Don’t Let Go

14. Aurora

14

Aurora

“Don’t let this consume you.” The words tumbled from my lips as I applied my ruby red lipstick, preparing to meet Paolo at the gathering.

It was never a good sign when the mafia wanted to have a “family meeting”, which usually meant something had gone wrong or was about to.

A knock on my bedroom door drew my attention from fixing my eyeliner. “Yeah?” I assumed it was one of my siblings, but it was Mamma.

She came into my room and sat on the foot of my bed. “Hey, fiore mio. I’m glad I caught you before you left.” Mamma offered a grim smile, that paired with her paint-stained jeans, I knew what she wanted.

“You need my help cleaning a scene tonight?” I examined my pretty French-tipped nails. Once again, my nails will be ruined, and my hands sore from all the scrubbing. Mamma’s hands were no longer soft, and her nails were stubs from years in the business. I didn’t want hands like that.

“If you don’t mind.” Mamma got to her feet and came over to me. She cradled my face for a heartbeat with one of her sandpaper-like hands. The way she studied my face was as if she had been leaving for a long time and feared she wasn’t going to return home. “It’s on the way to the meeting. We’ll only be a few minutes late.”

“Of course. I don’t mind helping,” I lied through my teeth. If I learned anything, it was you never disrespected your mamma. If she needed help, you dropped everything and helped.

She smiled, making me smile back. “Quelloè il mio dolce fiore,” Mamma said softly. She always called me her flower, saying I was the strongest of them all and beautiful.

She gently touched my chin. “You have the biggest dimples like your papà. Did you know those dimples were what made me fall head over heels for him? That and his sense of humor.”

Sorrow crept into my mamma’s eyes, making her appear older than she was. “I miss him every day. He was such a good papà.” She kissed the top of my head and turned to go. “Please be ready to go in ten minutes.”

“Yes, Mamma.”

As she left, I cursed under my breath. Of course, the night had to get worse. Not only did I have to deal with this mystery meeting and with Paolo, but now I had to clean a bloody crime scene before attending. Sometimes, my life was too fantastic to bear.

Mamma turned into a gated community deep into the heart of Paradise Valley and punched in the code for the gate. All these houses were huge with perfect green lawns and not a thing out of place. I bet if a piece of paper dared to land on the lawn, someone magically appeared to clean it. We humble servants live so the rich only see beauty.

“Here it is,” Mamma said, pulling into the driveway of a white house with light blue trim. The owner’s assistant had already hidden the keys for us. We were magic workers. They hardly saw us. For the most part, all they knew was they killed someone and called a number, and somehow the problem disappeared.

I looked around the lavish home and didn’t see the trail of blood yet. Everything was ivory white: the marble floor, the walls, the couches. They didn’t have a TV. Rich people didn’t need to sit around watching shows about pretty people because they were the pretty people the cameras followed. The fireplace was white and shiny with only a picture of a vase with flowers hanging above it. No family pictures, no sign of human life insight.

“Out here,” Mamma shouted.

I glanced around and realized I’d been overanalyzing the living room to the point that she’d left my side. She was always all business. She never got distracted by the décor or the fancy weird shit rich people bought. Once, there was a giant marble statue of a dog with a diamond collar around its neck. What was the point of that?

Her voice sounded like it came from outside. The French doors leading to the backyard were open, leaving the ivory curtains to dance in the breeze. This was where the magazine shoot would come to a screeching halt. Blood drops and muddy footprints on the cement lead to the pool and grass area. A female body floated face down in the water. Her hair fanned out all around her head. She appeared like a floating angel with her light pink dress, porcelain-white skin, long wavy blonde hair, and slim figure. My brothers had beaten us here with their truck. They fished her out so we could drain and scrub the pool.

I sat in one of the lawn chairs, watching Franco and Lorenzo grab her arms and drag her to the sidewalk. They flipped her face up. Her lips were blue, her eyes wide open like she saw who killed her and couldn’t believe this was how her life ended. She was still pretty, even in death. The blow was to the top of her head, giving her blond hair red streaks. Though she was rich and pretty and most likely a snobby bitch, I felt bad for her. She was around my age and probably had dreams. Maybe she was trapped in her golden life and couldn’t wait to escape. Now she was forever stuck, forever young. She was lost to the world, no longer able to do a thing about it.

Lorenzo got out the black tarp and laid it on the grass. They gingerly placed her onto it and rolled her up, taking her to the truck.

Who was she? Did she live here? Was she a neighbor who saw too much? A babysitter whom the man of the house assaulted and wanted to keep secret? Maybe she wasn’t rich at all. Maybe she went to thrift stores, bought designer clothes at a bargain, and did her best to blend in. That girl deserved better than this, whoever she was.

