“Besides you, you mean.” Caterina smiles too, but it doesn’t quite reach her eyes.
I remember her as a constant source of brightness. The one who lit up a room with her attitude and her kind heart. Every kid in math club had the hots for Caterina, and even Mr. Jackson, the grumpiest teacher in our entire high school, would soften a little whenever he addressed her.
But something has changed. She isn’t quite as brilliant, as if her shine has been rubbed away, a diamond that forgot how to sparkle. There are dark smudges underneath her eyes that weren’t there the last time I saw her. If I’m honest, she looks… sad.
“Hey,” I say, taking her hands. “Are you okay?”
She nods, forces a smile and mentally shakes herself. “Yeah, I’m great. But what about you? What’s new with you, Sara?” I recognize a distraction when I hear one, but I keep it to myself.
“Sara was just about to tell us her super-romantic engagement story,” Halle says with a good-natured grin.
Caterina gapes. “You’re engaged?”
I waggle my fingers at her, and she examines the diamond with wide eyes. “Holy smokes, Sara. That’s some ring! I know a good chiropractor. You’re going to need it, carrying this rock around on your hand the whole time.”
I shake my head and laugh. “Okay, it’s not that big.” I mean, it is, but I don’t want to come across as big-headed about it. Romeo could’ve bought me a cubic zirconia and I’d still be the happiest woman in the world.
“It’s gorgeous. Congratulations. So,” Caterina says. “Spill the beans! I want to hear all about it.”
I blush. “It’s really not that big a deal…”
“Oh, she’s being modest,” Mary cuts in because she already heard the story when I asked for some time off to go to Hawaii. “It’s romantic as hell. Tell them, Sara.”
Glancing around the room at their excited faces, I can’t help smiling. “Okay. Well. He took me to the beach where we had our first and second date. Elio let us stay in one of the houses they have there on the Shore. It was so romantic, covered in fairy lights, and they hired a chef to cook us a gourmet meal…”
“Elio… Rossi?” Caterina asks.
I nod. “Yes. Romeo works for them.”
“Oh,” she says in a small voice. She knows all about the Rossi family, of course, with her family connections and all, which means that she knows exactly the type of work that Romeo does for them.
I’m not ashamed of the man I fell in love with or what he does. Romeo works hard, harder than anyone else I know, and he’s moving up in the organization. So, I’m kinda stung by her reaction. Caterina De Luca of all people has no right or reason to look down upon people like Romeo Andretti, so I’m hoping that I’m mistaken. She clearly has a lot going on right now, and it isn’t entirely her fault that we didn’t stay in touch when she went to college.
“Yeah. Anyway,” I continue. “The Shore. The house. After, we go for a walk on the beach and he’s nervous as hell, his hand is shaking, and he isn’t saying much.”
I remember how Romeo looked as we walked down the boardwalk together, him in his leather jacket, black pants, and a crisp white shirt, and me in a white halter-neck dress.
“He kept pulling me toward something on the beach, and I didn’t know what it was, and then I realized that it was a picnic blanket all laid out with champagne, and roses, and chocolates that he made himself.”
“Goddammit,” Halle mutters under her breath. “This girl gets all the luck. A diamond bigger than her faceanda guy who can make chocolate.”
“So…” I suppress a cheesy grin. Elio helped him make the chocolate truffles, but I’m not about to tell Caterina this given her reaction to the Rossi name. “We get to the blanket and it’s a little way from the main boardwalk so it’s all quiet, and he fills two crystal flutes with champagne, and we clink them together. Then I sit back against him, and we look up at the stars.”
It’s a slightly edited version. Romeo and I made love on that blanket, trying hard to remain incognito, so we didn’t get caught. But there’s no way I’m sharing that with them either.
“And then he asked me to marry him under the stars. And I said yes of course!” I beam.
They clap and squeal and hug me tightly. Halle and Mary know Romeo—he meets me every day when I finish work and always brings them flowers or candy or magazines, something to make them smile.
But Caterina isn’t quite so exuberant. “It’s a beautiful story, Sara.” She pauses. “Do you love him?”
The question catches me off-guard. It’s the last thing I expected her to ask. I thought we knew each other well enough in high school to understand that we would never settle for anything less than what we feel we deserve. Neither of us.
“I do.”
I don’t even need to consider my answer. Romeo stole my heart, and I’d gladly give it to him over and over for the rest of my life. But my story feels a little tainted now, and I don’t like myself for thinking this, but I wish she hadn’t come into the salon when she did.
“I really do.”
