Lina
"Of course it is, you dummy."
Cameron pauses for a moment before saying, "Yep. It's you."
"Yes me, the cousin you promised you'd start keeping in touch with but then didn't," I say, angrily.
He sighs lowly. " Hold on for a second while I enter my house, cugina," he tells me.
I impatiently wait while he makes all sorts of shuffling sounds. It's only after I hear him plop on a chair that I hear his voice again.
"I got busy," he explains himself curtly.
"Too busy to call once and say hello?" I ask him accusingly.
He laughs softly at the other end of the line." Oh, you're good, cousin, trying to play the victim so you can pin all the blame on me. What about you, huh? You also promised to call, what's your excuse?"
Shit. My cousin is a sharp one. He had me there.
I clear my throat dramatically." Uh...Well, It also happened that I got occupied with my own life here too," I admit, biting my lips guiltily.
"Well, since we understand each other,' he starts with a convincing voice," how about we forgive one another and start afresh, yes?"
"Si," I agree readily, happy to be on good terms with him again.
"So, how are you, Lina?" he asks, his English thick with an Italian accent.
I think about everything that's happened in the last week.
"Good," I answer, my voice breaking slightly. I pray that he didn't catch that.
"Are you sure?" he asks.
"Yes, why do you ask?" I say, curious about his need to question me about my well-being again.
I hear the skepticism in his voice as he says, "Okay, Lina. I find it a little hard to believe that you've suddenly called me out of the blue because you missed me."
Holy, shit. My cousin is more shrewder than I thought. I guess I can thank America for that. I hear that it's eat or be eaten over there.
"Lina, are you still there?"
"Yes, "I croak out weakly. "I really did miss you," I clarify.
"I believe you but, that's not the reason you're calling isn't it?"
I say nothing, I just continue biting my lips guiltily.
" Lina, I know I haven't been there in recent years but I'm still your family. You can tell me if you need anything,cugina," he coaxes.
Tears mist my eyes as he tries his level best to talk me into telling him what's wrong. I feel so touched. Cameron hasn't seen me for years but he still cares enough to want to come to my aid. Who does that? True family, that's who. My dear cousin never forgot us, I conclude with a surety.
In a quavering voice, I manage to say," I have to get away from Mylari for a while."
"Why? What's wrong?" he asks in a concerned but curious voice.
I think about the circumstances in which I have to make this call. The gravity of it all makes tears well into my eyes as I continue biting my lips.
Looking at the ceiling, I swallow nervously before saying, "It's a little complicated."
Understatement, I know.
"Is this about your engagement, Lina? Your father told me about it just this week."
Okay, so he's definitely deductive.
"It's part of it, Cammy. But it's sooo much more complicated, Cammy," I tell him quickly.
"Okay, okay," he soothes. "Well, you should know that you can come to stay with me in New York for as long as you want."
"Really?" I ask with a mixture of disbelief and gratitude, surprised that he'd agree to such a weird request. Could it be that he's used to weird?
"Of course," he answers, " It'll be great to have you over and what kind of cousin would I be if I didn't help my baby cousin out?"
I smile at the still mysterious person at the end of the line.
"We are the same age, do not ever call me a baby."
"I'm older," he says matter-of-factly.
"By two months."
"Still counts,' he tells me.
I laugh at his childishness and he soon joins me too. I started to feel better since Bruno's ominous call.
It occurs to me that I could actually evade Bruno entirely.
Spurred on by that thought, I inform Cameron about when he can expect me: the day after tomorrow.
He's a little surprised though he tries to hide it. I know what he's thinking: What's with the urgency?
I don't clarify and he doesn't say anything.
After this, we spend a large portion of the night discussing the details of my stay in his home in Manhattan.
**** **** ****
Present
"What do you mean you're leaving the country?" Sophie asks her face a mask of shock.
"I'm going away to America for a while, New York to be exact."
"What!" she asks a little too loudly.
"Shhh..."I say gesturing for her to keep her voice down.
"I'll be staying with Cameron,"
"Who's the hell's Cameron!" she asks, the amplitude of her voice the same as before.
"Sophie!" I reprimand her."Keep it down, Carlos will hear." I repeat for the second time."Cameron is my cousin, you know, the one I told you about, the one who moved to America," I explain.
Sophie looks like she barely cares who he is. All she cares about is: "You can't leave."
"I can and I'm going to. I'm actually here to say goodbye," I tell her, looking straight into her blue eyes.
"No," she says in denial.
"Yes, It's the only way I can be safe from Bruno."
She looks at me for a moment before getting up abruptly. "I need a drink," she declares shortly.
