Tug-at-your-heartstrings new adult first love story.
What starts as a bet to avoid cleanup duties at her minimum wage cashier job, wins Amelie D'Amico more than she's ever hoped for.
When Ben, a cute customer who always checkouts at her register, fi...
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After the first text on my birthday a week ago, I wake up to one from my mother every morning. Today isn't an exception. "Amélie, I understand I may be asking a lot. I know I've failed you as a parent and that your father had to clean up the mess I've made of things. I'm sorry, I wasn't there for you, but I'm working on myself. My therapist thinks we should talk. I think so too, so I'm not going to give up. I only want to talk. Please. I love you. Mom."
I don't know how she finds a new thing to say in every one of them. I scroll through her messages; the hollow feeling inside my chest doesn't allow me to simply delete them. I read each and every one and open up the photos she sends. Yesterday it was a photo of a five-year-old me by a giant rock on the beach when I was her only child, and she still invited me for yearly trips to stay with her in France.
Every moment of my summer exploits with Mom used to be magical and the longing to spend more time in a country half of me was part of never lessened. Even everything with Mom hadn't dulled my desire to escape and reinvent myself. France didn't belong to my mother. I have every right to build a life there without her invitation.
Chicago has become my prison, where I'm in solitary confinement. The sad memories—doctors' appointments, chemo sessions, tests, scans, and me holding Dad's hand through it all as he dwindled away before my eyes—overwrite the glowing memories. Images of the years spent laughing with him and Nonna, them spoiling me, their little Principessa, rotten only remind me what's been taken away.
Nonna's aneurysm was too abrupt. "No time to say goodbye", I complained to my father. How I regretted thinking that in the months I spent watching the disease turn my gentle and funny Dad into a dull echo of his former self. The noises of the city I used to love serve as a reminder of him coding in the back of an ambulance. Stranded, suspended, surrounded. Trying and failing to get through crowds of drunk people in Leprechaun hats singing Irish pub songs along the Chicago River dyed vomit green. The unbridled celebration of life outside the ambulance oblivious to the horror of death I had to confront inside.
After his funeral, everything was on me: clear out his apartment, deal with the mountain of paperwork death brought with it. I woke up to how expensive trying to beat cancer was. A student with no income I used the cushy savings from the sale of my grandparents' restaurant, and there are still crushing debts. The only job I could find to fit around grad school was as a cashier.
Mom was MIA in France the whole time.
Reading her message, I have an urge to yell at her. Tell her I don't need her. I've managed this far without her. I waited my whole childhood hoping for the invitation from Mom to take me to live with her full time. It never came. She got married, had two new kids she actually wanted and over time stopped talking to me. I survived.
She missed her chance. Too little, too late. Don't need her now, didn't need her then. She's not my parent. No need for me to keep in touch with a random woman faking remorse to weasel back into my life at her convenience. I'm done playing her games. I will the tears away, blow my runny nose, and text her back.
Me: i'm glad you regret your choices. you were your own highest priority, and you said no to seeing me one too many times. if you want something from me, then you better forget about it. i'm not in the mood to be charitable. it's my turn to say no. so, no, i won't talk to you.
I re-read the message and click send. I sound like a bitch. So what. She was one first, so it seems like the appropriate response. I shove the phone under my pillow, grab my laptop and the two books I have to finish, and get out of my bedroom. Hundreds of pages on marriage rituals in medieval France aren't going to read themselves.
***
"How long have you been up for?" Angie's voice startles me.
"What time's it?" I stretch and shift for the first time since I sat down.
"It's past noon. I'm surprised you're in your PJs."
"Trying to finish the homework and free up time for you to officially collect on your bet.
"What? Which one?"
"Mr. Sweatpants talked to me. We had a proper conversation, and I'm ready to endure 'Pitch Perfect'."
"Yippee!" Angie runs around the living room and sings "Gonna Fly Now"—the Rocky movies' theme song.
"Yeah, yeah, another win for team Angie. Now let me finish this, so I can focus on my defeat and watch that movie for the gazillionth time."
Still singing, Angie retreats into the bathroom.
The copy of the manuscript from the cathedral of Bordeaux, which narrates the ritual of the archdiocese in 1460, doesn't come with a translation into modern French. Even with two semesters of Latin, it takes me hours to decipher the mixture of Latin and local French dialect it uses.
"Io te esposy, molher." The words come out of my mouth, sounding more Italian than French. I blame Nonna's influence. "I marry you, wife."
"What are you talking about?" Angie reappears and rummages for food in the fridge.
"Nothing. School stuff." I shut the laptop and put the books away.
"Why do we have raw salmon?"
Angie doesn't cook. She can warm things up on the stove or microwave or bake a frozen pizza, but even that happens once in a blue moon.
"It was supposed to be a surprise for you." I pick up the styrofoam tray with fish wrapped in cling wrap and pull it out of the fridge. "I'm going to cook."
Angie gawks, eyes wide in mock wonder. "Is there a camera here? Are you pranking me?"
"Shush. If you want to eat, you better stop your comments on my cooking skills."
"What cooking skills?"
I stick out my tongue at Angie and nudge her out of the kitchen.
The recipe Ben gave me is detailed, but Angie is right. Any cooking skills I might've possessed died with my Nonna seven years ago. I kick the sadness out of my head and remember the glowing warmth of Nonna's kitchen, the smells of my favorite foods she spoiled me with, and pretend I know what I'm doing.
Why are there so many bones in this thing? I should've bought the cleaned pre-cut fillets. I hack at the soft fish but can't cut through the skin. Have we ever sharpened these knives? What is kosher salt? I don't know what I'm doing. My rosy memories of helping Nonna must be a lie, an inversion of what really happened.
I push the button of the coffee-grinder, as if the hardness of my touch determines the final result. I flip the machine on its lid, slide the body of it up, and watch the fine grounds transfer into the lid. The warm bitterness wafting off the dark roast brings more snippets of happy mornings with Nonna. At least I'm good at grinding coffee. Onto combining the main ingredients. Rubbing the brown powder on the fish feels more like squishing lumps than a dusting but it's ready for sauteing.
Angie and I are salivating by the time it's done. The aroma that fills the apartment will make a dead person drool. We eat the first piece straight from the pan, curious about the combination. The coffee adds a rich earthy flavor to the sweetness of the fish. The crispy crust contrasts with soft pink flesh. This is not the best thing I've ever eaten but it's more than good. There are no leftovers, and Angie is ready to collect her prize.
We watch the movie twice. Back-to-back. I might never understand Angie's obsession with it, but a bet is a bet, and I'm not a sore loser.
