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Rocco got to all of us. Mum cried and made enough pasta to last us a month. I drank and threw punches and fucked. Paris… Paris got a new beau to shower her in jewels and attention for a few more months.
“I just can’t…” Mum sniffled as she wiped her nose on her sleeve. “He actually had the audacity to tell me that this family would be better off if we were still together!”
I stiffened. I’d guessed as much, but hoped I’d guessed wrong.
Rocco had pulled that stunt too many times over the years for me to count.
Belittling everything Mum had fought for, all she’d achieved, everything she’d put up with. It was Mum who’d been left cleaning up his mess and, now that Paris had dumped Maddy on our door, it looked like Mum had at least another fifteen years of cleaning up to do.
“I could kill him,” I growled and even I was taken aback by the vehemence in my voice.
“But you won’t.”
“Won’t I?”
She hugged me tight. “No.”
“And just why not?”
“Because you’re a good man, Roman,” she said softly. “Even if you refuse to see it.”
There were a lot of feelings rolling around in me. Anger. Denial. Fear. Sadness. Loneliness. Dejection. Rejection. I felt small and pathetic all over again.
Even a night spent making pasta with Mum and Maddy couldn’t calm the storm raging inside me. It only grew and grew the longer I had to hold it in.
While Mum was bathing Maddy, I made a decision. It was stupid. It wasn’t me. But it was instinct and I couldn’t resist it. I popped my head into the bathroom, keeping my eyes on anything but the bath.
“Where are the spare doonas?” I asked Mum.
She frowned at me, no doubt trying to work out why the fuck I wanted spare doonas. “Uh…linen by my room.”
I nodded. “Pillows there, too?”
“Ye-es…”
“What about those woollen blankets we used to use on the beds?”
She lost that confused look and it was replaced with a calculating smirk. “Yes.”
I pointed at her. “Don’t start.”
“Don’t start what, Grandma?” Maddy asked.
Mum’s smirk grew. “Roman’s got a date.”
“I don’t even know if she’s free,” I said then frowned. “I’m not doing anything.”
Mum laughed.
“What?” Maddy asked. “What’s Uncie Roman doing?”
I gave her my best grumpy frown, feeling most of it but also wanting to make her smile. “Nothing you need to worry about. I’ll see you in the morning.”
She giggled and gave me a cheesy grin. “Night, Uncie Roman.”
I patted the door, pointed once more at Mum to keep her quiet, and went to the linen cupboard by her room to ransack the supply of snuggly shit. I bundled it all up in my arms and carried it awkwardly to my ute. I threw it in the tray and then wondered what I was supposed to do with it.
“More?” I wondered.
