Chapter 66

Marabella’s POV

Lunch was delicious. Ma made us pastrami sandwiches with popcorn on the side. It sounds like a weird combination but it actually turned out spectacular. “Want to take a walk with me, beautiful?”, Luca whispered into my ear, as I rinsed our plates off to put them in the dishwasher. I nodded meekly, snuggling into his arms that wrapped around me.

Luca led me out of the back door and down a stairway towards the gardens. I realized that this was my first official time walking down here. There has always been so much going on that we haven’t had a chance to explore. The fences were much taller up close, scaling almost nine feet high. The density of the vines was mind-blowing. You don’t realize how full the fence lines are from the balcony.

“Wow”, I sighed with awe, as we walked. “Beautiful, isn’t it?”, Luca asked softly. “It’s magical”, I replied, glancing over at him. Luca grinned as he wrapped his arm around my waist and pulled me closer. “Just like the villa, this orchard and garden have been in our family for hundreds of years. It has been a great honor to maintain it and keep it thriving”, Luca explained, walking me along the narrow path between fence lines. “This is amazing”, I muttered.

We walked in comfortable silence for a while before stumbling upon a large web with a banana spider directly in the middle. I froze with fear, completely paralyzed. Luca sprung into action with no jokes this time. He picked up a stick off the ground and knocked the web and spider down, effectively taking it out of our path.

A shiver passed down my spine. “Come, bambina. It’s gone now”, he uttered. I took his hand and silently walked next time him. My first memory of my encounter with spiders plagues my memory. “When I was six years old, my mother and I shared a room”, I began. Luca looked over at me curiously.Some sentences are incomplete if you are not reading this novel on * .net. Visit to read the complete chapters for free. “We lived with some people that she had met. A young couple, with a little boy about my age. At first, everything was great. The couple was super nice, the little boy and I played well together”, I explained, talking with my hands.

“After a while, the father started to pay a little more attention to me. He would bring home toys for me when he came home from work. For the first few weeks he would bring his little boy something as well. But then he stopped, and would only bring me a gift. The mother noticed, along with the little boy. They both started to become meaner towards me. The mother would yell at me for the littlest of things, and pick at my clothes or how my hair was styled that day. The little boy would pinch me, or pull my hair, call me names and lash out”. I paused to take a deep breath.

“One night, the little boy snuck into our room. He had apparently spent the day collecting every spider he could find. His collection ranged from the little green tree spiders, jumping spiders all the way to brown recluses and widows”, I said, choking up. “He released the spiders into the bed with my mom and I. There had to be at least forty of them, crawling all over the bed and us”, I shivered, reliving the feeling of them.

Luca’s eyes were dark as he listened to my memory. “We both were bit multiple times. We both almost died. If the dad wouldn’t have woken up and panicked. We would never have made it to the hospital in time”, I explained. Luca shook his head in disbelief, “What happened to them?”, he asked. “I don’t know. I know we never went back there though”, I answered. “That is absolutely insane”, he uttered in shock.

He stopped walking and pulled me into a tight hug. “I understand your utter terror of spiders now”, he whispered, kissing my temple. “I’m sorry, piccola. That should have never happened to you”, he said gently. I stood in silence with my arms wrapped around him snugly. Luca combed his fingers through my hair, silently comforting me. I took a deep shaky breath and blew it out as I pulled away.

I smiled softly, “Let’s continue our little adventure shall we?”, I suggested, wholeheartily. Luca grinned and grabbed ahold of my hands to pull me down the path. The mood immediately lightened as we horseplayed with each other down the path. Laughter filled the narrow paths of the gardens as we chased each other around in play.

I wasn’t sure how much time had passed before the pain was too much and overtook my joy, slowing me down. I still smiled and giggled, as I tried to catch my breath, bent over with my hands on my knees. Luca gently rubbed his hand along my back, “Are you okay, piccola?”, he asked softly, crouched over to have a straight view of my face. I nodded as I took deep breaths.

“What’s your pain level?”, he asked, his face shifting from playful to stern. Breathing felt like it was getting more difficult with each breath I took. I shook my head, unable to answer. Luca immediately scooped me up into his arms, and took me to the nearest bench to sit down. “Deep breaths, piccola. In through the nose and out of the mouth. Like this”, he said , demonstrating himself.

I tried to follow his directions, but I still felt like I wasn’t getting enough air, sending me into a full blown panic attack. Luca’s voice faded, and my vision blurred before going black.