Page 58 of Hesi-Dating
Bruno said, “The damned loan shark was on the front lawn waving a knife like Julia Child on crack. Scared the neighbors. He thought I was Marino. The dude actually believed he was scaring me. He wants his money tomorrow or Marino can kiss his ass goodbye."
"Son of a…" Junior glanced up at me. His eyes gleamed as if super excited to hear a bad word. Maya had warned me when I started last month that his keen ears picked up forbidden words too well. So, I was careful. Most of the time. "Motherless goat," I finished.
"Got into a texting fest with Amber between all three of us. Just a heads up that it's on the menu for dinner tonight."
"The texting is on the menu?"
"Joley! Be serious. Discussing Marino's newest fuck up is tonight's topic. Be home by six. We'll make dinner. I'll distract Amber at first but then I'm sure she's going to have a burr up her ass about this one. I do."
My phone dinged again. In desperation, my heart turned over and stomach clenched with my first thought it'd be from Seth. It never was. He'd kept silent. The text was some sort of junk ad. I knew his silence was best to avoid heartache and further pain for myself and to keep him safe from Nosh. But the longer I heard nothing, the more of a jittery, insecure mess I became. I went through every day checking texts and emails with pitiful desperation. Even after several weeks, I still cyberstalked his social posts, even though I knew he wasn't the one doing them. Worst of all, I didn't want to even think about resuming my old life of first dates and one-nighters.
* * *
Holding Amber's hand like Bruno was escorting her into a Victorian dining room, he led her into the kitchen. She was late getting home so we'd kept the pasta warm. Spaghetti wasn't much but none of us were gourmet chefs. Maybe chef school could be my next schooling attempt. Probably a bad idea since I didn't have a very adventurous palate.
All of us were exhausted from our day jobs. Marino had been quiet since I got home. Bruno remained in his corner as if the boys had already had as much arguing as they could take before fists came out.
I could push Marino for details, but they'd come out soon enough. I didn't care to get angry. It had happened and now we would deal with it.
Marino and I claimed our seats at the round kitchen table. I poured red wine into glasses we’d picked up from a garage sale a few months ago. The set had the name of an opera house across them, but they were high class compared to plastic cups.
Marino spooned noodles and red sauce onto each plate. He doused his pasta in a mountain of Parmesan cheese and broke off pieces of French bread to put on each plate. His overt politeness kept his guilt heavy in the air around him.
Guilt swamped me too. I still hadn't told Amber or Bruno that I was about to fail out of dental school. My third try at pharmacology wasn't going any better than the last two. Marino knew. He and I were the screwups of the family.
"Come here." Amber pulled Marino into a hug, which he fell into. She was our mother figure, our savior, our financier, and our ass kicker when needed.
"I’m sorry you’re in this mess again." Amber let go and sat down. "Tell me what happened."
Marino pressed his lips together as he resumed his seat next to me. He wouldn’t make eye contact with anyone. I squeezed his arm for support. His crystal-blue eyes filled with gratitude when they met mine. Their color was a stark contrast to his brown face and dark, curly hair. He’d decided to start growing in some facial hair to age himself since he'd stopped aging at around twenty and got tired of getting carded at clubs. His beautiful face got him far more female attention than he could handle. A few years back, after doing one of those genetic cheek-swab tests, he discovered he was African American, Irish, and Korean. We all did the genetics test since none of us had a clue as to our ancestry.
Amber came up Spanish and Irish with a hint of Native American. Weird combination, we all agreed. Bruno was one hundred percent Mexican. And I was French-Canadian and Eastern European.
Marino sighed and glanced at the ceiling. "There was this girl…"
I groaned, but then giggled when I realized Bruno had groaned in sync with me. All of Marino's colossal fuck up stories involved a girl.
"Was there tequila?" Amber asked without a hint of humor.
He nodded.
"Was it in Vegas?" Amber compressed her lips. She was upset, probably because he hadn't called one of us for help.
He nodded again.
Amber sighed. "The deadly trifecta. Girls, tequila, and Vegas. How much do you owe?"
He didn’t answer.
"How much?" Amber pushed gently.
"Thirty thousand."
"Holy shit, Marino," I whispered.
Marino rushed out, "I was going to borrow some money, and I had a plan to?—"
"Were you going to gamble to get it back?" Amber covered her face. "Damn it, Marino. I’d give you half my liver if you needed it, but I want to slap you silly for that kind of stupid. You can’t gamble to fix a gambling debt. Tell me you see the problem in that."
