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“I’m sure.”
“Thank you.” I wanted to cry in my own bed, cuddling my dog, so I gave him a quick hug and hurried to gather my things before Garon showed up again. I went to the front of house and asked one of the other girls to distract Arno and Santo for a couple of minutes and it worked like a charm because they stared at her breasts enough for me to sneak out without being followed.
When I got home, I picked up Panini and cried into his fur, knowing that I only had tonight to feel all my feelings before starting fresh tomorrow. There was a new day of work. I couldn’t afford to be weak if I wanted to have any chance of getting out of this hole others dug for me.
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I woke up early because Panini was barking at me. He was understandably inpatient because I only fed and walked him early in the morning when I’d return from work. He was not approving of this change in the schedule.
“Altri cinque minuti16.” I whined, but he wasn’t willing to indulge me. “Fine, fine. I’m awake. You are a greedy little thing, do you know that?”
Visibly more happy, he followed me to the bathroom to wash up and get ready and started running in circles when he saw me putting food in his bowl. The bowl was licked clean in under five minutes and I rolled my eyes watching him eat with such hunger.
While Panini went to his water bowl, I found a tin of instant coffee and mixed it with some water. It tasted like mud, but I needed the caffeine kick. When we left Palermo, I wasn’t allowed to pack the espresso machine and honestly, even if I would have brought it with me, I would have sold it by now. I guess the days of good coffee were just over for me.
“Come on, Panini, let’s go for a walk.” I was in no mood to walk around the building until my over-energetic dog would get tired, but I wanted to get it over with and go back to bed, maybe wallow in self-pity a couple more hours.
Of course, Panini was not empathetic at all. He was running around, pulling at the leash, excited to get in his exercise. I knew he was lonely lately. I was either at work or sleeping and there were no dog parks around, so Panini was pretty much playing on his own. I didn’t even have a ball to throw around for him.
As small as he was, he dragged me down the stairs and to the door, but stopped when he noticed a polished man’s shoe and decided to attack it. A string of Italian cuss words followed and I almost burst out laughing watching Garon jumping from one leg to another, trying to escape Panini.Almost. Because him being here made me anxious and I just expected more trouble to come.
“You still have this dog?” He asked when Panini finally lost interest in him.
“Of course I do.” He was only six years old, still had a long life in front of him. “He’s the only thing I have left.”
Garon’s face darkened. He looked around us at the plaster falling down the walls of the building and the bags of garbage my lovely neighbors didn’t bother to throw away. The impoverished sadness of the landscape made him frown so deep I saw a line forming on his perfect forehead.
“I need to get you out of this place.” I had a feeling that mumble was mostly for himself, but I heard it.
“Well, this is the cheapest rent I could find. I’m not going anywhere.”
“Pina…”
“What more do you want, Garon? I’m done letting you interfere with my life, so say your piece and go.” My mood got the best of me. I was too hurt by everything that had happened to entertain him and his feelings.
“I’m not used to this.”
“To what?”
“To you being such a…” He left the sentence dangling and it irritated me to no end.
“Such awhat?”
“A bitch to me!” He exploded. “Don’t get me wrong, this new fire burning inside you is sexy—molto bello17—but I missed your blushing cheeks and shy smiles. I’ve been trying to steal one of those from you for a while.” I blinked, not knowing what to say, and Garon walked closer, raising my chin with his finger. “Is there nothing left of the girl I watched grow up?”
I found myself asking the same thing lately. Since the moment I realized my mother and father were not coming back, since I was told I had to come up with money to pay their debts when I only had a couple hundred euros to my name, I did nothing but fight. I wasn’t a fragile little princess, so I pulled myself together and looked for a way out. Unlike my sister, I never expected anything to be handed to me, because nothing ever was, and I wasn’t ashamed to work to stay afloat. I didn’t like doing it while my tits were hanging out, but I did it. Through all that, I never had time to stop and look if there was anything left of the old me, the one that was too scared to take leaps, but now I knew. The only thing left of the old Pina was the way I felt about this man. And that was almost impossible to wipe away, but I wasn’t going to let it bury me.
Garon rolled back into my life three days ago and has already caused me enough trouble. My entire plan was to keep my head down and do my work and he made it impossible. I had to find some strength in my weak heart and say no to his seduction.
“If you’re looking for a heart to heart, I’m not the person. I need to walk my dog.” I walked away and dragged poor Panini along when he was just being a good boy, laying down at my feet. I owed him a treat for that.
“I’ll come with you.”
“I don’tneedyou to come with me.”
“Look around you, woman.” He gestured at the symphony of dissonance and discord. He looked so out of place—a polished, rich man trapped in the middle of a cacophony of car horns, screeching tires, buildings burdened of age, and fainted argumentative sounds coming from open windows. The scent of decaying garbage was mixing with his expensive cologne and his crisp white t-shirt started catching the dust particles around us.
“What’s your point?” I said, pretending not to understand his obvious suggestion.
