Gio doesn’t argue.

The sight of the food turns him to putty, and with one more frustrated breath, he goes over to the sofa and flops down, staring out the window. “How long was I asleep?”

“About four hours.”

The place down the block is a Mediterranean one, cheap and fast. The food smells delicious. I fill both our plates with fragrant marinated chicken and heaps of rice. There are two more containers in the bag, and I carry them over first. Crushed lentil soup. It’s one of my favorites. I put them both on the coffee table in front of Gio and he picks one up in his big hands, cupping it as if he’s cold.

I bring the plates.

I bring forks.

I bring napkins, and last I bring one of the bags, the top rolled down. “Naan.”

“Thank you.” There’s a hitch in his voice. I gracefully ignore it and settle onto the sofa next to him.

The food tastes like it was literally sent down from heaven. For a while, we don’t say anything.

“You didn’t have to do this,” Gio says into the stillness.

“Do what?” I take another bite of rice and let the delicate flavor melt into my tongue.

“Bring food for me.”

I clear my throat. “In a way, it’s your own gift to yourself.”

He raises his eyebrows.

“I don’t have any money, so...”

Gio laughs out loud. “Christ. You took my shoes and my wallet? You should be a Moretto, not a Ricci. You didn’t leave any stone unturned, did you?” He puts his plate, empty, onto the table.

I put down my plate and pull the wallet from my brand-new pocket. “I kept it under control at the store.”

He takes the wallet back, but his fingers brush mine. It’s like tinder igniting, but I don’t want to pull away. I want to keep my hand in the flame. Gio must feel it too, because he takes both my hands in his, the smooth leather of his wallet between them. “Even if you hadn’t kept it under control, how could I blame you?” There’s something strange in his voice. An apology? Yes, but more than that, too.

“How could you, really?” The touch of his hand warms me from my wrists to my toes, and I have the sudden urge to blurt out the fact at the heart of me. After I was afraid of dying, I’d been afraid of something else. Now I’m not afraid.

“I owe you.” He glances at the plates. “You didn’t have to think of me. Not this way.”

“I knew you’d be hungry.” I shrug one shoulder. “It wasn’t a big deal.”

“It was,” he insists. “I can’t remember—” His voice cuts out, and he tries again. “I can’t remember the last time someone did that for me.”

“My uncle always cooked for us.” My memory travels over the lines of him in the kitchen, half at battle. “He never liked it, though. My mother, on the other hand?” I can’t help the big smile that crosses my face. “She loved to cook. She loved to bake. She’d surprise me after school sometimes, with a cake for the two of us, and we’d sit there and eat it until we were practically sick—” I laugh, but halfway through, it turns into a sob. My throat is tight with the sweetness of that cake, of her laugh beside me on the couch in the shitty apartments we’d shared before we moved in with my uncle.

“You miss her.” Gio’s voice is reverent, wondering.

I swallow down the tears. “You know, it’s been ten years.” The images come fast and thick. The wasting of her. The defeat of her. The death. “I don’t think I’m over it.” I look back into his eyes. “But you must know how that is. It must be the same for you.”

His face is written over with compassion. “No,” he says, even and soft. “I don’t remember much about my mother. What I miss is...” He pauses, like the words are hard to come by. “I miss the shadow of her. The her that never was. All those things that she would have done for me. With me. Not that my father was...” He trails off with a shake of his head. “He was a good father.”

“But it wasn’t how it was supposed to be.” I might have a more graphic image of what it’s like to lose a parent, but I know the bone-shattering sadness of what could have been. My voice rings with it.

Gio raises a hand and tucks a lock of my hair behind my ear, and his touch screams that I am something precious, something he’s never seen in all his life. “How could he do this?” It’s half-murmured, almost to himself.

“How could who do what? You’re very cryptic now. Did you know that?”

“How could my father turn us against each other? How could he do that when you’re the missing piece?”

I can’t breathe. I can hardly blink. My chest swells with warmth and light. We’re opposite sides of the same coin, Gio and I. We both live and breathe our loss. The women who disappeared from our lives shaped us into these people. It sweeps over me, a heavy wave. He’s the only one who can understand. He is the only one.

I kick hard for the surface, drawing in a breath that clears my head. “Don’t let him, Gio.” I sound desperate, like he’s clutching the only available live preserver and I’m drowning in the ocean. “Don’t let him turn us against each other. I—” The truth tumbles out. “I want you so much.”

He pulls me close in and I am overwhelmed by the scent of him, the mint and man of him. “In spite of everything?”

“Fuck it.” I can hardly force my voice above a whisper. “Don’t let them take you away from me.”

He kisses me then, an explosion of passion and fury, and the rest of the world ceases to exist.