Before You Say Goodbye

45

Early, the next morning, I helped Alice clean the place. With the house being locked, empty, the amount of dust that had collected – and not to mention the number of spiders living here without paying rent – should be illegal. Alice had already hired someone to clean the place before we got here, turns out their version of cleaning didn't include the living room and the kitchen – only the bedrooms were cleaned and new sheets were put on beds, but the kitchen and the living room were a complete mess.

Alice had warned Cruz to not go anywhere close to the fireplace until we had a chance to clean it – turns out that's the place the rats in the house liked to inhabit. Guess who else won't go anywhere near the fireplace? That's right – me.

Alice told me so many funny stories about Viktor and Roman as young children – it cracked me up so hard that at one point I had to stop and hold in my laughing because my stomach was cramping so bad. I, so badly wanted to ask her about her children – I didn't know if her son was the father of the boys or if it's her daughter. At one point, I even opened my mouth to ask, but then something in the kitchen beeped and Alice went to check on it. Before she came back, my mind was changed – if I wanted to know about Roman's parents, Roman should be the one to tell me.

She pointed to one of the pictures hanging behind the couch in the living room. It was probably a few years older. In the picture, a younger, carefree version of Roman was side-hugging a younger Viktor who had a big grin on his face. Alice and another man, probably her husband stood beside the boys, only having eyes for each other. It looking like it was such a candid picture that showed the genuineness of the love they had for each other.

"That was when we went to Amalfi – it's a small town in Italy. I was born and brought up there," she said running a cloth over the picture, wiping off any dirt on it, "This is my husband, Gio. Giovanni De Niro. It was in college that I first met him, stole my heart the moment my eyes landed on him. God, he was so handsome."

I smiled, deciding that I liked listening to her talk. I wiped the small table in front of the couch, "What was he like?"

"Oh, he was wonderful, Addie. He was so kind, so compassionate and god, he was so humorous! He made me laugh – it was magical the first few months we started to date. I couldn't wipe the smile off my face, at some point, my jaw hurt, that was how much I was smiling."

"Let me guess, you got married soon after?" I asked, half-teasing her as she turned to look at me, blushing like a teenager.

"You bet we did," she said, "I was very young – barely eighteen. My parents were so happy that I found an Italian man; and his family came reeking of money, so that made my family happier. Leeches they were, thought they could live off Gio's money. Too bad for them, we already knew the moment he marries me his family would disown him. The only thing we had to ourselves was the immense amount of love we had for each other and a couple of hundred dollars. We had to start our life together with that and not even a degree."

"And then?" I sat cross-legged on the floor, absolutely engrossed in hearing her love story, "How did you guys make a living?"

"We worked odd jobs for the first few years. Both of us," she nodded, "And then we saved money so Gio can go back to college. He got a degree in law and went on to become a great lawyer. Then he supported me while I went back to college, got a job here in a fishery as an accountant. Then we bought this house together. Got blessed us with two kids – a boy and a girl. Raised them. Celebrated with them when they got married. Held our first grandchild, and then came the other, and then the other, and then a few more. We went on vacations together. He took care of me when I got sick. I held his hands as he took in his last breath. And that was three years ago."