5.
Luca
ARRIVING late to a family dinner wasn’t anything unusual for Luca, lately. Running like a crazy man for Naz made it hard to be on time, not that anyone complained when he slid into his usual chair at his mother’s dining room table long after the food had been served.
Katya didn’t seem to mind when she beamed at him from her end of the table. Shit, there was a first time for everything. “I’ll grab you a plate, Luca.”
He knew better than to tell her to stay where she was—he was a grown man and was capable of fixing his own plate, but that wouldn’t matter to Katya. Guests that came for dinner at her home did very little but talk and eat.
Still, he tried.
“I can get it in a minute, Ma,” he told her.
Katya raised a brow. “I will. You sit.”
Right.
As he expected.
Katya left her chair and had to pass his to exit the dining room into the kitchen. On her way by, she patted the top of his head like one might do to a puppy. Except it didn’t bother him all that much. The fondness in his mother’s action was familiar and comforting in a way a lot of things weren’t for him. He might very well be a grown man, but he still adored his mom to the ends of the earth and back.
Even if sometimes, she drove him crazy.
Luca tried rejoining the conversation happening at the table. Or rather, get caught up on what Roz and Naz were chatting about with Penny and his father. Zeke, to his benefit, was only occasionally jumping in with something to say while Luca’s sister and Naz were doing the bulk of the work throughout the conversation with Penny.
He hadn’t seen her in a month, but she didn’t look ... any different, he supposed. In her case, he wasn’t sure if that was a good or bad thing, all things considered. She was still wearing a sweater that was at least five sizes too big but hey, it wasn’t black. It also wasn’t any color that would make her stand out either. The flat gray sweater with a logo on the front was a step up from her usual black, though. He had to give her that. She was still using her hair as a curtain between herself and anyone else that she didn’t want to converse with.
That just happened to be his father at the moment. Not that Zeke seemed very concerned with Penny’s attempt to distance herself from him.
For a brief second, Penny’s gaze lifted to find Luca sitting across from her at the table. A welcoming smile stretched his mouth; it was the only way he could seem encouraging when it was obvious she was starting to get uncomfortable.
The girl barely left the house. He was positive she hadn’t sat at his parents’ dinner table before now. Naz admitted to him the week before that trying to get Penny to do anything that involved other people was like pulling teeth.
In some ways, he understood that—her. He didn’t always want to engage, either. That didn’t change the fact he still had to and so he did. They all had to do shit they didn’t want to. It was a part of life.
But ...
Her life hadn’t been like theirs, either. Maybe it wasn’t fair of him to assume that she should behave the same way the rest of them did just because it’s what everyone else did.
Katya returned to the dining room with Luca’s plate in hand. She placed the ravioli casserole mess in front of him with a smile.
“Thanks. Ma.”
“Eat up,” she told him. “And there’s more if you want it.”
Oh, he would.
No doubt.
There was nothing quite like his mother’s cooking after he spent a day running from one side of the city to the other. The saucy pasta goodness flooded his mouth as the conversation picked up with Katya rejoining the table.
“Have we decided on something yet?” she asked once she was back in her chair. “I still think we should do the party thing. It’s only fair, Penny.”
Luca glanced up, still not entirely caught up on the conversation that had been happening before he even arrived. He knew it had something to do with Penny simply because of the way the attention at the table continued going back to her, but everyone seemed to want to tiptoe around whatever topic they were trying to discuss.
His mother didn’t have the couth for that. She was never one to beat around the bush. Not when she had something to say and the time to say it, anyway.
“You didn’t even let Roz throw you a party for your seventeenth birthday months ago.” Despite Katya’s kind smile leveling on Penny from the other end of the table from the teenage girl, it wasn’t working to encourage anything. Penny settled on tipping her head down and using her fork to push around what remained on her plate while not even entertaining the idea of replying to Luca’s mother. Katya didn’t appear offended, instead saying, “Your graduation and eighteenth birthday are right around the same time—within a few weeks, anyway. Why not just let us throw you something for both? One party instead of two.”
“We’re still trying to figure out the details,” Roz put in when Penny stayed silent. “Right, Penny?”
The girl only shrugged.
That did make Luca’s mom frown.
Katya’s gaze darted down the table to where Zeke sat sipping on a glass of red wine as if she was trying to get him to engage Penny alongside her. His father continued to drink his wine like he had nothing better to do at the moment.
How long had they been at this with Penny?
Too long, apparently.
“Excuse me,” Penny muttered, standing from the table without warning. She didn’t even bother to explain why she was leaving the table—a sign of disrespect at an Italian family’s table if there ever was one—before she headed out of the dining room without a look over her shoulder.
Roz sighed at the exit. “Well, that’s that.”
“Sorry,” Naz said to Katya. “Sometimes she’s just ... not in the mood. She was up for dinner today, but I don’t think she’s ready to talk parties and everything else.”
“I get it,” his mother murmured.
She seemed fine.
Luca wondered if Katya really was.
“The more you push, the easier it is for her to move away.”
All eyes at the table turned on Luca at his seemingly random statement. But hell, if anyone had been paying attention, it wouldn’t be random. Nothing about Penny screamed approachable or willing ... yet, people seemed to think they could change that about her if only they tried harder.
It wouldn’t happen.
Not unless she wanted it to.
He also knew why his family kept trying to get Penny to open up. They cared enough to do anything at all. He doubted it came across that way to her, though. When all someone wanted to do was disappear, being seen wasn’t exactly a good thing.
Then, Luca pointed at the food on his plate and grinned at his mother, saying, “But this is delicious, Ma. Really.”
Katya beamed again. “Thank you.”
At least, one thing was okay.
Luca could handle that.
Later, when his mother was distracted with clearing the table and the topic of Roz’s pregnancy, Luca slipped away from the table knowing he wouldn’t be missed. At least, not for a few minutes. It was all he needed.
He found Penny in the entry hall sitting on the stairs. With her back to the white railing, she wasn’t even pretending to be busy while she picked at her fingernails and avoided his stare as he leaned against the wall. That was fine—he didn’t mind that she wanted to ignore him. It wouldn’t stop him from saying what he was there to say.