Damn The Day I Met You

Chapter Twenty-Five

The room was silent as we all got situated. We sat around the kitchen table, waiting for someone to speak up. Finally Tristan takes the initiative and starts the conversation. He stares at my parents, “Mrs. DiGerlando, I believe the story starts with you.”

At first I thought my mom would be pissed at him for saying that or question how he knew she needed to start. But then she calmly nodded and squeezed my father’s hand before proceeding.  “As you know Katie, my parents died right after I graduated from high school. Dakota sent me on a summer vacation to Italy, basically forcing me to let go and adjust to everything. I agreed and went on the trip. But to make it more adventurous I pretended to be someone else. Juliana would never let go, and I couldn’t make her do that. So I kind of changed my look and my name. I had dyed my hair, worn colored contacts, and even got a tan. I also went by my middle name Skye. Well when I arrived to Italy and started to let go I got drunk and made quite a fool of myself.”

“Fool’s an understatement,” my dad mumbles but we all still heard.

She slaps his arm, “shut-up, you don’t enter yet. Like I was saying, I’m not a very sane drunk. I started being harassed by some guys and well your father here luckily had been walking by and took care of things.” I stared at her shocked. That’s not the story they told me on how they met. Sure it was in Italy and over that summer, but there was no mention of drinking. “Side note, your father was dressed as a knight—full shining armor costume. I was so out of it that I couldn’t remember what hotel I was staying at so I ended up at the apartment with him. As days went on we spent more and more time together until eventually he had me move into the guest bedroom to make hanging out easier. We traveled around to neighboring countries, took your aunt on grand adventures, and just had a fantastic time. But we both had school and summer vacation couldn’t last forever.”

She pauses and looks over at my dad for a moment before continuing. “Your father gave me his contact information, wanting to keep in touch. I didn’t give him mine though, thinking that, though I loved him, those feelings would go away along with the summer. So I headed back to Washington to start school. That’s when I found I was pregnant, with you obviously. I knew that your dad would have dropped out and left everything to take care of you, of us, and I didn’t want to do that to him. So even though I had his number, I never called it.”

Her eyes glance over to my dad again, this time passing the story along. “Your mother was stupid by the way. But I won’t go into that. She had left and I finished up school the next few years. During that time I did everything I could to forget about Sky and move on. There was no way for me to track her down so instead I went into player mode. I cannot recall the number of women I slept with over those years, and most of the names I have pushed out of my mind. But one of the many was Stephanie Bertina, and to be honest she was more of a regular. We ended up actually dating for a few months—I was trying to see if I could do a relationship again. What it showed me was that I definitely needed to find Skye because the whole dating thing wasn’t working out. So I broke it off with Stephanie, left my job, and headed for Washington State. I know, I know, it was a stupid move. I had her picture and kind of just went around the state asking people if they knew her. They didn’t. But I didn’t want to fully give up. I had a gut feeling that I’d run into her at some point or just fate would bring us back together. So I headed to Maine where I grew up and moved in with Dakota and Finn. I got a job, settled in a bit, but still kept my eyes and ears open for Skye.”

My mom looked like she wanted to laugh and cry at the same time, and I couldn’t blame her. The story was insane, and like he said, stupid. Who would go through all that trouble for just one person? “By now you were four Katie. We were living in Washington at the time. Also, by the time Adam got to Maine it had been about three months after leaving Italy. So he had been there for a while before I showed up. It was April when Dakota sent for me. She had just gotten engaged and wanted me in town for planning. I left you with Blake and headed across the country. Adam here ended up picking me up from the airport. He didn’t recognize me, due to all the changes, and I didn’t just blurt it out.