Secondhand Purses (10 page)

My mind drifted to Nick, as it seemed to do all the time. I had to say goodbye to Nick today. His sweet, secret smile that was all mine would be only a memory after today.

I leaned back against my pillow, and closed my eyes, indulging in my scenario of how our ‘goodbye’ would go today.

We would meet in the side yard of Nonna’s house, where we’d always met up. We would stand among the trees, hidden from the view of the street, allowed to talk privately, no one intruding on our moment. There would be tears in my eyes. Tears that I was holding back. Tears I didn’t want him to see because if he saw them, he would know. He would know the truth of the role he had taken in my life. The spot he held in my heart. But, as I raise my eyes to his, I would see that his eyes were red-rimmed. They would look a little more, I don’t know, liquid than normal. As if he were fighting, too. As if he were holding back.

He would reach his hand out, and gently caress my cheek. I would lean into it, a tear slipping slowly from my eye and onto his skin. Slowly, I would feel his arms wrap around me, pulling me closer to him. I would inhale his musky scent, committing it to memory as I let him hold me. He would lean back, tip my chin up towards him, and slowly, gently, lean in for a kiss.

Swoon.

I groaned as I swung my feet around to the side of the bed to stand up. Time to paint on my smile.

I pulled on my jeans that were fitting looser these days, and my favorite black t-shirt. A pair of Chucks completed the look and I went downstairs. I wasn’t expected over at Nonna’s until eleven so I decided to go help mom with the last of the packing.

Mom raised an eyebrow when I offered to help out, but just pointed me in the direction of the kitchen. I saw the smile she tried to hide. The thing was, she didn’t know that I’d seen her crying the other night alone in her bedroom. I never really thought about what she felt about all these moves we made. I never once wondered if they were as hard on her as they were on me. I definitely needed to try harder with her. I impulsively gave her a quick hug and set to wrapping up our glasses and dishes.

I looked up what seemed like minutes later, and realized it was time to go say goodbye to Nonna and Nick. My heart raced a little at seeing him again, but then sunk when I realized it would be the last time I saw him in person in maybe forever.

As I walked over to her house, I tried to imprint every tree, every blade of grass and every crack on the pavement into my memory. I wished I could have stretched it out. Unfortunately, I was there in what felt like record time and was turning the handle on the front door.

Amazing aromas nearly knocked me off my feet as I entered the well-worn living room. Someone had been busy. When I entered the kitchen my jaw hit the ground. There were cannolis, zappole, crostata and tartufo. I mentally waved the loose fitting jeans goodbye as my mouth watered.

Nonna turned to face me and I was surprised to see that her eyes were red-rimmed. Had she been crying?

“Nonna? Are you okay?”

She waved off my question, fixing an impatient look on her face.

“Took you long enough to get here, I thought we could have gotten one more baking lesson in.”

I looked at the clock. It was only ten past eleven. I didn’t know what world she was living in, but there was no recipe in her arsenal that took only ten minutes to put together, except perhaps a glass of water.

“Um, sorry? I mean, I am only about ten minutes late.”

“Well, you could have been here on time.” She gruffed out that answer, ducking her head and turning away from me. She didn’t turn fast enough, though. I caught her wiping away at the moisture that threatened to spill onto her cheeks.

I walked over and wrapped my arms around this amazing woman who had become my grandmother.

“I’m going to miss you, too.”

I heard her sniffle, and felt her body shake with her silent tears. Even now, always the strong one.

“You remember how to log in to your computer and your email, right?” She had purchased a laptop and internet just so that she would be able to email me no matter where we were living at the time. I had spent hours teaching her how to email. It had been frustrating and funny as hell, all at the same time.

“Yes, I remember how to use that blasted contraption.”

“Good. We’ll never lose touch. You’ll always be my nonna.”

Another sniffle, and another hug.

We sat down together in silence, each trying to eat a cannoli. ‘Trying’ because in all honesty, it tasted like paper with all the emotions clogging me up. I picked up my cell phone and snapped a couple of pictures of her. I wanted to make this memory last forever.

I looked at the clock, and realized I had to get moving. It was twelve thirty and the movers were supposed to be at the house by one. I heaved a sigh and looked at her, tears welling in my eyes.

“I love you, Nonna. I’m just going to miss you so much.”

“Don’t you dare say goodbye. We will see each other again, even if I have to come to you.”

I nodded sadly. We probably wouldn’t. But I would tell her the moon was made of ricotta if that would make her happy.

“Now, there’s a young man who is waiting patiently to say goodbye. He asked you to meet him in your spot, whatever that means.”

A small grin poked through the gloom of my sadness. Nick.

I hopped up, grabbing packages of pastries that she handed me, and headed out the back door after giving her a kiss on her powdery cheek.