Mamma poured some liquid into the pool. She nodded to another gallon jug next to me. “Some help would be nice,” she barked.

I snapped out of my daze and grabbed the jug, pouring its contents into the pool. The liquid turned the water foggy before becoming foamy white like dish soap. It was sanitizing the pool slowly so we could drain it without having the sides of the street stained with scarlet water as it ran toward the sewer.

After pouring about twenty gallons of the stuff into the water, we scrubbed the cement around the pool and cleaned the grass while we waited for the water to be treated.

I was on my hands and knees trying to get speckles of blood out of a crack in the cement when my mamma came over to give me a fresh bucket of warm, soapy water.

“How’s it going?” she asked, placing her hands on her hips.

I looked at her. Her brown hair stuck up all over the place, and sweat beaded down her face. I blew a stray hair out of my eye that escaped the ponytail I put in earlier. “Good. Just need to focus on this crack, and I think the pool deck and grass area are done.”

She bobbed her head. “Good, good.” She didn’t seem to take in my answer. She looked around, making sure my brothers were gone and we were alone.

“Are you happy?” she asked out of the blue.

“Umm… I don’t know how to answer that.” Did she mean this moment? This day? This lifetime?

She wiped her brow with the back of her hand. “I mean with school, with Paolo, with… everything.” She motioned toward herself and the backyard.

I knew what she meant. Was I happy with my life how it was? If I enjoyed living the mafia lifestyle.

“It’s not a bad life.” I scrubbed the crack some more before tossing my sponge into the water. I looked at my nails. Both pinkies were ruined, and three more nails were chipped. “Not a great life for the fingernails, though,” I tried to make light of the subject.

She offered me a hand up. I took it, brushing off the back of my pants.

“I’m serious.” She grabbed the bucket and poured it into the pool. “Do you know what tonight’s meeting is about?”

“No.” I shook my head. “I haven’t heard anything. Just that Paolo wants me by his side.”

“I was afraid of that.” She walked over to the pool controls and hit some buttons, making the pool drain.“ Tonight’s meeting is about expanding the business. It’s thriving here in Arizona. They want to tap you, Aurora.”

My eyebrows pushed together in confusion. “Tap me?”

She sighed, staring up toward the sky. The sun was setting, turning the sky cotton candy pink with orange highlights around the clouds. “Yes. They want you to be more involved. I think you’re too young, but since you’re with Paolo, many think it’s a great idea.”

“What does this have to do with Paolo?”

She chewed on her bottom lip for a moment, trying to figure out how she wanted to string her words together.“ There’s a rumor that the boss sees a lot of potential in Paolo and wants to give him more responsibility. Because you’re with him, they think you need to prove your worth to the family even more.”

I swallowed, but it did nothing for the growing lump in my throat. Is Paolo rising in the ranks already? Did they want to test my loyalty? This was all happening faster than I imagined. I thought they’d look to Paolo when he graduated high school. I prayed I’d be out of dodge before they thought of me being worthy of anything.

My mouth was as dry as a desert. “I… I don’t know what to say.”

The pool gurgled as the water washed away. I stumbled toward the porch to lean against a wooden beam. Mamma wiped her hands on her jeans and placed them on my shoulders. “I want you to make your mark in this world. You can do that here with us, in this line of work, or you can break away and find a new path. I’ll support you either way.” She cupped my chin, tipping my head back so I could look into her eyes. “But you need to decide quickly. The mafia isn’t forgiving if you flee, but since you’re young and not a true member, you still have a choice. Whereas I’ll always be stuck here if I like it or not.”

Did she truly feel stuck? Did my mamma want a new life if she could have one? I never knew she thought about these things.

I licked my lips. “I don’t want this life,” I whispered.

She kissed my forehead. “Then fiore mio, you need to find an escape plan fast.”

“How?” I felt dumbstruck, my whole life was pulled out from under me like a rug.

She walked to the pool pump and turned it off. “

“I’m sorry, but that’s for you to figure out,” she said, her apology hanging in the air, leaving me confused. “Now, let’s finish this and get to that meeting.”

While we washed and cleansed the inside of the pool, my mind raced. What was I going to do? How could I get away from Paolo? I wanted to wait until high school was over and let the distance from going to college crush our relationship. Now, I needed a whole new game plan, and I needed it fast.

“Let’s go get ready,” Mamma said, leaving the keys on the counter. She nodded at the two pool guys who walked through the gate past us. They were also in the family, and they oversaw the pool operated like normal, and refilled with water.

I shadowed my mamma quietly. Tonight was too soon to come up with a plan. I’d have to stay sharp and not agree to do anything I couldn’t get out of. Once the pressure of this night passed, I’d critically think about my way out of the mafia and toward a better way of life. I hoped Paolo wouldn’t retaliate when I made my exit, causing more harm to my loved ones.