Salted Wounds | 18+

FORTY

KARINA

Leonardo and I had spent almost every waking day together. He had taken me to bookstores, theatres, and art galleries. It reminded me of the first time we had met and how we did the exact same things. Would I consider those dates? No. But did I still have butterflies in my stomach? Yes. Our sex was amazing, amazing wasn't the word. We'd fucked nearly everywhere.

The kitchen table

The bathtub

The greenhouse

His room

My room.

Even pressed against the window of his balcony.

I felt so fucking good, like we were invincible. I had been on birth control and we both knew we were clean. I had called Bianca every week and she had told me how she was recovering. She had hated the way doctors had spoken to her, as if she was fragile and delicate. As if she could relapse at any moment. I was no better, I'd treated her the exact same way when she relapsed for the first time as if she was going to break. I was used to walking around eggshells when it had come to Bianca, I didn't want to say the wrong thing or trigger her to do something.

I hadn't spoken to Aldo since we had said goodbye to Bianca. I wanted to give him some time to himself to process. I knew this wasn't the best time for space as our bestest friend had left for rehab but I was afraid. Aldo had never been angry at me before, even the one time when I took his toy spiderman from him. He had just stayed calm and content, unbothered. I still had the spiderman in one of my boxes in my room, I had never given it back to him because I was afraid, afraid that he would explode and never forgive me. Now the time had actually come, the time when he exploded and I didn't know what to do or how to deal with it.

I had eventually told my parents about the burning, they were distraught. They didn't understand why I would do such a thing to myself. Surprisingly, I didn't know myself. My mother anticipated that it had something to do with the divorce and blamed everything on my father for cheating but my mother was not innocent. My parents got me a therapist, who I'd speak to every 3 days of my choice. Dr Ackernan, she was Canadian but she had lived in italy for a while, she had a pet cat Luna. It was a blue and brown birman and ragdoll mix with clean white fur. She was a beautiful woman, her skin dark and golden, her hair in a puff.

The first few sessions with Dr Ackerman, I didn't say a word. I thought the point and idea of a shrink was stupid, they'd listen to you being soppy and sad about having a shit childhood and then scribble on their notebook and diagnose you. I had then spoken to Bianca and she had convinced me it was worth a try. She was gutted to hear that I was hurting myself but she had told me that the one thing we had in common was that we were hurting ourselves without realising we were doing so. So I went through with the sessions and they began to help, I had actually begun to look forward to them.

The evening after my session, I got home and I noticed the house was quiet.There had been a storm outside. I grabbed  a lemonade from the kitchen and headed into the living room to see my father reading on the couch. I take a seat beside him and he begins to clear his throat whilst raising his glasses to his head.

"Are you excited for the internship?" he smiles putting a finger between the pages of his book

Oh right. The internship, I had almost forgotten.

"Y-Yeah I am." I say plopping myself on the couch next to him. I turn to him and see that he is raising his brow at me.

"If you say so," he hums.

Silence fills this air for a while and I focus my attention on the rain outside.

"I am happy you told us about the burning amore mio." He finally adds. I could see by the look on his face that he had been dying to bring up this topic.