The Other Dibenedetto Girl

I sat in Jimmy’s car beside Zack as we looked at Valary and Matt’s house. Zack insisted on coming along because it-supposedly-“would help convince them” since he was their best friend and they always valued his opinion. I highly doubted that they would listen to him on this one. They most likely already had their minds made up and were going to hate me whether we liked it or not. I would not really care either way, honestly. All I was happy with was that I now had Zack, and he had me. He and Jimmy were the only people I needed in my life, so I didn’t care about anyone else.

“Yes, you do,” Jimmy said, turning the car off. “Valary’s in there, so Michelle would be too. You can apologize to them both and get it over with already.”

Jimmy had already given me a speech about how I should let go of the past and learn to accept my sisters because they loved me. I reminded him that Michelle picked the fight with me, but he disclosed that by saying she was drunk and I should have ignored her and walked away. Then added that I never walked away from a fight and that was my problem.

“I’ve walked away before,” I told him.

“Oh really?” He said with sarcasm, “When?”

“This one time in kindergarten. A boy threw a crayon at me, and I ignored him.”

Zack laughed, “Because you knew you’d get in trouble.”

“She’d get into trouble whether it be kindergarten or when she’s seventy-years-old,” Jimmy said. “Anyways, let’s just go inside and see how they react, okay?”

“Fine.”

I sighed deeply as I watched Jimmy exit the car. I felt Zack grab my hand; he squeezed it gently and placed a kiss on my cheek. He whispered something about everything being okay; that he would still be with me if they didn’t like it. He said he would learn how to deal with it.

“I don’t wanna lose you again,” Zack said softly to me. “I don’t think I could live with myself if I just let you walk away again.”

A grin went across my face when I heard him say these words to me. We both shared a kiss, and then Jimmy opened the door for me. I playfully pushed him when I saw the large smirk on his face, practically saying “you’ve-done-him-probably”. I felt the butterflies in my stomach whirl up a storm when I got a real look at Valary’s house. I was not sure what would happen once I get in there, because there were so many possibilities. They could accept me; reject me; think about it for a while; forgive me; tell me to get out or become like I did and be cold to me like I was with them. It kind of hurt thinking back to Valary’s sad appearance when she watched me leave. I should have gotten out of the car. I should have done something to apologize.

‘You still hated her at the time,’ A voice told me, ‘You didn’t want to apologize to her. You wanted her to apologize to you. You wanted to make her feel guilty. You wanted her to regret ever inviting you. You wanted to get as far from this place then and now. You wanted to hurt them and break their hearts. There were so many things you had wanted, but now you’ve gone all soft. You don’t have to apologize. You did nothing wrong. What’s happened to you? Ever since Zack coaxed you into doing this, and Jimmy pressuring you to make peace, you’ve been a big sap about it. You were never a sap. You were a rock once. Be a rock again.’

I thought I was crazy for thinking these things as I walked up the stone pathway to the front door. I tried to think of how much better things would be if this went right. I could move back and live with Zack; try to make friends with my sisters and get to know their friends. Jimmy and I could hang out more; I could get my own studio so I could sell my paintings or something. A lot of good could from this act.

‘But who says it will last, Melanie?’ The voice spoke again, ‘Nothing that you ever thought was good had lasted long. What if Zack’s just making all this romantic shit up and is just gonna hit it and quit it before you could even blink? What if they don’t accept your apology? What if everything falls apart? You can go back to being alone. Don’t you want that? Didn’t you like the solitude you had? The constant routine that kept you sane? What are you gonna do about everything in New York? You’re just gonna dump that to live a fake fairytale life here with Zack and his tribe of morons? You know you can’t.’

I have to give it a try. I heard the faint sound of Jimmy knocking on the door; Zack lacing his fingers with mine. I felt like I was miles away from everything; sunken into my own thoughts and the voice that was trying to convince me to run. It said that I should run while I still had time. There were too many bad memories to just come back like it was all just swell and dandy, because it really wasn’t. What if this part was right?

‘I am right, well you are.’ I thought again, ‘You can still catch a plan to New York before the Christmas rush in a few days. You got the cash stashed in your bag. Come on, Melanie. Just give this all up and you can be happy again.’

‘No,’ another part said, ‘This can work, Melanie. You can feel it deep down inside. Think of the people that want-would want-you to stay here: Zack really does love you; Jimmy has always cared; His wife seems to like you a lot, and everyone else can once they see the real you. Don’t give up and run away, Mel. Stay. Stay and see what happens. You’ll never know until you give it a shot.’

I nodded to myself as the front door swung open. I looked up to see Matt standing there, catching me in his sights immediately and glaring a bit. I knew this was gonna happen. He was going to stop me from seeing Valary because she’s probably crying like the little baby she is. I’m not surprised if he caters to her every whim. Valary’s always had everything given to her on a platter because our dad liked her more than me. I’m sure she makes her husband do the same.

“Hey M,” Jimmy said friendly, “Is Val home?”

“Maybe,” He said a bit stone-faced. “It’s not like she would want to see her anyways.”

I really wanted to hit him. I could do it too, but the part from before was telling me to hold back. It would just make me look worse.

“She’s here to apologize for what she did,” Zack said, standing in front of me. “We brought her here so she can talk with Val. She feels really bad.”

“Then how come she’s not saying it? Did she become mute all of a sudden?”

Why was he making this so fucking difficult?

