Closer Enought

Vicenzo De Angelis

I wiped the back of my hands over my lips, wiping away the bitterness of loss and the poison of envy as I remembered those dilated pupils asking to talk to Giovanni about the deal, the silky touch of his hand on my skin causing shivers that only he and she were capable of cause.

Goosebumps crept up my spine like an omen.

I strode to the SUV calling a smiling Dominus for the morning's gift, took the driver's seat pulling the car towards the center of town with my mind swarming with tortuous thoughts.

I reached the heavy traffic on the avenues at lunchtime right in the center of New York, the silence inside the car, the people passing by. One moment in the middle of the city and the next entering the silent street of condominiums, stopping at a house far away, I went down accompanied by the soldier.

Pausing on the now-dead grass of the small garden, I walked to the back entrance, taking the key hidden in the false bottom of my wallet