Lisa Desrochers - A Little Too Much

I slip my arms around his chest and press myself against his back. This is it. He’s giving me what I asked for, a look into his soul. The honest truth is, I’m a little scared of what I’m going to see there, but I have to step up to the plate and be strong for him. I told him nothing I saw would scare me away, and I’m not going to let him down. “Who are these people, Alessandro? And if you say me, I’m throwing you out this window.”

He turns in my arms and rests his forehead on the crown of my head. “Then, I won’t say it. But it’s not just you. Every kid in school who I dealt drugs to, every person I let Lorenzo beat and rob, every kid I let him force into the gang, every rival gang member I let him stab.” He lifts his head and looks into my eyes. “And, even if he didn’t rape you, there were others.”

“Did you rape anyone?” I ask, confident I already know the answer.

“No.”

“Who gave you the drugs to deal?”

He blows out a breath and shivers. “Lorenzo.”

“Who beat and robbed those people?”

The moonlight glimmers in the sheen of tears pooling in his eyes. “I helped, Hilary. I didn’t try to stop him. I helped him. I was just as angry as Lorenzo was. He was just better at acting on that anger, so I took my lead from him.” He rakes both hands through his hair and tips his head back, his Adam’s apple bobbing as fights for control. “And I shot a man. It was only by the grace of God that he didn’t die. I don’t even know what became of him or his family. I looked for them when I came back, but . . .”

“Whose gun was it?” I try not to let the shock show in my voice. I can’t believe Alessandro, the boy I knew, the man I know, would have shot anyone. But if he did, I know at whose urging it was.

He lowers his gaze. “It doesn’t matter whose gun it was. I’m the one who pulled the trigger. That man’s blood will forever be on my hands. My hands, Hilary. Not Lorenzo’s.”

I step back into his arms and lay my head on his chest. “Tell me what happened.”

He draws a shaky breath and blows it into my hair. “It’s what finally got us arrested. There was an old man who set up his hot-dog stand at the corner of the park near our house on weekends. It was dusk and just starting to rain . . .” His voice hitches. “Lorenzo didn’t usually carry, but he was short cash for his supplier and he knew they’d be coming after him, so he walked up to the old man while he was packing up his stand and pointed the gun in his face. When the old man opened his cashbox, Lorenzo pistol-whipped him and dropped him to the ground.” He shakes his head. “He couldn’t just take the money, he had to beat that poor man too. He gave him a few kicks to the ribs to be sure he was down, then handed me the gun so he could grab the money. The last thing either one of us expected is the man to take that kind of beating and get up, but he did. Before I could react, he was off the ground and on Lorenzo.”

My face is pinched in a grimace of dread. I force it to relax and push back to look at Alessandro. “So you shot him.”

He lets go of me and rubs a hand down his face, and that’s when I realize it’s tears he’s wiping away. “I didn’t even hesitate. I shot a defenseless old man in the back.” He leans his hands on the windowsill, hanging his head.

For a long time I can’t speak. “You were there . . . in that position, because of Lorenzo, Alessandro. If he hadn’t robbed that vendor, you never would have had that gun in your hand.”

“But I did,” he says as another tear rolls over his lashes. I want so badly to wipe it away for him, but I don’t. “I had a choice. I didn’t have to shoot him. He ended up in a wheelchair.”

“I won’t believe you wanted to hurt that man. You were scared.”

“It’s irrelevant whether I wanted to hurt him. He ended up paralyzed.” He pushes away from the window and turns, reaching up to tug his hair. “When I went to the police and told them what happened, Lorenzo was furious.”

“Wait! What?”

He breathes deep. “He couldn’t understand why I would—”

“No. I mean . . . you turned yourself in?”

He nods.

And still, he insists on beating himself up over this. I take a deep breath. “So there are some things you did wrong, Alessandro. You made some bad choices. You’re human. But you have to separate those things from the things Lorenzo did. You have to let his shit go so you can focus on what to do about your own. I want to help you.” I lift my hand and trace a finger along the scar on his side. He flinches away from me, but I don’t stop. “I want that more than anything . . . for you to let me in so I can make you see what an amazing person you really are. But I can’t do that unless you want me to. You have to invite me in.”

