STOLEN SMILE [ GXG ]

CATERINA

 
"Give a girl the right shoes, and she can conquer the world."

-Marilyn Monroe

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I STOPPED SHORT IN AUDREY'S doorway and closed my eyes in disbelief.

"Papà is going to kill you," I told her.

"Good," she muttered, adding a long arc with her paintbrush to the canvas that leaned against the wall. The painting would be a rainbow if it wasn't all black.

My sister had been brooding since Ryan came over. She went to her classes, but otherwise stayed in her room. The week crawled by with her casting a black cloud over the house with her emo paintings and sappy music. I was beginning to feel guilty again, but there wasn't a part of me that wanted to put myself in her place. I'd rather have a wife who wasn't so rude, wasn't such a womanizer as I'd heard, and truthfully less beautiful. Maybe that sounded odd, but to me it made perfect sense.

Laughter filtered up the stairs, and I closed my eyes once more. Audrey's engagement party had started five minutes ago, and she currently sat cross-legged on her floor in overalls, covered in paint.

I could see Papa's temper not far in the distance, and I would feel its heat just because I was such an easy target. Audrey never reacted when our papà raged at her, and it annoyed him, so he turned it on me.

"What on earth could you be thinking right now?" I headed toward her closet, not looking forward to digging through costumes to find the rare dress she could wear.

"That I hate my fiancé. She's rude, and you've seen her, right? Can you even imagine us having sex, Caterina?"

I paused, gave my head a shake, and continued pushing clothes on hangers aside. "Um, no. I'm not going to try to imagine that."

She sighed. "A couple of hours ago I realized I would have to have sex with her."

I made a noise of acknowledgment, not surprised it had taken her this long to come to that assumption. The obvious was like the hidden secrets of the world in Audrey's eccentric mind. Surprising, as she'd always aced her schoolwork and had more friends than I could ever hope for.

"And I kept thinking, maybe there's a reason she manspreads so much? She has a dick can you imagine a girl having a dick but that's not the problem . I'm sure her is big that's why she manspread so much . Then I began to worry, so I started looking up pictures-well, videos of women her size, naked, and that only made me worry more."

"You were watching porn," I said, deadpan, standing in the closet doorway and watching her paint Mr. Rabbit beneath the black rainbow.

She tilted her head to eye her masterpiece. "Yeah, I guess that's what it's called."

"Audrey!"

My sister groaned, and I looked toward the door. Mamma wore a red cocktail dress and an angry expression. A slew of Italian flew past her lips as she snatched the dress from my hand and then smacked Audrey on the back of the head. "Shower, now!"

Audrey grumbled and got to her feet.

"And porn!" More Italian. "What were you thinking?"

A laugh escaped me.

Mamma shot me a glare, and I turned it into a cough. She had always shown up at the most inopportune times. We couldn't get away with anything.

"Caterina, go pacify the Melgren. Lord forbid she starts shooting the guests again."