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Chapter 1
Lucia
I’m having a bad day.
The kind of bad day where you spill coffee on your favorite shirt right before an important meeting or get a parking ticket right after finding the perfect parking spot. The kind where you accidentally delete an important email while trying to clean your inbox and now you have to jump through all these hoops in an attempt to recover it.
The kind where you question why you’re doing what you’re doing when you know it’s going to be a mess no matter what.
Truth be told, I would gladly take the headache of a stained shirt or a deleted email over what awaits me at the cabins up in the mountains that my parents rented for the holidays. Just the thought of heading there for Christmas sends bile rising up my throat.
“Miss?”
Most people look forward to seeing their families for Christmas, but that’s because most people don’t come from a huge Italian family like I do. They’re the nosiest people I know. They’ll push and prod you for information about yourself until just the thought of seeing them makes your blood pressure rise.
Don’t get me wrong, I don’t hate my family. Or Christmas for that matter. It’s just that when you’ve spent the majority of your holidays having over a dozen different cousins, aunts, and uncles pry into your personal life, it tends to dampen the holiday spirit. Even then, I think I could get over that. It’s when my parents and grandparents join in that I start to wear down. I can’t shrug them off like I do my extended family members. Instead, I have to sit at meals and gatherings and whatever and constantly dodge questions from literally everyone I’m related to. It’s like I’m under a microscope as they poke and prod me about my love life and give me unsolicited advice about why I’m still single.
“Excuse me, miss.”
I don’t have a boyfriend. I don’t have time for one. I tell them that every year, and every year I’m told that ofcourseI have time for one somewhere, I just have to find it. Hearing that is more exhausting than all of the time I spend studying hard. I spend every single second I have studying my ass off so that when I inherit my family’s business, I don’t run it to the ground. College is hard to begin with, and I take my responsibility to take over seriously. Between my business management courses and the odd tutoring jobs I do on weekends for my scholarship, my calendar is too busy to fit in lunch dates and walks in the park. It’s not like I don’t want to date, I just don’t have the time to disappoint another person by being constantly unavailable.
“Miss, are you ready to make your order?”
It’s not like I don’t have time to find someone. I’m only twenty-one. I know I have plenty of time to settle down, but that’s not what my family thinks. Every year above twenty that I go without being in a relationship seems to be one step closer into eternal spinsterhood or something for them. It’s like they don’t understand modern medicine or modern relationships. I’m not going to college for an MRS degree, I’m going to college to learn how to run the companytheystarted. Marriage and kids and everything can come after. I don’t know why my family makes it sound like I’m ruining my life by letting time pass by.
“Ma’am!” someone snaps, tapping my shoulder. I look up, startled. It takes me a second to place where I am and when I do, my cheeks flare with heat. Everyone in the coffee shop is staring at me like I’m causing some sort of scene. In their defense, I kind of did. I didn’t realize I was that spaced out. Honestly, I feel like I’m going a little nuts just standing here.
“Sorry,” I mutter, smiling apologetically at the barista who offers a sympathetic look. “Can I do a small Christmas cookie latte with an extra shot of espresso?”
The kind barista nods and smiles as she writes up my cup and rings it up for me. As I move to the space where my drink will come out, I’m careful not to let myself get too lost in my thoughts. It’s not like it’ll do much good anyway. The next several days are going to be stressful enough on their own without me dwelling on it. Thank goodness my parents rentedseveralcabins for the holidays. I get my own room this year, which means that I’ll be able to escape every once in a while. Maybe I’ll even be able to get some extra prep for next semester knocked out. I know I’m supposed to be on a holiday break for studying but even studying is less stressful than running the gauntlet with my relations.
Some part of me wonders if this year will somehow be different.
My cousin Belinda just had a baby a few months ago, didn’t she? Maybe everyone’s attention will be on her and the kid. Or maybe everyone will be tittering about my other cousin Marco—he got his girlfriend pregnant and now has to marry her. Surely everyone will be focused on giving them opinions on how to plan their wedding, right?
I breathe out a sigh as I step outside into the parking lot, my drink in hand.
“It’s okay, Lucia,” I whisper to myself as I plop down in the driver’s seat of my car. “It’s just Christmas. Everything is going to be—”
My phone starts to ring. I swallow hard and look down at the screen. My father is calling. I know why he’s calling—he’s probably wondering what my ETA is—but already I can feel my eye twitching as stress floods my systems. Even if I want to, I can’t just ignore the call, not when I’m still only a few hours out from the cabins.
“Ciao, Papa,” I say.
“Lucia!” I find myself smiling fondly at my father’s heavily accented voice. It’s not normally this thick, but it gets this way when he’s been spending time around lots of family. “Lucia,cara, are you there?”
“Si, Papa. I was just—”
“You are on your way home, yes?” He doesn’t wait for an answer. “Your mother and I have missed you so much. Thanksgiving was so strange without you, even your cousins have been talking about how excited they are to see you.”
My heart swells with warmth. It’s just enough to push the anxiety back into its corner. Every holiday for the Giovannis is a family event, and by family, I meaneveryone. I’m sure there are people who never talk to their cousins or their great aunts or distant uncles that you’re not sure how you’re related to. That’s not how the Giovannis do things, though. We’re a tightly knit group, for better or for worse. I used to be able to weather gathering better than I do, but as I’ve grown up, it’s gotten harder. After last year, I decided that I needed to save my sanity for school, which is why I didn’t go home for Thanksgiving. And now I’m beginning to wonder if that was a mistake, if it’ll be worse because I was off their radar for a few months.
“I missed you too,Papa,” I murmur, my head swimming.
“Good, now hurry here! Everyone is waiting and so excited to see you—”
Suddenly, there’s a commotion on the other end of the line. I can hear my father yelling something loudly in Italian as his voice fades into the background and another voice takes over the speaker. “Lucia, is that you?”
“Nonna?”
