“Wow, you are a prick this morning,” Angelo said with a glare. “Sorry I’m not a fucking genius like you.”
“You’re the one asking for more money,” Nova reminded him. “You have to do more work to get more money. I’m pissed about the La Bomba thing. Do you know what would’ve happened if Tino went down?”
“What does he have to go down for?” Romeo cut in as he put a plate in front of Angelo first since he had to get to work. “Not like he’s drinking.”
Tino raised his eyebrows but looked down at the tablecloth instead of saying anything.
“Are you drinking?” Romeo barked at him.
“Nah.” Tino shook his head, giving a mock look of being disgusted. “I hate drinking. Gross. Yuck.”
Angelo burst out laughing.
“Valentino—”
“Shirley Temples all night,” Tino assured Romeo, but cracked and started laughing with Angelo, even though Romeo looked like an angry bear. “Okay, come on, we can’t all be perfect like you, Rome.”
“You’re underage.”
“No shit?” Tino pulled out his wallet and looked at his fake ID in surprise. “The DMV lied to me.”
Romeo picked up Tino’s wallet and looked at his fake ID. Then his shoulders slumped, like all the energy was sucked out of him. “This is my fault.”
Tino was just considering pulling it back and admitting he really didn’t drink much. Which wasn’t a lie. He preferred blow to booze, but Tino tried to keep it a little real with Romeo. He couldn’t let him walk around thinking Tino was lily-white. A few things were good for him to know in case the truth ever did come out; he wouldn’t die of shock.
“I’m pretty sure Tino would be right where you see him if Dyker Heights never happened,” Nova said, though there was a haunted sound to his voice like he understood this lie Tino created was what he thought would’ve happened. What Tino should’ve been, which was the exact opposite of who he actually was. For the first time, Tino realized Nova had believed it too. Seen what he wanted to see and ignored the rest that was too painful to deal with until Tino flat-out told him in the hallway that it was a lie. “This is where he’s supposed to be.”
“Drinking and partying his ass off all night?” Romeo sounded miserable at the notion.
“There are worse things,” Nova said distantly. “There are a lot worse things, Rome.”
Tino felt guilty.
He’d let the anger get the most of him, and he probably shouldn’t have admitted to Nova that it was all a carefully designed lie. He understood wanting to believe it, even knowing how untrue it was. Sometimes Tino almost believed it too.
“You wanna hear my story or what?” Tino asked the table. “It’s gonna shock the shit outta you.”
“Yeah, man, tell us your fucking story,” Angelo agreed as he took a bite of his eggs. “It’s too early for things to get this intense.”
“I met this chick, right? She was hot too. You gotta remember that. So we’re dancing, and she’s on my shit. She wants it—”
“Oh Jesus,” Romeo groaned from the kitchen. “I hate these fucking stories, Valentino. I’d almost rather go back to Angelo bitching about not getting enough dirty money.”
“Stai zitto.” Angelo threw up his hands at Romeo and then looked back to Tino. “So she’s up on your shit.”
“Like fucking glue. On me.” Tino waggled his eyebrows at Angelo, all the while feeling Nova’s intense stare and Romeo’s annoyance. “And I’m like, hey, why the fuck not, right? I ask her if she wants to take off. We can go to my place or—”
“Your place?” Romeo barked.
Tino rolled his eyes. “Relax. I don’t fuck here. I go to Nova’s.”
Nova was quiet rather than argue that Tino had never brought a woman over. When Romeo put a plate in front him, Nova said, “Grazie,” still looking very distracted. Then Romeo hit the back of Nova’s head, and he grunted. “What?”
“You let him bring women over?”
Nova held up his hand, like he didn’t understand the problem, even if his gaze was still haunted and distant. “Who am I to tell him what to do?”
“No shit,” Tino mumbled under his breath, keeping to himself that he’d modeled half his fictionally bad sexual behavior after Nova at eighteen.
Nova at twenty was much more reserved.
Sort of like the ecstasy that disappeared out of his life like he’d never loved it to begin with. Nova just gave up partying after the fallout in the Savios’ basement. Like he was punishing himself, even though the Savios’ basement wasn’t his fault any more than Mary was.
Now Nova’s life was nothing but work and family.
“So anyway,” Tino went on with a pointed look at Romeo for ruining his punch line. “I ask her if she wants to take off, and she says to me, ‘I’ll go home with you, but only if you promise me one thing.’”
Angelo leaned forward in anticipation, and even Nova dropped the ice and looked at Tino curiously.
“She says, ‘I’ll only fuck you if you promise’”—Tino stopped rather than go on. Angelo held up his hand, and Tino waggled his eyebrows—“‘to come on my face.’”
“Valentino!” Romeo shouted.