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¨You like to turn against your family for love, huh?¨
¨I do not love Alex anymore, Mom. I’m here to help my career and my studio. And Alex has been Alex Masters for the past five years. He’s denounced his family name. Doesn’t want anything to do with them. He despises his family way more than you imagine that I do! Like, way more.¨
¨I know he cheated on you numerous times…not with one person. Nothing small enough to go to counseling or give him another chance. He got close enough to you to tell his family where your father was going to be at the night he was poisoned and…¨
¨Mom, he had no idea his family was targeting Dad. No idea. That was very easy for us to believe at the time. I really didn’t call you to revisit the tragedy.¨
My mother is quite unshakable and often fixed in whatever belief she settles on.
¨How are you doing, Mom?¨
I switch the topic. I reach for the sharpest, pointest high heel in the walk-in closet that’s been layered with shoes my size and style. Holding the shoe by its front, I swing and smash the phone with the heel to shut up the looped creepy message that is hard to take seriously. It’s almost comical, and I have a gut feeling Ciro was the one that thought of this one. He can be such a prankster.
¨ I’m good. Just got a massage this morning and on my way to meet your aunt Gladys.¨
¨Send her my love, please.¨
I almost want to bypass my mother and talk to my aunt. She’s never been afraid to speak up about the Costas whenever she’s felt like it. I wonder what she’d think of what I’m doing.
¨Will do. When are you coming back?¨
¨Less than four weeks.¨
¨Good. You’ll be here before Ciro’s birthday.¨
¨Oh, sure.¨
As if I’ll be there to see my mother fawn all over her baby boy. So typical and disturbing is the reality of Sicilian mothers putting their boys before their girls. My belly is getting bubbly as I recall this truth. Childhood trauma is one ugly beast, and since I don’t want to stay in its rabbit hole, I tell her about the lovely gift I received.
¨Oh, they’re trying to protect you. I could only wish for brothers like you when I was your age. They stand up for you, they give you money, but you refuse even though it is your father’s wish that you condemn every time you do that.¨
¨Mom? Hello? Mom? I can’t hear you. I’ll call you back later. Love you.¨
I hang up. I can’t do this, and I refuse to hear her ramble about that. Before, I wasn’t motivated to hop back into the streets of London. However, I need something to take my mind off all this. Simon, here I come.
I meet Simon at an outdoor Hookah lounge in Camden Market. I told him I wanted to meet someplace in public, around normal everyday British people who aren’t locked up in exclusive clubs or private restaurants. No art elitism, please. As expected, he was totally down with it, hauling portfolios of my students’ art that I sent a link for him to review. Apparently, he had his assistant print out 8 by 10 images for him to review. Of the twelve artists’ works I sent him, he has four artists he has eyes on.
I select a green mint Hookah flavor, which I believe is subconsciously linked to the remnants of Alexander’s natural scent. Somehow, my body is craving more minty things in any way I can get them. Ugh, why am I so easily turned on by that man? There’s gotta be a Sicilian family story generations back that link the desire as much as the hostility between the Costas and the Matanis. Because if you were to ask my body, the Matanis are meant to dip into us. God, I can not sit here thinking about Alex sexually while these pretty blue British eyes are staring at me with great wonder.
¨You have some talented students.¨ He states once the hookah waiter walks away.
¨Thank you! They are, aren’t they! I tell you, every generation gets better. That’s the way evolution works.¨ I nod to myself.
¨Do you want to hear the four I have my eyes on?¨ He blinks heavily, acting more excited than I’d imagine. This only makes me more eager to find out.
¨Yes, please.¨
As expected, the oldest students of the bunch are selected, with the exception of Ezra, who is some master genius painter that uses things he finds lying around Brooklyn to add to his work. He created this mammoth canvas depicting his version of gentrification based on the items people left on the street. This piece is constructed to look like an old road map that children learned to read when I was in elementary school.
¨Ezra is unbelievable. Is he really only fifteen?¨
¨I know. Incredible.¨ I nod, approving all the students he’s selected to invite into his international youth exhibition.
¨My assistant is working on writing letters to their families. I will make sure she copies you on the letter drafts. You may be needed to help with language, or anything you suggest would be helpful.¨
I nod as I think he is concluding that he doesn’t believe his assistant is capable of communicating with the families of the youth I teach. I’m not sure how I really feel about that, but I take the notion of him including me as a positive rather than allowing my mind to think more about it.
¨Sounds great to me. I love how your assistant was able to print these pieces of theirs so well.¨
