Page 57 of Wasted On Us

My mother almost chokes on her wine, sputtering a mouthful right back into the glass.

“What was that?” she asks, wiping her mouth with the back of her hand.

“Food poisoning,” I offer with a tight smile.

“No,” she growls, holding her jaw so tight she looks like a ventriloquist. “The one before.”

“Luggage?” My gaze shifts from the ceiling to the pillow in front of me, picking at a seam between my fingers.

“Eden Louise…”

I swallow, taking a deep breath before plunging into the heart of the matter.

“Matteo-and-his-family-are-on-the-tour.” I let the whole sentence come out of my mouth in a single breath, screwing my eyes shut and wincing away from the words.

After a minute of silence, I open them again, to find my mother staring at me, unblinking. I think I understand now where Ensley gets it from. She stands from her chair, opens her mouth, closes her mouth, then opens it again.

Then, she takes a step toward the hallway, before stopping and turning to face me. “I see.”

That’s it. Two syllables. Two tiny little words after I admit to hiding a massive trick up my sleeve. I have no idea how to take it, and she’s striding off to her bedroom before I can say a peep otherwise.

It’s a long, sleepless night before we leave for our flight in the morning. I booked one in that sweet spot where we leave before morning rush hour traffic, but not so early that the sun isn’t up, and we all consider going back to bed and canceling the trip. Breakfast is awkward. I can’t tell if Mom has told my father anything. On top of that, she’s acting like nothing happened between us… That could be a good thing, I guess. We’re at least still going. Which means she’s either decided to make an honest attempt at things or she’s letting me dig my own grave and climb right in while she waits to push dirt in on top of me. I’m no closer to figuring it out when we call the Uber, loading the minivan with our bags before zooming off to the airport.

When we enter through the departures area and head for the self-service kiosks, I can already see Mateo, Salvador, and Abuelita standing off to the side, boarding passes in hand. He and his father are having a heated discussion at a volume I can’t quite make out, but I distinctly hear Mateo utter the phrase ‘non-refundable,’ and watch Salvador slump his shoulders in resignation.

It’s only after we’ve printed our own tickets and made it all the way through security that my father spots them standing by our gate.

“Is that Salvador García and his son?” He stops so abruptly that I almost walk into him before my rolling suitcase clips me in the back of the ankle.

“Ouch,” I hiss, bending down to rub the already-pink skin. “And yes. It is. And his mother. They call her Abuelita. “

He looks from me to Mom and back again. Mom simply turns away, mumbling something about needing to buy gum so her ears can pop on the plane, and quickly walks off to a nearby newsstand. So much for helping me out.

“And why are Salvador García and his family boarding our flight? Our thirteen-hour, transatlantic flight, I might add?”

“Because.” I stand up as straight as I can, trying to project some kind of confidence about the whole affair. “They are going onmytour and helping outyourdaughter.”

Looking over my dad’s shoulder, I make eye contact with Mateo, and he smiles. It’s all the reassurance that I need and reminds me of his strategy earlier.

“And,” I add. “If we do not get in line to board soon, we will miss ournon-refundableflight to ournon-refundablehotel room.”

The implication behind my words is clear. Not only has Daniel Lorenson always been a frugal man, but the idea that he would lose thousands of dollars to sit at home and wallow in his own pride, while Salvador and his family get to enjoy an expensive vacation that he could’ve taken instead, turns his stomach and ignites his stubborn streak at the same time. My gamble pays off, and after a few seconds of watching the gears turn behind his eyes, he clutches his boarding pass and quietly gets in line.

They’re both cheap. I guess that’s one thing my dad and Mr. García have in common. Maybe they should just sit together and start ranting about that. By the time we get in the air, all will be right with the world, I just know it.

I couldn’t be more wrong.

It isn’t a great flight or even a good one. The two of them spend the entire thirteen hours trying to pretend that the other doesn’t exist. In anticipation of this very dilemma, I booked us in separate rows, but that means that Mateo and I are nowhere near each other. Abuelita sits passed out on his shoulder, while I spend the whole flight seated next to my parents, who refuse to talk to me beyond asking me to let them out of the row to use the bathroom or reminding me to get a Diet Coke for them when the flight attendant with the cart comes back. While it’s certainly not ideal, it’s better than it could’ve been. They could be having an all-out screaming match, terrifying the flight attendants, going viral on TikTok as the Karens of Frostvale, and forcing the pilot to turn them around. Or worse—they could’ve not gotten on the plane at all. So, in the end, I guess I can tolerate a bout of stubbornness.

The ride to the hotel in Verona doesn’t fare much better. Salvador decides to not only speak exclusively to Mateo, but to do so in Spanish, which I can tell irritates the hell out of my dad. Sick of the entire affair, I ignore them both to have a whole conversation in Italian with the taxi driver, telling him the story of our situation, which he finds endlessly amusing, even wishing me luck when he drops us at our hotel.

I get everyone checked in smoothly. The rooms are on the same floor but with three rooms between us as a neutral buffer zone. I tell everyone to wash up and get changed into something they don’t mind doing a little bit of walking in because Mateo and I have something planned for them this afternoon.

It’s a little hotter out than I would like, a thin sheen of sweat forming under my linen dress, walking through the cramped cobblestone streets. But it’s worth it when we get to the Juliet House, passing by the wall of letters to Shakespeare’s heroine, stuck there with tape and chewing gum. The age of the building itself inspires me, making me feel like my problems are so brief and insignificant. So what if our parents don’t get along? They will one day, I’m sure of it. And if they don’t, then what does this momentary discomfort really matter in the grand scheme of things? Mateo and I love each other, and we’re going to make it work.

I haven’t told him of my plan. For all he knows, I came here to stick a letter on the wall too, and then take our parents to go sightseeing and have espressos. I tell him that I have to go find a brochure for my mother and that I’ll be back in just a moment. So, he’s just as surprised as everyone else when I appear on Juliet’s fabled balcony, standing above them, the paper in my hand trembling like a leaf on the wind.

“Beloved Juliet, from two houses of equal honor, a feud, ancient and senseless, simmers in this fair Verona, the stage for our lives,” I commence, my voice quivering with a cocktail of emotions. My mother looks up, curiosity dancing in her eyes, nudging my father to pay heed. Shakespeare, once a high-school acquaintance, now becomes my confidante. I need his spirit now more than ever, so I hope he’s with me.

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