Page 61 of Heaven Help Me

She hesitates a little longer, but then her shoulders drop and she opens her mouth. “I got a call from your girl Georgia.” She gives me a deadpan look. I shake my head and motion for her to continue, panic starting to flare in my gut. She and I both know Georgia is not “my girl,” so I don’t bother taking the bait.

“Anyway, she said from my bloodwork, it looks like I might be experiencing…”

I lean in because I didn’t catch that last word. “Experiencing what?”

“Perimenopause!” Valentina whisper-shouts it right in my face.

I jerk my head back. “Oh. Okay.”

I study her, trying to take my cues from her reaction because I don’t know the first thing about menopause, peri or otherwise. She fidgets with her phone, zipping and unzipping the pocket where she has it tucked away.

“Is that…a bad thing?” Why do I feel like I’m stepping my way through a minefield with my eyes blindfolded?

Valentina huffs and paces in front of the pullup bar. “I don’t know! But she said it might explain my panic attacks and that I need to see a doctor for further care.”

I step closer, halting her pacing. “So, is that what’s been bothering you this week? That you need to go see a doctor?”

“No!” Valentina swipes her forehead, clearly agitated. “It’s the idea of menopause that has me freaking out. Like, what do I want to do before I’m old and useless? Even your dad asked me what I want out of life and I couldn’t answer him. What kind of woman reaches menopausal age and doesn’t know what she wants?”

I take a tentative step forward across the minefield. “Probably a lot of them? I mean, everyone is faced with these questions at some point in their life. I don’t think it’s weird to be questioning what you want out of life. Everybody should.” I reach out and put my hand on her shoulder. “But what makes you think being older makes you useless? Look at my father. He’s old. Do you find him useless?”

Valentina’s eyes fill with tears and I watch as she dashes them away angrily. “No. I love Marcel. He’s lovely and exactly who I’d want for a father if I could choose.”

I squeeze her shoulder. “Exactly, so why do you think you’re becoming useless, just because your body’s not producing certain hormones like it used to?”

She holds my gaze and I see the answer there. We both say it at the same time.

“Bettina.”

“Okay.” I step back from her, the injustice of what’s been done to Valentina over the years making me angry. And if I’m honest with myself, I feel partially responsible. I left her in that environment at seventeen, never coming back to check on her or to perhaps be a good influence when she had none. “Let’s put all the Bettina, mob-boss, crime-family bullshit on the table.”

Valentina wrinkles up her nose. “What are you talking about?”

I duck down and pick her up in a fireman’s carry. She yelps and beats her fists on my back as I walk us over to the kiddie playground. I don’t put her down until we’re at the top of the tower with a view of the whole park. Our options are going back down that ladder, sliding down the fireman’s pole, or going down the slide. For now, I invite her to sit next to me on the edge of the platform, our legs swinging. Thankfully, she does without arguing with me.

“You need to go through the reprogramming my father did with me every fall when I came home from summer vacation in New York. He’d take me to the park and we’d shoot hoops while he talked me through all the things I’d seen or done living with Bettina. He set me straight right there on the court, not disparaging Bettina but also not letting me carry her bullshit beliefs into the rest of my life.”

Valentina bumps me gently with her shoulder. “Your father’s a badass.”

“I know,” I say softly. “You didn’t have a Marcel. So let me be that for you. No one’s here but you and me. Get it all out there.”

Valentina sucks in a deep breath and straightens her spine. Her gaze is focused on the copse of trees on the far end of the park, but I doubt she even sees them. She’s too focused on her past.

“Let’s see. Old people are useless because they get physically weak and lose their power. You have to be even more ruthless to combat the supposed frailty. Trusting people is stupid and could potentially get you killed so don’t ever do that. Love is for saps who don’t have the balls to do what needs doing. Respect, earned through following up on threats, is currency and something to be sought after. Oh, and the Feds suck.”

My laugh is a bit pathetic. “Feds do suck.”

Valentina joins in, though I can hear the sadness in her tone. “That’s about the only belief in there that doesn’t make my chest ache.”

“Because all the other ones are cold and ruthless and straight from Bettina’s playbook.” I turn to look at her. “Have you always felt this way about mob life?”

She tilts her head, thinking. “Honestly, no. But for the last ten years or so? Yes.”

“Wow. You stayed a long time after you stopped believing in it. What made you stay?” I left the second I was an adult and could make my own decisions.

“Bettina adopted me, Deuce. Kept me from being yet another kid in the system.”

“You were just a child when she adopted you. That doesn’t mean you owe her your whole life. You can be grateful and still choose your own path.”