Page 52 of Forbidden Romeo

“Is everything okay?” Roisin asks as I walk back into the kitchen.

I contemplate telling her that my head is spinning so hard it feels like it might fall off, but think better of it. “Yeah, he just has work.”

Roisin doesn’t look entirely convinced, but she seems too preoccupied to press it any further.

I offer her a gentle rub on the back as I sit down next to her. “Still feeling rough?”

“I don’t want to talk about it,” she replies, placing her forehead on the table.

“Go back to bed,” I suggest. “I’ll make you some soup—”

Suddenly, Roisin’s fist slams dramatically down on the table, making me jump. “Dear God, Aimee,” she exclaims. “Are you really going to sit there and ignore the fact that the guy you’re sleeping with is insanely attractive?”

Confused and surprised by her outburst, I stammer, “What?”

“He’s like famous-person-hot,” she continues, emphasizing her point.

I nod, trying to comprehend her astonishment. “I did tell you he was hot, remember?”

“Yes, but there is regular-person-hot, and then there’s straight-off-the-runway-hot,” she says as if she’s not spouting absolute nonsense. “And somehow, that man is more attractive than even that.”

Realizing her point, I ask, “Are you saying I’m punching above my weight class?”

“I’m saying,” she declares with certainty. “Jesus Christ, Aimee. People don’t look like that in real life.”

“So I’m outmatched.”

She looks up at me from the table with exasperation. “Listen to me; you could never be outmatched. You’re gorgeous, and there’s no man on this earth who could ever deserve you.”

“Thank you,” I reply, oddly moved by her words.

“But that man comes pretty close,” she adds in hindsight.

I roll my eyes. “You met him for like twenty seconds.”

“I’m a great judge of character,” she defends herself.

“Right, that’s enough,” I say, formulating a plan to divert the conversation away from my love life. “Go back to bed, you party animal.”

Roisin pouts but proceeds to get up anyway with a groan. “Are you heading out today? We’re out of ibuprofen.”

I walk over to the medical cabinet to double-check and grimace a little when I discover she’s correct. I pull out some aspirin and throw it to her. “Take this for now. I think I’m going to go for a walk to the hospital—I haven’t heard anything from Dr. Lous yet. I’ll grab you some ibuprofen while I’m there.”

“You’re a saint.”

***

As I walk through the bustling streets of New York, a wave of nostalgia washes over me. The city, with its vibrant energy and ceaseless movement, it hasn’t changed at all since I was last here.

But I have.

I remind myself of that as I pass by shop window after window advertising the latest fashions. There was a time when I would have fought and screamed with my father for even a moment longer to stare at the displays. Now I walk by, barely noticing them in my peripheral vision.

All I wanted as a child was everything we didn’t have. I didn’t understand that there were more important things and that the people around me were hurting.

My father was hurting because he lost my mother. It made him drunk and miserable, and he took it out on every one of us, even if I didn’t recognize it at the time.

I didn’t realize how far Roisin had slipped into her own pain before it was almost too late. She was barely seventeen when I found her, dying of an overdose and addicted to the drugs my father let her take. I knew then that we couldn’t stay in New York, that I would have to put away my dreams of nice things and a penthouse apartment to keep her safe.

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