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My stupid, stupid brother.
I love him, but he’s reckless.
He and Benny might be the same age and hold the same level of authority in their families, but they are day and night. While Benny is confident, Tommaso is insecure. Benny makes calculated moves while Tommaso pulls his gun out on a dangerous man with no intention of pulling the trigger.
It’s why so many of us dread the day Tommaso steps into our father’s role. Even though I see Benny as a psychopath, I wish Tommaso had his smarts.
I’m met with a chill when I walk outside. The concrete is cold underneath my sock-covered feet. I tuck my boots underneath my armpits. Benny settles his hand on the small of my back and leads me toward a black Range Rover parked in the driveway. It’s a newer model of the one he handcuffed me in last time we were in his car together.
I shiver and hug myself as we pass through my mother’s flower garden. The Manneken Pis fountain provides a temporary calmness to the chaos I’m picturing will be the rest of the day with Benny. The French marigolds are in full bloom, lining the walkway in orange, red, and yellow. They match the colors of the leaves on the ground, shed by the large trees in our front yard.
One day, I asked my grandmother why the leaves fell.
Why the trees allow such a significant piece of them to wither and die.
She corrected me, “Trees aren’t much different from us, Neomi. Sometimes, we must accept that parts of us will shed and change. But in time, something more beautiful will bloom. That’s why you should never fear change, for what’s to come could be better than you could ever imagine.”
Just like the trees, I’ll change.
I’m just worried something more beautiful won’t come in my marriage.
That I’ll fall in love and not be loved back.
Benny opens the passenger door of the SUV, motioning for me to get in, and I don’t mutter a word as I fall onto the leather seat. He slams the door shut before circling the car, and the scent of black-cherry car freshener and his cologne permeates the air.
“Was that really necessary?” I ask, dropping my boots onto the floorboard and slipping the sweater on. “I’d rather not spend the day with you …especiallyafter what you just pulled with my brotherandlast night.”
Benny starts the SUV. “We have business to discuss.”
I jerk the seat belt over my body. “We have nothing to discuss.”
“You also need to see your new home.” He drops his arm to the back of my seat and reverses out of the driveway.
“I like the home I live in perfectly fine.” My throat goes dry. With everything happening, I spaced that I’d have to move in with Benny.
“It won’t be your home for much longer.”
“We don’t have to live together.”
“I doubt your father will appreciate me fucking your brains out under his roof.”
The scoff that leaves me is dramatic and loud. “There will be no fucking my brains out.”
“We also need to discuss last night. That type of behavior can’t happen again. You are about to become a Marchetti, and we don’t play childish games.”
“Iplay childish games? You were the one who got a blow job from a random woman to piss me off. You succeeded in thepissing me offpart, which is why I did what I did. Cause and effect.”
When we reach the gate at the entrance of my subdivision, he gives the guard a two-fingered wave and exits.
“I warned you what would happen,” he says.
I snort. “I didn’t believe you were serious.”
“I’m not a man who speaks just to speak. When I say something, it means something. If I tell you another man is not to touch you, it’s not a threat. It’s a promise I will kill him.”
“Technically, he didn’t touch me—”
He shakes his head. “Touch you. You touch him. Neither better happen, or there will be violence.”