As I ran down the stairs and turned the corner around the house, I slowed as I heard voices coming from our usually meeting place. The deep tinder of Nick’s voice pulsed through to my core, filling me with warmth. I stood there, smiling, enjoying just the melody of his voice until a chill filled me. I recognized the other voice as Eddie, his cousin who had always been nothing short of feral in our interactions.

“Aw, it’s so sad, isn’t it, Nick? Today you have to say goodbye to your little
girlfriend.
Ha! Little girlfriend, who am I kidding? There’s nothing little about her except for her chance of ever getting laid!” Eddie’s guffaws felt like a kick to my stomach. The physical pain it caused forced a small tear to roll out of the corner of my eye.

“Dude, not cool. Don’t talk about Vic that way. Seriously, she’s really awesome. You totally missed out by being such a dick to her all the time.” Nick’s voice was low and dangerous, sending my roller coaster spirits back up, soaring high into the clouds. No guy had ever defended me.

“She’s got you so whipped, man. You guys will be so perfect for each other. Freakin’ love birds. I can see the wedding invitation. You are invited to the unholy matrimony of Little Nicky and Icky Vicki.”

I heard a thud, and then a low growling voice.

“We’re not freaking love birds, you ass. She’s like, the best friend I’ve ever had. If you ever breathe that love bird crap about us again, you’ll be in the emergency room for a broken jaw.”

I staggered back. One step backwards, then another. I felt something on my legs and didn’t know what it was until I realized I had dropped my boxes of homemade goodies from Nonna and they lay on the ground and splattered up on my legs.

I hung my head, the pain of Nick’s rejection turning into ice. Anger turned into numb.

Numb turned into feeling…nothing.

“Hey, did you hear that? What the hell…”

I turned and ran around the other side of the house. As I turned the corner I looked back for a half of a second, and saw the face of my dear Nonna, looking back at me in sadness. I raised my hand in a half wave, then continued on to home.

I ran into the house and up to the bathroom to take my second shower of the day. I washed away the end. Washed away the hurt. I washed away the remnants of our life here, everything I’d been holding on to.

“Hey honey, you’re back! The movers are working really quickly, so we should be able to be on the road in about an hour.” Mom had cracked the bathroom door as she spoke to me.

“Great! That’s awesome news. Besides, this gives us a chance to reinvent ourselves, right? This is a chance to start fresh, isn’t it?” Even I could hear the mounting hysteria in my voice.

I didn’t wait to hear her answer as I set back to scrubbing my skin almost raw.

As I scrubbed, I washed away more than just the past half hour. I washed away Vicki.

CHAPTER TEN

“Shit.”

I cursed under my breath as the heat from the oven hit me in the face and rolled over my already sweaty body.

Wiping the sweat from my forehead with the back of my arm, I reached into the oven and pulled out my fifteenth batch of chocolate cupcakes.

For a few seconds, I just stood there with my eyes closed. I imagined that my surroundings were a small, cozy bakery on a bustling walking street. Customers would come in with bags from nearby shops, just dying for a taste of one of my Italian specialties. I would watch them roll their eyes back in a total foodgasm as the creamy filling of their cannolis coated their mouths. They would groan in appreciation for the zeppole.

I could see myself decorating a designer cake, with the strawberry lemonade cake recipe that I had perfected. I would be looking in the eyes of an engaged couple in love, sitting across from me, holding hands and feeding each other samples before deciding on their wedding cake flavors.

I could even see Nonna by my side, piping the filling into the cannoli that the customers would be lining up around the block to eat. This was our dream, and we were doing it together.

“Alex, quit your day dreaming and get those cupcakes moving. You’re behind on production.
Again.
”

Sigh.

Once again, all of my dreams were thrown on the back burner as I poured another batch of plain, old, boring chocolate batter into cupcake papers and put them in the oven. Setting the timer, I returned to the ones I had just taken out of the oven and proceeded to remove them from the cupcake pan.

Instead of being a famous Italian style baker, I was working at the SuperMart in town, making about five hundred of the exact same cupcakes every week. I never got to do anything creative. I had tried to whip up some zeppole once, but it went over like a fart in church. You’d have thought I’d tried to feed them rat poison.

I had actually gotten written up for poor performance and insubordination for that one. Well, I probably deserved the insubordination part. When my boss sneered at my beautiful pastries and threw away the batch without taking even a small taste, I told him that he was a soulless asshat who wouldn’t know what a delicious pastry was if it bitch slapped him across the face.

I had to giggle a bit about that one still, remembering how red his face got as I was sent home for the day without pay.

