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While she waited for Riker to show, Gia did the best she could to check herself out in the hospital bathroom mirror. From what she could see, she looked pretty good—all things considered. The dress was a short, silvery, beaded confection that shimmered when it caught the light, and the empire waist was a perfect choice for her thickening waist. Gia’s hair— freshly washed, and smoothed— hung long and loose down her back. Her make-up was minimal and cleverly designed to camouflage and highlight. Gia’s long tanned legs were bare and she had on a pair of strappy silver sandals that, of course while being outrageously expensive, matched the dress perfectly.
Riker’s eyes lit in surprise and approval when he saw her, but to Gia’s disappointment he didn’t actually comment on the effort she had made. And the civil ceremony itself—pfft—it basically consisted of a bored looking stranger blurting out a few perfunctory words. Then there was a quick awkward kiss to seal the deal and that was it— Gia Bonzini’s big wedding day.
It was not even close to what she had always dreamed it would be, but probably no more than she deserved.
The whole time she was getting ready, Gia had been worried that Riker wouldn’t even show—that he would reconsider the whole stepping up thing and hightail it for the west coast. But to Gia’s profound relief, not only had Riker shown up on time, but he had come bearing gifts—a set of his and her gold wedding bands that were smooth and gleamed bright in the early afternoon sun.
On the way over to the apartment they really hadn’t talked much—which oddly enough had made the whole situation more weird and less weird at the same time. However, it had pleased her to see that Riker had thoughtfully arranged for Dolly to go to Gia’s house and pick up some of her things. Now an over-sized suitcase sat on the shag carpet next to her as if waiting to see what was going to happen next.
Well that makes two of us.
Oh no…oh no…oh god, no! Because the pink bathroom and dizzying tile floor wasn’t bad enough, the moment Gia opened a window to let out the musty smell of the room, all of that old nausea came careening back to her. She felt her stomach lurch as the strong smell of smoked meat filled the room and began to cloak it in a suffocating steam. She ran back to the window and pulled it close only to find the source of the smell was teeming up from the street directly below her. An enormous meat smoker sat outside the back door of a butcher shop where it was stoked and ready for a good long run.
Gia quickly ran to the front of the apartment. The windows there were wide and long and looked out onto the front side of the street —the opposite side of where the smoker was. Gia shoved open the largest window, and with a firm grasp on the window frame, Gia leaned forward as much as was humanly possible. With her head shoved out the window, she sucked in the cool air in deep heaving gasps fighting off the sickening dizziness.
“What the fuck?” Gia felt a strong arm wrap around her and pull her away from the window.
Gia latched onto to Riker’s hard biceps and steadied herself.
“Jesus, Gia are you alright? What the hell are you doing?” Riker growled out.
“What?” She forced herself to focus as the world spun around her.
“What do you meanwhat? Why were you looking out the window with everything but your ass hanging out?” He looked at her like she was insane.
She pulled away from him and straightened out the beautiful little wedding dress that she still hadn’t had the heart to remove and he still had not commented on. It had been a very long, nerve wracking morning. Gia narrowed her eyes at him.
“I wasn’tlookingout the window, Riker. I was getting ready tojumpout the window.”
Riker’s eyebrows shot to the top of his head. Then he gave her a long look.
“Not funny, Gia.”
She gave him a long look back. “No, I suppose it isn’t. But you know what is? That not even one full day after my release from the hospital, I find myself living on top of a meat smoker. And my guess is that that smoker pretty much runs round the clock — guaranteeing that I will spend the next few months dry- heaving up the smell of barbecued pork.”
Riker moved over to the window, glanced down at the smoker and actually looked contrite. “Shit, babe, I haven’t been here in a while.”
“I don’t think anyone’s been here in a while, not since Gerald Ford was in office anyway.” Gia sighed and plopped down on a chair.
Riker looked around the room confused at first, then had to grin. “Yeah, it does kinda have that Archie Bunker feel to it. But hey, who doesn’t love a gold shag rug?”
“I guess that could be worse.” She considered, then asked “But we haven’t even talked about the cotton candy colored bathroom yet. Even without the smoker, that’s enough to make even you puke.”
Riker looked startled. “Seriously? The bathroom is that pink? I cannot piss in an all pink bathroom.”
“Oh, I’m dead serious. Go take a look.” Gia lifted her chin towards the closed bathroom door.
“Holy shit!” Riker yelped out as he poked his head into the pink powder room. Then in a flash he was standing back in the middle of the room. “That’s fucking distasteful.”
“See what I mean?” Gia reacted to Riker’s look of horror. Then to his surprise, she gave him a devilish grin.
“You can’t piss in a pink bathroom and I can’t stand the smell of smoked meat. Maybe we should both jump.”
Funny,Riker thought. Damn the girl was funny. Even after that rushed ceremony and being dumped in this shit hole, she had kept her sense of humor. Gia may be a lot of things—many of which he had yet to discover— but a whiny bitch wasn’t one of them. Woman could roll, that was for sure.
And she had it in the looks department too.
She was real pretty.