He tips his forehead into mine. “You are so far inside me, sometimes I’m not sure where I stop and you start.”

“Then let me help you. You can show me your pain. I promise it won’t break me.”

His gaze burns into mine. “I’ve always seen your strength, even when we were young. But I can’t burden you with mine on top of what you’re already dealing with. It wouldn’t be right.”

I pull away from him. “If you can’t trust me to help you through this, I don’t think we’re going to make it.” I tip his face up and kiss him gently on the lips. “And I want to make it, Alessandro. I want that more than anything.”

A tear spills over his long lashes, and then another. I wipe them away with my thumb and watch as what’s left of his composure crumbles. I manage to coax him back to my bed, where he wraps himself around me. I hold him as he falls apart, and hope it’s enough.

After the longest hour of my life, he finally lifts his head out of my chest and looks at me. “You’ll help me sort mine from his?”

“I will do anything for you that you’ll let me.” As I say it, a knot forms in my chest at the truth in those words. I’d do anything for him. “Is it too hard for you—being here in New York? I mean . . . if you were back in Corsica, would you be able to get past this?”

His eyes flare in the dark. “I thought I was clear. I’m not leaving you again.”

I swallow. “What if I came with you?” I want him to heal . . . to feel whole again . . . and if leaving New York will help him get his soul back, the way he helped me get mine, I’d do it for him in a heartbeat. I don’t want to give up the theater—especially now—but I realize just at this second that Alessandro means more to me than Broadway. He means more to me than anything, except maybe Henri. If he needs to go, I’ll go with him.

He shakes his head slowly. “And just when I thought I couldn’t possibly love you any more . . .”

“I’m serious. I want you to be free of this burden. It will crush you otherwise. If we have to leave for that to happen, I’ll go.”

“No, Hilary. We’re going to do this right here. You’re right that I need to sort Lorenzo’s from mine, and I trust you to help me.”

“I’m so sorry what I said about Lorenzo before you left. I hope you know I didn’t mean any of it.”

His eyes glimmer in the moonlight through the window as his finger traces the lines of my face. “There was some truth in it. I did worship Lorenzo. But you have to understand, he wasn’t always the person you knew. When we were little, Lorenzo was my hero.”

I listen intently as he tells me everything. It turns out Lorenzo wasn’t always hard. He was softer when they were young kids. But he changed after he got beat up one day on his way home from school.

“I could see him slipping away,” Alessandro says. “He started hanging out with older kids, who I guess he thought would protect him. They thought it was funny to use Lorenzo as their gofer. They’d send him into stores to shoplift cigarettes or candy, and he’d do it. They’d send him to buy their drugs, and he’d do it. I threatened to tell our father what he was doing, but he said his ‘gang’ would beat the crap out of me if I told. And then Dad died and Lorenzo just went off the deep end. He started using . . . skipping school . . . and our mom was too distraught to see what was happening.”

We talk for hours about Lorenzo as Alessandro tries to sort it all out in his head. There are more tears—both his and mine—as he recounts everything leading up to the group home.

“And then . . . what he did to you. I couldn’t bear it when he started bragging. I wanted to help you, but I didn’t know how. When you came to me . . . when you told me what you wanted, I felt sick. But you didn’t give up, and I’d always . . . I really liked you and I . . .” He swallows as more tears threaten. “God help me, I wanted you for myself, and I rationalized what I did by convincing myself I could help you if you let me close enough.”

“You did help me, Alessandro. You helped me more that I can even say.”

His lips purse. “Not in the way I’d meant to.”

“Please, Alessandro. I don’t know how to make you understand. You were what I needed, and if what we did was wrong, it was my fault. I can’t live with your guilt. If you can’t forgive yourself for you, do it for me. Please.”

He brushes his fingertips over my jawline. “There’s very little I wouldn’t do for you.”

I kiss him, then sink deeper into his body, resting my head on his chest. I remember how safe I felt in his sixteen-year-old arms. Some things never change.

BRIGHT MORNING SUN is streaming in my window when I finally wake in Alessandro’s arms and find him gazing down at me. His lips brush mine. “Good morning.”

I roll so I’m facing him, his glorious naked body pressed against mine. “Morning.”