Perhaps I had been stepping just a teensy bit over the line, especially considering that I totally got up in his face, with my hands flying as I let him know his deficiencies as a baker. I knew that I was getting dangerously close to getting fired from this job. I really didn’t care, though. This place had no heart. There was no soul in
any
of the mass produced piles of flour, sugar and egg that they created.

I gathered up the ingredients needed to make the standard chocolate frosting that would be piped onto the cupcakes and started throwing them in the industrial steel bowl. Even the bowl railed against my desire to personalize the bakery experience for her customers. I didn’t bother with measuring cups or spoons anymore, I would know if the frosting was right based on the flavor. Looking around to make sure asshat wasn’t watching, I pulled a softened block of cream cheese from my apron pocket and added it to the mixer.

I smiled to myself, the store wouldn’t miss it, and technically it wasn’t stealing if the merchandise was going to be used for the store. Was it? I felt guilty for about three seconds, but then shook it off. If they actually cared, they would fix the security cameras.

I knew that the store’s security cameras didn’t work worth a shit because I may have gotten a little cozy with the loss prevention dude. Give an acne laden nineteen year old a chance to make out and feel you up, and it was
amazing
the type of information you could get. Clearly, the SuperMart didn’t put enough thought into their hiring efforts.

I grabbed a spoon and took a quick taste of the frosting.

Almost there. Not quite.

Another quick look around the room proved that I was on my own, so I reached for the cinnamon and shook out three quick dashes. One more taste had a grin slowly growing on my face. Yup, that was just right.

I could hear my boss, Lou, coming in from the back before he made his appearance, so I had plenty of time to hide the evidence of my ‘crime’. Yeah, trying to improve upon the mundane recipes that the ‘Mart was pushing out on its customers as ‘gourmet’ was a crime in this small minded place.

I sent up a quick prayer of thanks to whatever baking god was watching out over me today, because Lou was a diabetic with a lactose intolerance. Which meant, quite simply, my work was never actually tested.

I snuck a look at the clock while I started piping the frosting on the cupcakes. Sigh. Only ten o’clock. My shift had started at five, so I still had another three hours before I could blow this hell hole and get ready for my date with Rhine.

Warmth flooded my body and settled in my nasty bits as I thought of Rhine. I had met him at this biker bark in town, and the fact that he rode a Harley and had a crap ton of tattoos made him just about the sexiest guy I’d ever seen. It also didn’t hurt that he had dark, olive toned skin, ink black hair and dark brown eyes that promised danger. Ugh. I had a thing for that look, I wouldn’t even attempt to deny it.

“Alex, that frosting looks a little lighter than normal. Are you sure you followed protocol? We know you have a bit of a rebellious history.” Lou sneered at me, and I had to fight my instinct to both roll my eyes and gag at the way his eyes traveled down my body.

“Yeah, Lou. Followed it to the T. Maybe the new lights are brighter in here so you just see it better. Wanna try a bit?” I scooped up a healthy spoonful of my doctored frosting and held it out to him.

He jumped back about three feet, grabbing his stomach as his face twisted in horror.

“Hell, no. You know I can’t eat that shit. You trying to kill me again?”

As he waddled off to his office, a closet that they built a shelf in and called a desk, I let out a breath I didn’t know I was holding so quickly that it came out as part cough part laugh.

He was always saying that I was trying to kill him. Probably because a month ago I had him try a new concoction, totally ignoring all his stupid dietary restrictions. I wasn’t completely heartless, I just figured he was full of it and being a total drama queen.

I giggled remembering how quickly he ran to the shared bathroom that day. It was still impressive to think that a man that large could move so fast. Apparently, the fear of your stomach exploding all over the place was a motivating factor.

Now, the fact that I had put his headset, the one that allowed all managers to make announcements over the store’s intercom system, next to the door so his gastronomical distress was broadcast to all customers? That was just fun.

Another quick look at the clock brought on another heart heavy sigh as I returned to my task of frosting the cupcakes. Why did time seem to go backwards when I was here? I had thought that being a baker was my dream. Either I was all sorts of in the wrong job or I had glamorized the concept and dream of being a baker so much that nothing was going to meet my expectations. I seriously had no idea. All I
did
know was, this wasn’t it for me. I was pretty certain that I was meant for more than sneaking ingredients into frosting and hoping for the best.

Holding the frosting bag in my hand, I executed the perfect swirl on each cupcake. Three swirls. Not two, not four. Under my breath, I modified parts of “Monty Python: Search for the Holy Grail”.

“
First, shalt thou squeezeth the frosting bag, then thou shalt executeth three swirls, no more, no less. Three shall be the number of swirls you squeezeth, and the number of squeezed swirls shall be three. Four thou shalt not squeeze, neither squeeze thou two, excepting thou continue squeezing a third.”

