CARMELO
One month later.
It's been thirty days, seven hundred and twenty hours, forty-three thousand two hundred minutes, two million, five hundred ninety-two thousand seconds of April.
And the guilt still tasted the same. It grappled my heart so hard. And how do I ever look at them the same ever again? I simply had no answer.
"Thank you for coming here with me. I couldn't tell Marco as he is extremely busy nowadays." Laura uttered, holding and pressing my arm as we stood side by side. Marco was indeed busy as he was working on reestablishing the remainder of his family fortune into a single business corporation and not a Mafia group anymore. I have been helping him with a few things. But he was smart himself and already had things planned out beforehand with her sister.
"It's nothing." I smiled at her. The strongest woman I had come to know. She placed the flower on the gravestone. I did the same and then we both stood there, deep in our heads. The cold wind sang in the air. I leaned down and adjusted the scarf around her neck. She wrapped her hand around my back and I on her shoulder. Both silently looking at the name and the picture on the grave.
"I'm sorry, Laura." I uttered after a while.
"You have said that a million times already, Carmelo."
I sucked in a breath. "And it still doesn't feel enough."
She patted my back, "You did what you had to do to protect us. Let it go." She uttered and I couldn't stop wondering from what soil this woman was made up of. Some people go straight to heaven without getting judged.
"Have you forgiven me?" I asked. "I have. Let's move past it, son." I glanced at her and looked back at the gravestone. We stayed there for a while before returning to the hospital. Where my family decided to give us a surprise visit. It's been a week since they last were here. I told them not to camp inside her hospital room, especially my Mama, who couldn't stop crying whenever she watched her.
Mama and Papa shared the same couch and Celia sat alone with a bouquet of flowers, scrolling on her phone. She was always on her phone. Our parents greeted each other. Celia came to hug me. I leaned down and pressed my lips on her forehead. "You look like a zombie, Melo." She said.
I ruffled her hair, "Good morning to you too, princess." She swatted my hand, "You're lowkey annoying. I spent an hour straightening my hair." She pouted and went to greet Laura next, beaming.
"Hi auntie."
"Hi, dear. I see your hair has improved." Laura touched her hair, and she leaned to her touch with a giggle. I scoffed. "I did exactly what you told me and look, my hair is lit. All the girls are losing their minds at school. They think it's some expensive hair product. Duh. If only they asked and then I would've told them that it was some herbals. Anyway, you are a GOAT auntie, period." She said all that in one sentence.
Our parents laughed while I shook my head. The two of them shared a couch, conversing about her new hair routine. Celia had developed this crazy obsession of wanting silk hair after seeing Laura's hair. And since then, that was all they were talking about whenever she came to the hospital. And honestly, I loved it for both of them. They were healing each other's traumas by keeping each other busy.
I entered the sectioned part of the hospital room. Where my heartbeat was laying, unconscious. It smelt like citrus as the air purifier on the bedside released the steam, a refreshing fragrance. Looking at her chest rising and falling on the hospital bed was like a breath of fresh air to me. The machine beeped stably. I exhaled and went to the washroom to wash my hands. I then sat on the edge of her bed after a while, pulling the covers up until the lower of her chin.
"Hey, love. I'm back." I leaned down and smooched her cheeks, which was now my daily routine. I changed the flowers on the bedside table with the fresh ones that Celia brought. Chiara was shot on her abdomen that day. The bullet fortunately, missed damaging any of her fatal organs but it has surely caused a significant blood loss. Which led to her prolonged coma.
The day she was operated on, things got very horrifying as she had lost so much blood. I lost my mind if you can't already tell. Thank God Junior was there to hold me back. The doctors said it was a miracle that she was still alive. They had to re-stitch her shoulder wound as well. I haven't left the hospital ever since. Laying on a couch, watching her. Day and night.
The fact that I had to witness a second time of her being in a life-threatening condition, made me want to protect her even more. And I would do that with my life. My little miracle. I smiled, grazing her cheek with the back of my hand.
"We went to see Luca with your mother today. She said she had forgiven me." I sucked in a sharp breath, taking her hand in mine. "I'm sorry, sweetheart." I pressed my lips on her knuckles.
"I missed you." My head hung low, tears trickling down. "Please come back to me already. I'm so impatient and desperate to feel you kissing or holding me back whenever I do. I really do." I had to constantly remind myself that she wasn't going to die. That she was strong. That if she goes, I was following her to whatever the hell that was. I blinked more tears, pressing my forehead with my free hand. After a while, I got up from the bed, tucked her in properly, placed a kiss on her forehead, shut the glass door and returned to the sitting room.
"Where is she?" I asked, sitting where Celia had just been. "Her friends called her. They were meeting for bowling or so she said." I stared at my father. "And you let her go?"
"It's just bowling with friends, Melo."
"Well, what if it is some male friends?"
"Her bodyguard is with her, for God's sake." Mama butt in.
I sighed, pulled out my phone, and texted Storm to check with her bodyguard. These people had no idea how messy the world was out there. It wasn't her. It was the people she was going around with. Next thing we'd heard was her partying with some bunch of drug smoking idiots. "Excuse me, Laura. Get used to my overprotective bull over there." Mama said.
Laura shook her head. "He is just like my Chiara with her siblings. I believe they just want what's best for them." Laura said. I smile at her, "Exactly." At least some people understood me. It was refreshing hearing we had something logical in common, me and my woman. Mama clicked her tongue.
"How is she doing?" Asked Papa, leaning back on the couch. There were three coffee cups and a box of tissues on the table between us. "The doctor said her condition has improved a lot and that she might wake up anytime soon." I replied, pocketing the phone after seeing the picture which Celia's bodyguard had just sent me. They were bowling, all girls.
"She is so strong." Mama uttered, her lips lifting as she looked at the sectioned area where Chiara was. "She is. And she has always been that way. It was unfortunate that we had to end up with Antonio." Laura placed down the cup, her face distant.
"How did that happen if I may ask?"
"Mama!"
"Honey!" We both called her out at the same time. She shrugged, "What? I'm just curious."
Laura chuckled and spoke. "That's okay. It is an unpleasant story, but I might as well let it out of my chest." I pressed my temples. My mother would always be in her best form, even when she shouldn't be.