Luberto

Back on The Surface

Alberto and I swam to the shores of Portorosso together. when we got out of the water and dried off, Alberto wouldn't look at me. He just stared at the buildings in front of us.

"Alberto?" he turned towards me but still wouldn't meet my gaze. That's when I saw the large bruise around his right eye. I must not have been able to see it when he was a sea monster, it probably blended in with the colors of his scales. "Alberto! Ercole did that?" looking at the ground he nodded, his hands balled into fists. I lifted his face so that he had to look me in the eye, then I wrapped him in a tight hug, and after a moment, I felt him relax and return the hug. "Thank you. You took care of me." He hugged me tighter and said,

"I couldn't stand it, he was hurting you. I don't want to let anyone do that again." We stood there for a few minutes. Just stood there on the beach, hugging as the gentle waves splashed at our feet. When he finally stepped back, there were tears in his eyes and he smiled. "Luca, You are the best friend anyone could ever want!" I smiled back and elbowed him in the side.
"I know." We laughed and went back to Giulia's.  Alberto led the way, walking in the door without knocking. 

"Guess who's back?" I called. Giulia rushed into the room and almost ran me over.

"You're back! I swear when I see that Jerk I'm gonna-" 

"Giulia," I interrupted, "I don't want to think about that right now." I looked at Alberto and he offered a small smile. I noticed Giulia wouldn't look directly at him. Probably because of the bruise around his eye. As I watched him, he studied the room like it was the first time he had ever been there. I felt bad for him, he'd gone through all this because of Ercole- and me. If I had fought harder, he wouldn't have had to fight for me.

Later that week, Alberto was almost fully recovered and Massimo made our favorite dinner, the very dinner that had won us the Portorosso cup. We dug in and Giulia asked a bunch of questions about the night we had spent on the island. Alberto blushed through the entire conversation, Massimo just laughed as Alberto's face grew redder. He scrambled to quickly finish his pasta, then grabbed my hand and ran out of the house, dragging me behind him. I yelped and tried to keep up as he pulled me to the back gate.

"What are you doing?" I asked, out of breath and laughing. He got behind me and covered my eyes with some type of cloth.

"I got you a surprise." I felt him guiding me forward and after a minute, the cloth was removed from my eyes and in front of me, was the Vespa we had bought with the prize money. Alberto had fixed it up, and repainted it green and blue, the colors of our sea monster scales. I turned around and hugged him.

" I can't believe it! I thought you sold it! How did you get it back?"

"Between working as a lifeguard and fishing with Massimo, I earned enough money to buy it back" I stepped back and realized the cloth he had used to cover my eyes was his shirt. I turned back to the Vespa, blushing.

"Can we go for a ride?"

"Of course!" He put his shirt back on and motioned for me to sit up front so I could drive.

"Have you ridden it yet?"

"Nope. I wanted to do it with you." I jumped on the Vespa and Alberto got on behind me, wrapping his hands around my waist. I could feel my cheeks heating even more as we took off down the streets of Portorosso.