And yes, I did it in a slightly falsetto British accent. Why? Because I freaking could.

***

Three hours that felt like ten hours later, I strode away from the ‘Mart with my middle finger held high. I adjusted my Coach bag on my shoulder and grinned as I executed a perfect little pirouette and walked away from the place that would surely be my ruin.

Thanks to EBay and Craigslist, I had amassed a lovely collection of used purses. I totally blamed Nonna for this obsession. Each acquisition was photographed and a picture sent to my dear friend, who had moved from Providence to the coastal Massachusetts village of Onset. I snorted a little, these purses, of which I had over twenty, were the only girly thing about me.

I had to laugh at my mom, who had this look of happiness and confusion whenever she came over. Happiness that
something
seemed to have rubbed off, finally. Confusion because the ultra-feminine, often pink purses were in stark contrast to the black clothes, black hair and black boots that I usually wore. I just told mom to consider it a statement piece and get over it.

Mom. I picked up the phone and tapped on the photo of my mom to quick dial. I tried to speak to my parents at least once a week.

The phone rang twice before mom’s breathless voice came on the line.

“Hey, Mom. Please tell me I did
not
interrupt you and dad doing something that you definitely should NOT be doing at your ages.”

A shocked silence and then laughter met my ears from the other side of the phone. I couldn’t help but smile, it had taken a lot of years, but finally mom
got
me and accepted me the way I was…a little twisted and a lot crazy.

“If I felt the need to answer the phone during
that
, then your father obviously isn’t doing it right.”

Ew.

I heard a soft chuckle. I must have accidentally voiced the ‘ew’. Oops.

“You ready for your date with Ryan?”

“Mom, his name is Rhine.”

“Only because he felt that Ryan was too, oh, how did you put it…conforming to social standards set forth upon us by those in power. Isn’t that what you told me about how your boyfriend went from Ryan to Rhine?”

Ugh, when she said it, it just sounded crazy.

“Mom,
Rhine
and I enjoy each other’s company. We don’t feel the need to label ourselves in any way that defines a relationship. We just live in the moment and enjoy
being.
He can call himself whatever he wants. I don’t give a rat’s ass. What matters is we have fun and he’s hot as hell.”

“Glad you have your priorities set straight, sweetie.”

I snorted.

“Always. Hey, where’s dad?”

Mom sighed from the other end of the phone.

“Oh, you know your father. He’s out on the golf course trying to shave a few strokes off of his golf game. I don’t know how my super cool radio jock husband became a yuppy golfer. This is just not right.”

This was a common theme of our conversations since Dad had retired. They moved a few hours away to Savannah, Georgia. Dad loved it because it was somewhere he had never worked. When he went to the grocery store, no one recognized him or his voice. If he was in a pissy mood, he could be a bit of a dick and it didn’t end up on social media.

“Mom, I love you. I don’t know how to tell you this, but someone needs to give you a reality check. The only time Dad’s ever been cool was when the red light was on.” The red light was the ‘on air’ sign that went on outside whatever radio studio he was working at as soon as the microphones were turned on. That was when dad came alive.

“An old lady can dream, can’t she?”

I pictured mom, in her sixties wearing leggings, knee high boots with high heels, an oversized tunic with a belt and some funky, chunky jewelry.

“Mom, you’ll never be an ‘old lady’, no matter what your birth certificate says.”

“Aww, sweetie, thank you! You are my favorite child.”

“Nice try, mom. I’m your only child. Your uterus realized it had attained perfection and shut down after me.”

“Ha! Love you, sweetie. I’ll let your dad know you called.”

“Thanks, Mom, I love you, too.”

As we disconnected I had to smile over the changes in our relationship. I had thought my parents were pretty much out to get me when I was a teen. I’m glad that we had changed things around for the better in my twenties.

The year we moved to Georgia, well, it was pretty freaking hard. Hearing that rat bastard, Nick, talk so callously about me, well, I couldn’t lie. I was messed up big time when we moved here.

I shook my head as I remembered the stupid shit I’d done. I was rebelling big time, and not because I was pissed at my parents. Nope, this time I was grateful that we had moved. My whole life I had hated every move, every box, and every roll of packing tape. This time, I had been grateful for the new city, far away from the pain of my first heartbreak.

I had gotten caught shoplifting at a local drug store, and ended up at the police station. I got caught drinking in a party after using my fake ID when I was nineteen and ended up at the police station, again. My poor parents had received more than their share of two a.m. calls from the local police department. I was just so screwed up in the head, I had no idea who I was or who I really wanted to be, so I started hanging out with the wrong people. I had even gotten caught spray painting graffiti on a local business. I spent about five weeks cleaning that mess up, and then another six completing the community service my parents set me up with before I decided to straighten my own ass up.