I pulled up along the curb in front of the Agnelli house and turned off the engine. Both of us sat there until we watched the front door open and Maria came bounding down the stairs. The moment Peter was out of the car, she jumped into his arms, wrapping her legs around him like a spider monkey. The siblings laughed as they hugged and Peter kissed the side of her head. “Good to see you, too.”
“You can’t leave again. It sucks so much when you’re not here,” she complained. Silvio barking commands echoed from somewhere deep inside the house. “He’s such an asshole. I can’t wait until my birthday so I can get the hell out of here. I don’t know how much more I can take, Bubby.”
My heart melted a little for him, hearing her call him by the nickname he used to despise. Even if, by some chance, the fire between us smoldered and died out in time, I knew as I watched the two of them hold on to one another like a lifeline, he was making the right move by coming home. Not for me and Sophia, but for himself and the connection he’d created to one of his siblings.
“I’m here,” he whispered over and over, smoothing a hand over her hair. “I’m not going anywhere. And you’ll always have a place with us.”
He looked to me for confirmation, and I nodded. I’d told him on the drive I wanted him to think of my place asourplace from now on. Eventually, I hoped to add his name to the mortgage, but that wasn’t a decision to be taken lightly, and I hadn’t even mentioned it to him yet. Merging our lives to that extent was a huge commitment, and I didn’t want him to feel rushed or pressured.
“Are you going to come in or just give the neighbor’s something to talk about, prancing around in the front yard?” Silvio hollered. Both Peter and Maria stiffened, so I stepped closer to them, placing a hand on each of their shoulders.
“Don’t let him get to you,” I said quietly. “He’s always been a hard man to deal with, and right now, he’s still reeling from losing your mama. Give him a chance.”
I couldn’t believe I was trying to convince them to cut Silvio some slack, but it wouldn’t do anyone any good for them to walk into the house with their defenses up. If Silvio felt threatened, he’d get nasty; we’d all seen that happen more times than we could count.
When I tried maintaining distance, Peter sidestepped, lacing his fingers with mine. I glanced down at our linked hands and then up to see him smiling at me. He leaned his head against my shoulder. “We’re in this together, right?”
“Always.”
Silvio sneered at us before turning to lead us into the house. He motioned for us to take a seat in the formal living room. Nothing had changed since the last time I’d been in their home nearly a decade earlier. The high-backed couch with its gaudy floral print and stuffed to the point the cushions barely moved when you sat on them was still a few feet into the room facing the fireplace. The wing-backed chair we used to call Silvio’s throne was still perpendicular to the couch, his reading glasses folded on the end table next to it alongside a glass of amber liquid dripping with condensation. The fact he’d been drinking already didn’t give me hope for the direction tonight would go.
“Maria, this doesn’t concern you,” he scolded her when she tried to sit on the other side of Peter. She leaned back, crossing her arms tightly over her chest. Sensing the impending fight, Peter leaned in and whispered something in her ear. She stood and left the room, giving Silvio a death glare the entire way. “Lucia called Gianna and told her it would be for the best if she didn’t come over tonight. Whatever you have to say is between you and me, we don’t need to involve anyone else in our business.”
He looked directly at me as he spoke, obviously expecting me to bow to his subtle hint and leave the room as well. Too bad for him I wasn’t his child and didn’t have to abide by his rules. If he’d been drinking, there was no way in hell Peter was facing him alone. To show him how serious I was, I took Peter’s hand in mine and rested them on my knee.
“Freddieismy business, and that’s what I wanted to talk to you about,” Peter told him. Every thread of uncertainty he’d shared with me earlier seemed to have vanished, and he sat straighter on the couch. “I’m moving in with Freddie and wanted you to know.”
“How can this be? What did you do to him when he was so gracious to allow you to stay in his home?” I stiffened at the accusatory tone in Silvio’s voice, resenting the implication I was so weak I could be swayed into liking dick if I was as straight as I’d always led everyone to believe I was.
“I didn’t do anything to him.” Peter slid his hand out of mine, resting his elbows on his knees as he leaned forward, maintaining eye contact with his father the entire time. “I don’t have to tell you anything about Freddie’s and my personal business, but know thatheis the one who did everything for me. He is the man who proved that I’m worthy of being loved and that not everyone here sees me as an abomination. He accepts me for who I am and isn’t trying to make me fit into a life I don’t want.”
“And he’s worth you throwing away everything you used as reasons you couldn’t come home when your family needed you?” Silvio shot back. His nostrils flared as he dug his fingers into the padded arms of his chair. Seeing his jaw clench made me a bit queasy, remembering the temper he showed whenever Peter dared talk back to him as a child. “You had no problem turning your back on your family because of your silly little whims, but now you’re coming back. For what? For a man who, the last I heard, was still married to a woman? How is that supposed to work?”
“Quite well, thank you.” I hid my laughter behind a cough at Peter’s quick retort, praying he didn’t choose this moment to explain my bisexuality to his father. “The only reason I came over here was so you didn’t hear that I’d moved back through the rumor mill. I wanted to give you the respect of hearing it directly from me.
“My hope is that we can eventually work through our differences and you’ll realize I’m a good man. I know I’m not what you dreamed of in a son and I know you believe I let you down, but I did what I had to in order to live.”
Peter’s voice cracked, and he wiped a tear from his eye. Not giving a damn what Silvio thought, I slid my hand over his back, fitting him against my side. “I love you and it killed me to tell you I couldn’t run the bakery, but believe me when I say I would’ve failed you even more if I’d tried. I wasn’t cut out for that life. And then we’d be in an even worse place because you’d have watched me destroy everything you worked for your entire life. The bakery wasyourdream, Papa, not mine. Can you see that?”
“What I see is an empty storefront every time I run errands.” Silvio was still angry, but his tone had softened a bit. “Every day, it’s a reminder that all my work, as you put it, was for nothing. There is no legacy to be carried on, only memories that fade with time. Someday, another shop will open in that space, and then there will be nothing.”
I almost opened my mouth to tell him that was on him; if he hadn’t been such a misogynistic asshole, he could’ve turned the bakery over to Lucia and it would’ve been a rousing success. She now worked for a small bakery a few towns over and they were thriving, all because of the recipes she’d learned from the jackass who couldn’t let go of his disappointment in Peter.
Rather than continue the fight, Peter stood, turning to me. “I’ve said what I came to say. Let’s go get Sophia and go home.”
Just as we’d walked into the house, we walked out hand-in-hand. A united front, rising to meet whatever challenges we faced in life.
Epilogue
Freddie
One year later
I wipedthe sweat from my brow after setting down the last box. How the three of us had accumulated so much crap I’d never know, but we were finally home. I met Peter at the curb, opening the passenger’s door for Mama. She’d graciously offered to entertain Sophia while all the brothers, plus a few extra hands, loaded the truck at the townhouse and followed us to the cute split-level ranch home we’d closed on last week.
When I thought about adding Peter’s name to the mortgage on the townhouse, it never felt right. Sure, it was the first home I’d purchased, the place where I’d raised my daughter for the first six years of her life, but there were also bad memories lurking in the shadows. It took sitting down and sharing my concerns with Mama for me to see the solution.
“My boy, you need a home that’s yours. A place you pick out together because it’s where you see yourself raising your family,” she told me.
