Chapter Text
“Hey Giulia,” Alberto knocked on his sister’s door. “My salvataggio shirt get put in with your laundry?”
“I dunno. It’s probably at your boyfriend’s house.”
“Haha very funny since I don’t have one.
“How about the guy you dumped Luca for?”
“I didn’t dump--wait. How’d you know about that?”
“I’m Luca’s friend, too. He actually tells me things. Unlike some people.”
Alberto growled through the door. He had noticed she’d been a bit stand-offish with him recently. He hadn’t gotten to talk to Giulia about whatever had put him on her shit list since he’d been dealing with being the center of a weird human/sea monster love triangle. . . thing.
“Can I come in? I’m gonna be late.”
“Guess so.”
He leaned in the door to find Giulia sitting on her bed. She folded her arms and tried not to glare directly at her brother. Alberto saw the shirt right away, folded on her dresser. He couldn’t help but give her the side-eye as he picked it up.
“Ugh,” she rolled her eyes. “Don’t tell me you don’t have a boyfriend and then come in here with a hickey.”
Alberto yelped and put a hand on his neck. Right. His sea monster nipped him. He hadn’t broken skin but it must have been hard enough to bruise.
“It’s, uh. . . complicated?”
“Who is this person, anyway?” she asked. “The only person you’ve been all over is Luca.”
“I’ll have to tell you later,” he said, pulling the shirt over his head. “I’m gonna be late if I try to explain right now.”
~*~*~*~
On an empty street, Alberto ripped down a reward poster with more force than was probably necessary before ripping it up and throwing it away. He had started taking down any reward posters he saw for sea monsters. The people of Portorosso wanted his lover’s head and he didn’t like being reminded of it. Had any of them actually talked to a sea monster? No. They threw their harpoons and asked questions later. Alberto wanted to figure out a way to destroy his father’s news clipping wall full of sightings held up by knives, but he knew he’d have to make it look like an accident. He grew up with that wall and it had never bothered him before. It was just a fact of living in the Marcovaldo home. Now. . . Now when he looked at it he was filled with dread. The thought of his sea monster dead by his father’s hands. . .
Alberto snarled and ripped down another poster.
He wondered what Luca thought of sea monsters. He’d noticed that whenever Luca saw some of the art around town of sea monsters being killed he got nervous. Alberto figured his friend just didn’t like violence. . .
He hadn’t seen Luca in a week. What if Luca never came back? What if his sea monster never came back? What if he’d just lost Luca for nothing?
Who had he been using the most? Had he been using Luca to get over the sea monster, then the sea monster to get over Luca? Luca had riled him up before he’d met the sea monster again. He’d slept in his bed, held his hand, promised him more. . . then Alberto had rejected him. A couple days later he’d made out with someone he barely knew but somehow loved more than he had any right to.
Alberto almost wished the sea monster hadn’t shown. It’s what Alberto deserved. To be alone. He didn’t deserve either of them. He’d just fuck up their lives like he did everything else--
Alberto stopped and put a hand over his Silenzio Bruno tattoo, took a deep breath, and let the words go.
~*~*~*~
Alberto could only avoid Giulia for so long since they lived in the same house and all. She pretty much cornered him in his room after dinner that night.
“Pretty sure everyone at the party thought you and Luca were together if they didn’t already,” Giulia said, arms folded and a slight glare in her brown eyes. “You were laying it on thick, too. Warning Matteo off of him, looking into his eyes as you sang Elvis. There might have been a pool going over if you two fucked that night or not.”
“Is this going somewhere, Giulietta?” Alberto snapped. Unlike their father, Alberto only called her that when he was annoyed.
“You lead my friend on then left him high and dry for someone else and you better have a damn good reason for it!” she shouted, an angry finger in his face.
Alberto growled and slapped her hand away from him.
“I love Luca. I do. But. . . Shit, Giulia, I can’t. . . He deserves better. He deserves someone who won’t leave him for. . .” Alberto bit his lip and turned his back to her, hands grabbing his hair in frustration.
“For what, Beto?”
Alberto took a few deep breaths and let his body relax. His hands let go of his hair and fell limp at his sides.
“. . . Remember when I nearly drowned?”
“Like I’d forget.”
“I lied. About not knowing who saved me. I needed to protect him.”
He pulled out his most recent drawing pad and started flipping through it until he found one of the more recent pictures of his sea monster. It was one of his favorites that he’d colored with pastels.
“You can’t tell anyone. Not even papa. Especially not papa. Clear?”
“Crystal.”
He took a deep breath to brace himself and handed her the drawing. Giulia blinked at it for a moment. After the shock wore off she gave a surprised laugh, looking at her brother for the punchline. Just the look on Alberto’s face told her there wasn’t one. She turned back to the drawing, taking in every detail.
“Santa mozzarella.”
“I know.”
“He saved you?”
“Yeah. He sat with me until I woke up. I guess he got me to shore, too. Can’t remember that part cause, y’know. Passed out.”
“You’re sure this wasn’t some vivid hallucination?”
“I wasn’t sure for a long time, then when I found him again. . . lets just say he felt very real.” Alberto motioned to the bruise on his neck.
“Whoa whoa whoa-- did you have sex with a sea monster?!”
“No!” Not for lack of trying, though. . . “No, we just y’know. . . kissed a little.”
“You made out with a sea monster?!”
“Judgy much? Geeze Giules. . .”
“What was that like?”
“Wet.”
“Well obviously.”
Alberto laughed and watched his sister flip through his secret sketchbook. It felt good to have his secret out to someone.
“Not mad at me anymore?” he asked.
“Oh, I’m still furious with you over what you did to Luca, stupido.”
“Fair,” Alberto said, nodding his understanding.
“He’s crazy about you.”
“I’m crazy about him, too.”
“But you’re also in love with a sea monster which is. . . also crazy.”
“It’s fucked up is what it is.”
“You got me there.” She closed the book with a sigh. “So, just so we’re clear: you’re dating a sea monster?”
“Sort of? It’s not like we can date exactly, I mean. . . He’s kinda confined to the ocean? He couldn’t dry out.”
Giulia groaned and rolled her eyes upwards for a moment. Alberto could be so dense sometimes.
“What I’m asking is: you’re choosing the sea monster, over Luca, as a romantic interest?”
“Yeah. Guess so,” he said with a shrug. The fact he couldn’t meet her eyes told another story.