Enzo: So is that a yes?
Chari: What night?
Me, playing coy. Because I literally have zero plans for the weekend.
Enzo: Sat. night into Sunday? I’ll send a car. Come to NY.
Wait. Is he serious?
“Who you texting?” Devon asks.
Ugh. “No one.”
I don’t look up. Thankfully, he takes the hint, grunting and going back to his show.
Chari: For real?
Enzo: Yes, for real.
I have no idea how to take this. Most people start with dinner and a movie or something. Maybe drinks. But an overnight first date? With Enzo? I can’t breathe.
Enzo: I have a spare bedroom. I hate to see you drive two hours back and forth.
So coming back to Bridgewater is not an option. Makes sense. I pretend to contemplate this, if only so I’ll seem like less of a sure thing. But my decision was made the moment he asked. Short of a Nor’easter, I am going to New York this weekend.
Chari: What the hell. Yes.
Enzo: Be ready for a car to pick you up at four o’clock. Dress for dinner.
He really doesn’t mess around. Kinda bossier than I remember too, and I’m surprised by how much I like it in this context.
Chari: OK
Enzo: You telling Dev?
Does he want me to?
Does it matter what he wants? This is my brother, my decision. And I don’t want Devon to freak out over what might end up being just one date.
Chari: No
Enzo: K, see you Sat
Chari: :)
Welp. So that just happened.
9
Enzo
I’m aware of being a contradiction.
Anyone walking into my apartment at this moment would see the Enzo DeLuca I’ve become. They would take in the floor-to-ceiling windows in my penthouse apartment, the picture-perfect view of the Hudson and the city lights, the white oak herringbone floors, and the marble waterfall countertops the building’s owner sold me on, going on about the famous designer as if I cared about such things.
I don’t, for the record, and I care equally less that I’m apparently sporting a “tonal look”—a grey Donegal tweed waistcoat paired with a grey Prince of Wales shirt. Hiring the personal assistant who told me how to dress hip, yet classic, was the best decision I ever made. Unlike Hayden, I didn’t grow up this way. Even now so much of it feels foreign. Fake. Like I’m a poser.
But walking the walk is as important as talking the talk, or so I’m told. And besides working out, which helps me think through problems, I don’t have time for much else besides Angel, Inc., and certainly not for putting that much thought into my wardrobe.