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But was she going to cry too? Gia never cried.
“Because Vito and you are such babies that she was going to betray this pack and run, taking you with her. Dad didn’t have a choice…he didn’t…” She sounded like she was trying to convince herself. She slumped, covering her face. “She didn’t need to take my sisters and me because we’re proper Snakes. That’s why she didn’t want us…was going to leave us behind…”
I reached out of the bath and rested my hand over Gia’s arm, squeezing.
Gia lowered her hands and stared at me in shock.
Then her expression softened in a way that it never had before.
Now, I blink the tears out of my eyes. I slide my hand over the front of the cookbook.
It’s all that I have left of Mom.
I press my fingers over the fingers prints that are left behind in the corner in sugar — Mom’s unique finger prints.
She held this book.
Sometimes, it feels like my only proof.
She’s vanished, lost, been erased from our lives.
But I have this.
I press my fingers harder against hers.
As adults, Vito and I tried to search for Mom, but the Institute didn’t keep records back then, and her name would likely have been changed.
Dad burned all her possessions symbolically because of her betrayal.
For days, I couldn’t get the stench of the fire out of my hair. I wept and begged Vito to wash my hair over and over in the sink.
In the end, we took turns to wash each other’s hair.
It didn’t help.
Perhaps, it was Mom clinging to us in that smoky scent.
To my surprise, the night before the sacrificial bonfire, as I lay crying in my bed, Gia slipped into my room, clutching the cookbook under her arm.
“You’re the one who liked to do sappy things like cook with Mom.” She shoved the cookbook onto the bed without catching my eye. “Hide this well. If you’re caught with it, I’ll pretend that you having it has nothing to do with me.”
Gia terrifies me now, but I still remember her tall figure offering me the only comfort that she could in her own way.
Perhaps, she was moved by the same impulse that made me rest my hand on her arm in comfort.
Few people are all good or all bad.
Plus, pain sometimes connects people.
When my phone vibrates, it startles me out of my thoughts.
SEVEN: Sweet Venom, what are you doing?
I open the cookbook to one of my favorite recipes: chocolate-peanut pie.
My mouth waters, as I’m instantly transported to the pie’s rich, smooth taste. It’s one of Vito’s favorite comfort foods with its chocolate cookie crust and creamy peanut butter, cream cheese, powdered sugar, and whipped cream filling.
I don’t care what I need to do to raise the money for ingredients.