“Just let her talk with Valary, dude,” Jimmy pleaded. “We promise she won’t cause any trouble. I’ll make sure of it, you know that.”

“I don’t-“

“Get out of the fucking way!”

I ducked underneath his arm and walked right into his living room. As I expected, Valary was sitting on her couch with her knees locked together and her arms rested on her thighs. I figured Jimmy had told her ahead of time that I’d be coming over with him. She looked a little nervous having me here; perhaps even worried I might wreck something. I hoped it didn’t go there. The small good part wanted to remain calm and talk this whole thing out. The other part wanted to just rush out all the way to New York.

Unluckily, Michelle was there too. Valary must have called her over. She was seated comfortably in an armchair near the couch and glaring at me. I nearly laughed when I spotted the large bruise on her cheek. I had hit her harder than I had contemplated.

“What are you doing here?” Michelle said to me.

“I wanted to talk with Valary in private,” I looked right at Valary, who stared right back.

“Get the fuck out of my-“Matt started, but Valary interrupted him.

“Matt, please,” She said to him gently. “I want to talk with her. Can you guys give us a minute?”

Matt seemed to relax a bit and then walked to the kitchen nearby, Zack and Jimmy following him. I felt the tension spread throughout the room as the three of us sat there. I was not so sure if I wanted to do this anymore. I knew I should give it a try, but I was actually scared. Me. Melanie, was scared of something for once. I was never good with confrontations, which is why I always waited for Him to charge at me rather than do it first.

“Melanie,” Valary said, sitting facing me, “There’s a lot of stuff that had happened in the past, and I know it must be tough to get over. It wasn’t as easy for us either.”

“How?” I asked, “What kind of struggle did you go through? I’d like to know.”

“You didn’t see him after he left,” Michelle answered. “He actually got worse because he had no one to beat on, so he picked on Mom.”

I was silent. I had never known that he had hit her too. I had guessed it once, because I knew he would never hurt them. I looked away from them and ran a hand through my hair. I should have stayed then, if I had known he would turn on her. He did always blame her for stuff; for what? I’m not exactly. Now, it’s too late to ask.

“You never knew that, huh?” Michelle said, “Yeah, he hit her too. We watched him do it too; I even tried to stop him once, and look what he did.” She lifted her shirt to show a scar going across her side. “He had thrown me onto the floor and that hook we used to have there cut me. He said that if he ever tried it, I’d get even worse than that-“

“You would have,” I said to her. “I mean, look what he had done to me.”

I lifted my own shirt to show them the various scars I had from times he had cut me with his knife. “You remember that knife he used to carry for work? Yeah, he didn’t use it for just work. You say you just got cut by accident…He tried to kill me.”

They both gave me dumbfounded faces. They had not known that. “If you had been around, you would know this stuff,” I said.

Valary spoke, “We’re really sorry, Melanie. When we started having to take care of Mom, we saw how bad it was. I thought about what it must have been like for you, and it hurt that we didn’t help you out. We were just really-“

“-Scared? I’ve heard the excuse before,” I said to her. “I think you had every right to be, actually. Neither of you would have had the balls to take him on the way I did. You both fled whenever he started yelling. I was the one who got hurt trying to defend myself from him-“

“-Yeah, because you’re such a little hero,” Michelle said. “You didn’t have to put up with his shit. You could have just done what we had done-“

“-He would have caught me anyways. He let you guys go whenever he was angry, but me…He would chase me until he had me. That man was probably the most vicious, evil monster I’ve ever heard of. Nothing is worse than a drunken 6-foot man trying to forget his own problems. They can get nasty. You should know if you’ve seen him do it to Mom.”

They were both quiet, before Michelle said, “Is there a real reason you’re here? Besides telling us your little sob story.”

“Yeah, I came to apologize to Valary for what happened last night. I should have kicked your ass outside instead of spilling blood on her floor.”

“Oh please, I could have-“

“-Trust me on this and take some advice: Never fight a person who’s been fighting for years. Dad was a huge guy; you’re a little skinny piece of shit. I could’ve destroyed you without even blinking. Luckily for you, your fiancé was there to save you and pull you back. Plus, you started fight by throwing a beer can at my head. You practically asked for it.”

“She’s right, Chelle,” Valary said to her. “You did start it.”

Michelle gave up the argument and looked away from us. Valary looked at me. “You really don’t have to apologize-“

“-I’m also apologizing for being so mean to you when you were just trying to be nice to me. I didn’t even want to be here; I wanted to stay home, but I thought I should see Mom be buried, since she had loved me more than anything,” ‘Even you two’ “I should have seen that you felt terrible about our past and wanted to make a fresh start. I’m sorry for that, and the things I’ve said to you.”

“So,” She said quietly, “You wanna start fresh? Wipe the slate and try to be-“

“-Civilized people hanging out together in a nice setting, yes…”

“I was gonna say ‘friends’…”

“Don’t push it please.”

Valary seemed to cheer up a bit and relax. “Okay, that’s fine. Anyways, I’m glad you’re staying because you would have missed out whatever you got in the will.”

“Will?”

“Yeah, Mom’s lawyer has said that she had written a will while she was in the hospital. He told us he left us all something, including you. It’s gonna be in a few days, since they have to overlook everything before giving the stuff to us.”

“Oh, okay.”

If my mother loved me the way Rodney said she did, and then I must have gotten something alright.