Slowburn

Chapter 55

        I haven't seen Renzo in two days and it is a good thing. I was let off the hook on working Friday night since Dante and I had to wait for someone to come fix my door. Saturday and Sunday went off with a breeze, because aside from being ambushed by questions from the girls when I first walked in about Gabriele, I was otherwise left alone. 

The only thing I've noted and this is the third time now, is that Pandora seems a bit off lately. She masks it, but something in the eyes tells me something's up. I wasn't sure who to bring it up to besides herself and I wasn't there yet. Everyone has a few off days, but if I see this again on Wednesday I wanna talk to her. 

I should probably mention that when I walked in on Saturday night the office was completely different. New furniture and a brand new laptop. Even the frame on the wall was different. 

I knew why. The girls told me all about Renzo flipping out. I know they're whispering about me now and wondering what's going on there, but surprisingly no one has asked me outright yet, except for the time Teagan teased me.

        I wasn't able to facetime with my family yesterday because there was some feast they'd gone to involving the church. We had our call today instead, and I spent five of those minutes talking to my niece about her crayons. 

Apparently my brother bought her new crayons, but they aren't the normal crayons because they have different shades of pinks and blues. It's the big pack, so she showed me every pink crayon she owned, and kept making my brother read off the name of each one because she likes that. 

He'd been watching tv off to the side, and she was on his lap and kept saying, 'dada, name?' and he'd read something like 'princess peach', and Mya would turn to me and say 'this one is princess peach' like I hadn't just heard for myself. 

She's very cute though. She talks a lot for her age. People don't believe she is two. Of course she couldn't speak as clearly as I had just translated our conversation, but that was the gist of it.

        I miss my family a lot and with the tip money I earned the night of the private party I was starting to save up to buy a ticket to visit home soon. I didn't let Gabriele pay for our time in the hotel because I am no prostitute, but he'd thrown down a few hundreds when I had first gotten there. I had never picked it up, so at the end of the night Raquel collected it for me and told me that's my rightful cut for entertaining him on the premises. 

Felt weird but I did take it. It's a bit pricey to fly to Nola right now because of all the music festivals coming up, so I am just saving it aside for now.

       My mind wandered to Friday's conversation with Dante while he had been here with me waiting for the door to be fixed. I knew Renzo sent him. I had said something like, "Your cousin has control issues." Dante looked at me with a serious expression and said, "He might not know how to properly show it, but he's hurting right now." 

That stuck with me all weekend. Why was he hurting? He has no rights to me. He's the one who sleeps with everybody, but when I do it I am made to feel guilty. 

I didn't like it, but some small part of me did feel bothered that I had angered him that much. That his anger might not have entirely been anger, but a misplaced way of showing me he was jealous in a way that hurt him, not just angered him. 

        When I was informed Renzo was in jail I had gasped about it, but Dante said, "He might be better off in a locked cage right now...for everyone's safety." Dante was the one I called when Renzo stormed out of my apartment talking about murder. He'd been out looking for him, and then he'd gotten the call from jail.