"Want one?" she asks as she pulls out a bottle of whisky from the cabinet.
"No, thank you," I tell her quickly, knowing that I needed to stay soberer than I'd ever had in my life.
Sophie pours herself a fair share of whisky into a glass, and quickly swallows the contents in a go. My god, I'd never seen Sophie so stressed in my life. This Bruno stuff must be scaring her just as much as it was scaring me, I realize. I have to try to calm her down somehow.
"Sophie, it's only for a little while. Just until Bruno forgets me," I say, hoping that the man has the attention span of a child. He assured me that he didn't but I'd take my chances. After a while, he's going to get bored of looking for me and crawl back into whatever bloody hole he came out of.
"What if he doesn't, Lina? What if he comes after you and hurts you for this?" she says her eyes wide.
"He wouldn't hurt me," I say quickly, surprising both of us.
"Of course, he would Lina, look at how he's been acting."
"No, he wouldn't,' I say with more surety in my voice this time. The thing is, I really do believe that despite his unstable behavior Bruno wouldn't hurt me.
"And how do you figure that?" she asks, coming to sit on the sofa again.
"Because he told me," I answer.
She looks at me skeptically.'You can't believe anything he says."
"I do, Sophie. I can't explain it but I do."
She looks at me like I'm crazy and I can understand why. She hadn't yet seen Bruno again, all she knew was the things I was telling her. I must've made it sound like he was some kind of monster now instead of a person, albeit one with no limits.
"Okay, if you say so, Lina. But what makes you think that he'll just let you go after all the trouble he went through? Don't you think he'll just come after you?"
" I doubt it. He won't even know where I am. I didn't even tell my parents, You're the only one who knows. Also, I think he's bound to get bored of looking after a while. I mean how obsessed can one man get about a woman he's only seen after five years for five minutes,right?"
Sophie bit the inside of her mouth thoughtfully.'Guess you have a point," she says then sighs.
Her head suddenly snaps up again."Wait, who did you say you were staying with again?"
"My cousin Cameron"
"In America?" she asks and I nod.
"Yes, he agreed to let me stay with him."
"Didn't you tell me that you haven't seen this guy in years?"
" I forgot to tell you but he recently came to see me and my parents during Christmas."
"Oh. But are sure that you can trust him?" she asks worriedly.
" Of course, I can trust him. He's family."
"Okay, what do you know about him?" she asks worriedly, crossing her arms.
Mama Soph.
I roll my eyes skyward."Okay, Sophie, you're getting paranoid."
She still stares at me expectedly and I groan."Okay, he's currently unmarried. He's a businessman who owns a lot of hotels, clubs, and restaurants. He's actually really successful. And he owns a cat, Charlie, named after his mother. Are you satisfied now?" I ask wearily, raising an eyebrow at her.
"That's nothing. You don't know a person unless you know their hobbies."
"His idea of a good time is reading," I inform her quickly.
"Oh yeah, what kind of novels?" she asks, unfolding her arms and softening a bit. Reading is her third love, after Carlos and dancing.
"Philosophy," I answered blandly.
"Yuck!" she exclaims.'If he does something that boring, he has to be safe."
"Glad, you're convinced," I say, looking at her with a mixture of amusement and exasperation.
Sophie looks at me back and suddenly throws her arms around me."I can't believe you're going," she says unhappily.
"It's not forever, Soph."
"Still, I don't want you to go. Curse that Rossini bastard, making you leave your own home like this," she mutters angrily.
I try to shove down the flash of anger at that insult to Bruno. How can I feel bad about this? I ask myself. It's so fucked up.
Sophie detaches herself from me and says, "When are you leaving?"
"Tomorrow morning,"
"Wow, that soon?"
"I had to use today to prepare for the trip so tomorrow is my only chance. He's coming for me the day after that."
She nods in understanding. "Well, it seems like you've thought of everything," she says.
"Not really, "I tell her.
She looks at me inquisitively, "What do you mean?"
"He's going to be watching me."
"Cazzo, I forgot about that," she says. 'Bruno will stop you before you get to the airport."
"Well, I don't think it's going to be him exactly. This morning when I went to buy something for the trip, I noticed two guys following me, separately. I think they work for him."
"The problem remains. It doesn't matter who's following you, the fact is that you're every move is being spied on. How are you going to get on a plane without him realizing?"
"Don't know. I was hoping you could help me come up with something," I say with a reckless smile.
"I'd like to help you, Lina, but I'm not sure that I can."
"Come on, Sophie, I know that if we put our heads together, we'll come up with something for sure," I say, clasping her hands in mine.
"You're right, bella," she says, squeezing my hands affectionately before smiling.