foundation shaper smoothing me out yet allowing me to breathe. I used to hate my body growing up—my mother made sure I did. For her it was already an insult that I had darker skin than her, that my hair was dark, thick, and unruly unlike her own fine, blonde hair, how I looked like my father and nothing like her. To have a fat daughter on top of it all made her even more bitter about the wrongs she had to bear. She was constantly putting me on diets, weighing me and measuring me every week.
If it weren’t for Nonna, I would have eaten nothing but fruit and salads. When my mother left the house Nonna gave me the pasta and carbs my mother outlawed. Nonna was my savior in so many ways. She appeared in my life when I was ten, not dead as my mother believed. My mother and I went from being homeless for over a year, barely surviving in the roughest parts of Boston, to a beautiful home in Milan. Nonna never said a word about my weight, understanding I was having a hard time adjusting to Italy. Timid and shy, I was overwhelmed by the loud, boisterous girls I met who always seemed so pretty and chic at even ten years old. I’d always been a reader lost in books that took me away from the loud shelter where we shared rooms with crying babies and exhausted mothers, but I started comfort eating and staying inside and packed on the pounds.
At eighteen I came to Chicago, I hadn’t intended to stay. I only wanted to meet my father for the first time. He was teaching at one of the universities but after the brief meeting I didn’t feel like I had anywhere else to go. My mother told me if I went to meet my father to never come back so the round-trip ticket turned out to be one-way.
I got a job as a waitress and the weight started coming off with all the walking and having to decide between food and bills. I managed to go all the way down to a size eighteen. The only problem was the more I lost, the more I wanted to keep losing. I started doing dangerous things. They got me all the way down to a size ten. It became imperative to prove my mother wrong, I could survive in Chicago on my own without her money, and I was going to be skinny while I did it. My doctor warned me what I was doing was hurting myself. I wouldn’t listen; I was a size ten, inches away from being out of double digits. No way was I going to stop, then I wound up in the hospital.
While in the hospital a doctor talked to me about how I was wrecking my body. How if I kept doing what I was doing the next time it wouldn’t be easy to come back from. Scared, I listened. Learning how to eat again wasn’t easy. My problem was growing up poor and rarely having regular, healthy food, I didn’t know how to eat properly. Overeating always happened when I finally got food because there was no guarantee the next time I was hungry I would be able to eat left me with issues I was still dealing with as an adult. To this day I have stores of food in my room, my desk, and my kitchen cupboard. I even carry around granola bars and single packs of nuts in my purse. Food that’s there just in case—of what I have no idea, but I need it there for me to breathe easier. I’ve had some lapses, but they were few. Now I’m settled in my sweet spot of a size sixteen. Although I have spots I sigh over every now and then, I’m comfortable with my body and myself.
In this dress, I’m loving my body. The hemline is less than an inch above my knee. I sit, it goes up a mere two inches; excellent. I like it, I’m going to buy it except it’s not for this initial meeting, and I say as much to Lydia.
She nods. “I understand. Try this one, it has a little more oomph to it.”
I like the color, a deep, rich purple. On, I love how there is a dimension to it, as it’s a woven pattern. It clings perfectly to my curves, sexy, not sex. The only problem is it’s sleeveless, while I love my body as a whole, I’m not in love with my arms. I think they are too flabby.
“I love it but I don’t love how it’s sleeveless,” I moan from the dressing room.
“Coming in, I got you, boo. I know your hate feelings toward your arms.”
Boo. I laugh—Lydia is the only person I know who could pull that off. “I love this.” It’s a thin gold jacket that stops an inch below my ample breasts, they’re a double D and a pain in the ass. I wear a bra even at home, old, worn-out sports bras, but still. The only time I can go without a bra is when I sleep. When I put it on, the jacket fits the dress perfectly. “You are a freaking genius. I love it. This is it.”
“I am pretty awesome. Your hair needs to be down. Enzo likes long hair like yours.”
I sigh; my long hair is thick and stark black. I often dream of dying it red or pink or even brown to add something to it. Except I’m too lazy, busy, whatever to get to a salon every six weeks to deal with root touchups. I make appointments the third or fourth time I get frustrated with how out of control my hair has gotten. Grasping the clip holding it in the messy bun, I take it out. There’s a slight wave. My eyes meet Lydia’s in the mirror. “You think I look okay?”
She laughs. “Woman, you look fabulous. Let’s get you rung up.”
“After I try on the other dresses, because you are too damn good. I’m sure I’ll love them and want to wear them later.”
“Sure thing.”
We end up having a super late lunch to catch up. I try not to show how jealous I am as Lydia talks about Ella and her plans for when the new baby comes. I’m beyond annoyed with myself for not being able to shake my desire for children. I completely understand where Enzo was coming from making his crazy contract marriage to get the family he wanted. Hell, six months ago I went online to a sperm bank after reading a story of a woman who did the same thing. A vial has been sitting in the cart for six months. I can’t bring myself to press buy but I also haven’t taken it out. If I want kids, then it’s what I will have to do. My childhood, my mother, my grandmother, and the few men I allowed into my life were proof positive I don’t need a man, I’m better off without one. Doing it alone is scary, and I’m not stupid enough to think it will be easy, but it’s also how I want to do it.
I love my life; I do what I want to do without having to worry about anyone else. I can work until eight or nine without someone whining I’m ignoring them. I can stay up reading until midnight without someone bitching about the light being on or they thought we were going to have sex, and the sex I do have is so much better because I always come, then I can wash off my vibrator and go to bed. Yet I do still want a child. If I had my choice it would be half a dozen but if I’m doing it on my own, more than one doesn’t seem fair, even though I hated growing up an o
nly child. It will be better without a man, no arguing about spending holidays with one grandparent versus the other, a man making me feel guilty for wanting to work instead of staying home. Laying my head against the window, I stare blindly out of it. Yeah, I called Enzo a control freak and I had no right to.
As I settle into my desk, a glance at my watch tells me I have twenty minutes until I’m due to meet Enzo. I open up my purse and pull out my makeup. I prefer to keep it simple, a powder because I get shiny on my T-zone, mascara because I have long lashes without it and it makes my eyes pop, and a lipstick, usually a dark red to finish, which is all I’m wearing today. Since this is the first meeting and my dress and jacket are oomph enough, I refresh the powder then cheat by using one of my half-dozen lipsticks in a burgundy and swipe a small amount over my eyelids. My eye catches my berry lip gloss. It’s not something I use often, as I’m pretty sure no one gets taken seriously with shiny lips, but I love the color and how it makes my small lips seem bigger. With a shrug I swipe it over my lips. Done.
With six minutes left I load the properties into my leather briefcase, unapologetically pale pink, and head to the elevator. I press the button then turn my phone to silent before slipping it into my briefcase. On Enzo’s floor I’m guided back to his office by a fidgety blonde.
