AllFreeNovel
Share Us
Not talking was worse than talking, and the six-and-a-half minutes it took to get from downtown to Gia’s market felt like six-and-a-half years. How had they gone from passionate kissing in the street to silence so quickly?
“Can we talk later?” Gia asked from a front-row parking spot, the bright light of the market pouring out its all-glass front calling her inside like a moth to a flame.
“There’s nothing to talk about.” Roxi turned to face the side window, and Gia imagined she was once again cursing her in Spanish. This time, silently.
All this after one kiss? And one rejection. But still. It was just one kiss.
“I think you know there is,” Gia pressed. “You told me not to run when things get uncomfortable. I can say the same to you. I don’t want to lose our friendship over this. Okay?”
Silence, save for the engine purring. Roxi’d turned off the radio during the drive. Perhaps for effect? She was awfully good at the silent treatment, and even better with no soundtrack to provide a cover.
“Okay,” Roxi said without turning. “We can talk next week. After the meeting.”
“Good.”
“Bueno.”
“Okay, I really have to go. Thanks for the ride.” Gia slid out of the truck onto a discarded piece of gum. “This fucking day,” she said to no one as she shut the door.
Taking stock
Roxi didn’t show up to the meeting the next week.Or the following. Gia hadn’t heard a peep from her since the night they’d kissed—and she’d freaked out. No, “hey, it’s okay” or “how are you?” No replies to the texts Gia had sent with those sentiments. She told herself it was just as well—she wasn’t in a position to get into a relationship, no matter the chemistry.Especiallyif there was chemistry. Why the woman who said to stop running away when things got uncomfortable, ran away, she didn’t understand. But if Roxi couldn’t handle a little conflict without disappearing, Gia didn’t need her, anyway.
On a bench in a park near the market, Gia sat eating a day-old sandwich that hadn’t sold, thinking. It was 6 a.m., but she didn’t want to go home after work. That lonely, generic apartment would be there in an hour—or four. No one was waiting; no one expected her by a certain time.
As early morning walkers passed, a filmstrip played and re-played the previous three months in her head. Unlike the past before the latest move, she remembered it well. Her memory was crystal clear, in fact. She re-lived conversation with her dad, where she once again asked for help in making a new start, and he’d once again complied, transferring her money and wishing her well. He hadn’t reached out since; it was their pattern. Gia contacted him when she was in trouble, he bailed her out, and then went back to his new life with his new wife and children. Though they’d been married for fifteen years, Gia considered her father’s wife his “new wife.” She understood why he’d left. She knew the pain of living with her mother. And she still resented him for it.
The last she’d spoken to her mother—the woman after whom she was named—she’d been hung up on. Theirs was a rocky relationship—perhaps because they were too similar. Perhaps because oftheirpattern, which went like this: Gianna would express her frustration with Gia’s lack of life direction. Gia would push back, saying she was doing her best, and Gianna would rant in Italian. That’s exactly what had happened when she said she was moving to Palm Springs. Old habits die hard.
Chewing a turkey and avocado sandwich on a faded park bench, Gia realized she’d left a trail of failed relationships and friendships in her wake—she wanted a friend and had no one to call. She had a string of “not-the-ones” littering her rearview mirror, old girlfriends unwilling to tolerate her addictive nature, or those whose behavior she didn’t like or couldn’t handle. The one person she’d met in town and had a connection with was ignoring her. Even Mrs. Edelman hadn’t needed her cat fetching services.
Lost in thought, Gia barely heard an older man suggest she’d “be pretty if she’d smile,” as he walked by. She bit her tongue instead of barking back at him. Men had been telling her to smile as long as she could remember—there wasn’t a reply that left her satisfied, so she opted out. If that wasn’t growth, she didn’t know what was.
The morning light was bright, but not blinding, and it lit the palm trees along the park’s walking path in a way that made them seem out of a postcard. She was, arguably, sitting in a postcard. And miserable.
“Fuck it.” Gia fished her phone out of her back pocket. She’d promised Mikael she’d call her mother. That was almost a month before—maybe it was time. It was seven a.m. in California, which meant it was eight in Arizona. Too early for her mom to be drunk.
The phone rang five times. “Hi, you’ve reached Gianna. If we know each other, you know I don’t listen to voicemails. If we don’t, you can leave a message, but don’t expect a call back.”
Classy, Gia thought, regretting her decision to reach out and clicking the red button to end the call. That voicemail greeting said everything about Gianna. She lived in her world by her rules and didn’t want anyone interrupting her plans. Even her daughter.
When the phone rang less than a minute later, Gia waited. Did she really want to talk to her mother? Was she just lonely and without other options? Would any good come from answering the phone, or would she feel worse afterwards?
“Hi, Mom.”
Loneliness won.
“Hi, Gia. How are you doing, angel?”
Angel?
“Mom?”
“Yes.”
“What’s going on?”
“What do you mean, doll? You called me. What’s up?” Gianna said in a neutral tone. No rage. No anger. No slur.
