My Italian Nightmare

Chapter 31: Revelations

Teo handed me his lighter while he stretched out on our big blanket, breathing out white smoke rings that vanished into the air. "Can you teach me how to do that?", I asked and lit up my own cigarette, before handing the lighter back. "Sure, I can try! But it took me a lot of time to perfect it", Teo replied and grinned crookedly. I lay down on my stomach and tried to watch Edoardo and Hanna, who were swimming pretty far away from us in the sea. Teo followed my gaze and raised a brow. "So, Ari, what's with Edoardo and you? What the hell did we miss there?" I sighed and looked at him, then at Valentina who looked curiously over Teo's shoulder.
"I don't know honestly. I'm confused myself. It all kinda started after we facetimed this one time and then I was at a party and Edoardo texted me this weird proposal on Instagram..." I tried to sum up our conversation from that night and Val and Teo first stared at me with big eyes, then burst into a giggle which I eventually joined in.
"Jesus, Edo my love", Val sighed and shook her head so her blonde her fell into her face. "You must know Ari, he really didn't mean to offend you. He is the kindest person I know. He just...has a little hard time with communication sometimes."
"I mean, actually he's a great communicator", Teo interjected. He's just...very direct. You have to get used to it."
"Right", Val agreed and continued, "but also, he keeps to himself a lot. Even with us...I honestly didn't have an idea he fancied Ari, did you?", she asked directed at Teo whose mouth slightly twitched.
"I mean...", he grinned and shrugged, "I could kinda tell, the way he casually asked me things about you", he said looking at me, "and also, let's be serious, he was never interested in this whole groupie business – why would he be interested in it now? I think this whole uh...proposal, was more of an...excuse, don't you think?" Val nodded slowly. "Yeah, that actually makes more sense. Well, it was a little bit awkward, but in the end it worked, didn't it, Ari?" She smirked at me and I blushed, shrugging my shoulders.
"I don't know. I am...I'm so in between...I mean, what about Angelo? I feel...I feel so guilty", I said quietly and quickly looked away from Val and Teo.
"Ari...", Val started and I looked back at her, "I feel like maybe you should hear the whole story." She exchanged a glance with Teo who nodded, but she still hesitated for a brief moment.

"You know about the whole, 'we are not allowed to hook with fans anymore' rule, right?"
I nodded and fetched another cigarettes from my pack.
"This all started when Angelo met this girl – a fan – she was very persistent, was front row at every concert and eventually caught Angelo's attention. Basically, when we got up fans on stage, she slipped Angelo a note with her number – and he called her afterwards, asking her to come backstage." I took a long drag from my cigarette and watched the fume escaping from the end of it.
"How was she?", I asked, not sure if I actually wanted to hear the answer.
"At first, really nice", Teo now answered and reached over, signaling he wanted to take a drag from my cigarette. I handed it to him and he put it to his lips. "She was...she was not really interested in us, only Angelo. We didn't see much of her. They vanished for a while and we kinda knew what was going on."
"Mhhm", Val made and tucked a strand of her hair behind her ear. "Then they stayed in contact for... a couple weeks maybe? After that it started to go downhill pretty fast." She sighed and Teo had put on a grim expression, when he handed me my cigarette back.
"You probably know, I mean...we got popular so fast, so quick...it was absolutely crazy", he said and frowned slightly. "Nothing could have prepared us. I mean, it's great, to make a living doing the thing you love. But..." He shook his head and Val continued: "The pressure is pretty intense. The amount of people who suddenly want something from you, the people who recognize you on the street, the fans on social media, everything. It's a lot."
"So how should we know how to act, how to handle things like this? I honestly didn't even think groupies were still at thing", Teo added and shifted his position, supporting his chin with his hands. "We couldn't know and Angelo couldn't either. He was just happy that a pretty girl gave him so much attention–"
"She straight up worshipped him. I mean, it was crazy. She was so devoted to him, it wasn't healthy at all. But he didn't see that.", Val interrupted and Teo nodded. "She did not care for him as a person, only as a celebrity", she finished and suddenly looked rather angry.
I listened to their story in silence, my heart racing. I couldn't help comparing this girl to me, even though I knew my story was different.