You Broke Me First

The Sun After the Storm... Hopefully

*Sofia's point of view*

I couldn't help but feel like artwork in a museum sitting in this room. Even though Elio was everyone's main concern, I could feel the tension between Luciano and me, which was creating awkwardness between everyone else in the room. Everyone knows how weird it is for us to be in the same room, but no one saying anything, therefore makes me feel like I just wanna crawl into a ball and hide.

Even though Luciano is clearly still mad at me, seeing him for the first time in months sent butterflies throughout my entire body. I don't remember being such a blithering idiot, but when I looked at him, I lost the ability to speak. I figured it out a few minutes later, but it was still really embarrassing, not to mention I spilled coffee on myself.

Enough about me and my idiocy, because I need to mention how different Luciano is. Not only physically, but he seems like a whole different person. He's clearly been working out a lot, and it may be a terrible time for me to notice something like that, seeing as he has literally been shot, but even though his clothes and all the gauze, I could tell how muscular he was.

Except... he seems empty almost. I feel the same way, but that's because I am the one who ruined everything. He should be fine by now, he should have moved on. When I look at him, I just wanna walk up to him and run my fingers through his hair, pushing his head back to face mine. Kissing him. His lips, his neck, the tattoos running down to his chest, towards his arms. I hope the emptiness he's feeling is just temporary, unlike mine. It's constant. All the time. Every second of every day. I hope he's only like this because of what's going with Elio. And more than that, I hope Elio is okay, so no one feels this pain anymore. So he can make all of us laugh, so he can make fun of us for being worried, so he can... come back to us.

I looked down at my hands, playing with my fingers. I pulled the rings on and off, trying to distract myself from everything going on around me. I felt my tears dripping down onto my hands every few seconds, as I cried silently, trying to avoid any more attention. I was clearly failing though, because every time I glanced at the corner where Luciano was sitting, he was glancing at me as well. I couldn't read his emotions though, because of how void of them he was. The only time he was clearly upset was when he looked at Elio. He cried earlier and it broke my heart. I have never seen Luciano cry, as long as I've known him. But then again, everything else that happened today was out of the norm as well.

"Have you called mom and dad?" Asked Luciano quietly, breaking the silence. Ella looked up at him and shook her head 'no'. "Good. Don't. Not until we know more, it'll just worry them and they can't do anything from Rome anyways." She nodded. It made sense, but I would kill my children if they kept something like this from me. But I would do the same thing they're doing right now.

Izabella's phone started ringing, so she excused herself and stepped outside to take it. Luciano was still glancing over at me, and I guess Ella noticed the stare he was giving me. I watched her roll her eyes, as I looked back down.

"Oh, get over it Luciano, she's here for Elio," said Ella, causing me to almost jump out of my skin. I shot my head up and looked at Ella, wide-eyed. I can't believe she said that. I looked at Luciano who looked at me, then back at Ella. He took a deep breath in and then sighed. I felt my face burning up, probably bright red from embarrassment.

"Thank you... For that, Ella" he said, running his hand through his hair. I cleared my throat, catching both of their attention. I spoke as lightly as I could while still being understandable.