Si Dolce È'l Tormento | A BruAbba Story

Trish

When the team had finally reached the safe house near 11:00 the previous night, crashing from a high of adrenaline and fear, Trish had been too exhausted to do anything but collapse in the room Bucciarati had pointed her towards. By the fading sunlight of the second night, however, she had to brace herself just to walk through the doorway. The rest of the team – except Giorno, she supposed – had long since plastered the walls with posters or framed photos and filled empty corners with beanbags and stereos and even piles of unfolded clothes from previous trips (at least, Narancia and Mista had). But the room before her was completely bare, a blank, cavernous space with a bed sitting in the middle. The emptiness seemed to crawl into her soul as she shut the door behind her.

Trish sighed, imagining she could hear the sound echo, and ducked into the bathroom to avoid the empty room for a few more minutes. A clean toothbrush sat in a cup by the sink, along with a travel-size tube of toothpaste. Other than that, the room didn't even look like it had been used before. She flipped on the light and still jumped a little when Mista's dark eyes stared back at her in the mirror. That had certainly been a change to wake up to. On the other hand... she brushed her fingers against a tan cheekbone, turning to the side. Not too bad. How much would she have to work out to get abs like that? And that ass...

Keep it together, Una. She had embarrassed herself plenty for today on that front, anyway. She reached for the light, but something caught her eye in the mirror. Leaning back in, she could make out smudges of pink – her own lipstick – on the corner of her mouth. Great. And no makeup wipes, either. Even her emergency makeup bag was on her real body, with Mista.

Trish scrubbed her hands over her face, as if it would wipe away the entire insane day. But the empty bathroom was still waiting for her when she opened her eyes again.

She flicked off the lights, darted through the doorway to the bedroom and then the hall, and tiptoed down two doors. It had to be near 11:00, and to her surprise the house was quiet. She knocked softly before she could overthink it.

Through the door, a vaguely irritated voice called, "What?"

The hinges creaked softly as she pushed open the door. Abbacchio glanced over from the full-length mirror where he seemed to be bracing himself to undo Bucciarati's complicated braid, and the look of irritation softened. "Oh, Trish. What's up?"

"I just need to, uh, borrow a makeup wipe. I don't have any of my stuff."

She hoped that didn't make her sound as lost as she felt.

"Of course. Top drawer on the left."

He nodded to the dresser behind him. Trish followed his cue and opened the drawer to find an unsurprisingly magnificent collection of brushes, eye shadow, mascara pens, and various methods of makeup removal. She grabbed a makeup wipe and began to scrub off the pink, hoping he didn't notice. "No lipstick, huh?"

Abbacchio smiled, eyes still glued to the mirror. "There's a separate drawer for that."

Trish eyed her handiwork in the mirror over the dresser. No evidence of intense making out in a closet. Good. The satisfaction faded quickly. She glanced down to the used makeup wipe in her hand, suddenly reluctant to admit her errand over. That was why she had come here in the first place, wasn't it? So she wouldn't have to sit alone in her empty room down the hall, thinking she probably shouldn't be there to begin with –

"Hey." Abbacchio was looking at her, concern written into the crease between his eyebrows. "What's really going on?"

Trish scrunched up the makeup wipe, hesitating. "I don't want to drag you into my drama."

"There's drama and you didn't tell me?" He gave up on the braid, turning away from the mirror. "Here – second drawer. I'll take black. And then you can tell me about it."

She opened the drawer to discover neat rows of nail polish. The majority of them were dark colors, but she grabbed a burnt magenta along with the black.

"Bucciarati's going to kill you if you get nail polish on that suit," Trish pointed out as she sat across from him, mostly to fill the space. She couldn't even picture Bucciarati angry with Abbacchio. Some kind of fault line would probably tear in reality. But she also couldn't picture herself actually talking with someone else about her own problems, and that was apparently happening.

At Abbacchio's motioning, she set her hand on the tile. The cold of the brush was comfortingly familiar as he started with a practiced ease.

"So." His eyes stayed on the motion of the brush. "What's this all about?"

"It's going to involve Giorno," Trish warned. "Sure you want to hear?"

"I'll repress my disgust."

Trish rolled her eyes, but something inside her unknotted slightly. "It's... god, you know what it is? A cliché love triangle. I can't believe I got caught up in that."

"With you and Giorno and Mista," Abbacchio filled in.

"Right."

"Who both like you...?"

"I... I think so. I mean, yes, I know they do. But I swear they have, like, moments sometimes. Mista definitely stares at him sometimes, he's not very subtle."

Abbacchio started on her other hand. "Ok, so complicated love triangle. Not that I have thoughts on the matter, but which one of them do you like?"

"I..." Three weeks of accumulated confusion hit her full force. "... don't know."

"You actually don't know, or it's Giorno and you don't want to tell me?"

"It is Giorno. But it's also Mista. It's both. That can't be a thing, right?" She could tell she was starting to ramble, but it felt like she had uncorked something in her brain, and the same endless thoughts that had been racing around for weeks were suddenly pouring out. "I always assumed I'd end up with one of them – the right one, whichever one that was – and everything would work out. But Mista and I ... look, Giorno walked in on us sucking each other's faces off, and he hasn't talked to me since. Actually, he hasn't even looked at me. And I don't feel like we've resolved the love triangle, I just feel like we've fucked everything up."

Abbacchio screwed the lid back on and sat back, raising his eyebrows. "Wow. You weren't kidding about the drama. And I'll try my hardest to forget the phrase sucking each other's faces off in connection with you and Mista."

She winced. "Sorry."

"Well... if you want my advice, forget about Giorno."

She rolled her eyes.

"Alright, alright. Clearly you have feelings for him. For some reason," he added, and continued before Trish could protest. "So talk to him. All three of you."

Trish raised an eyebrow. "Like you're doing with your extremely repressed feelings?"

Abbacchio held up his hands. "Hey, you're the one that asked me for advice."

"Touché." Trish sighed, letting her eyes fall to her freshly painted nails. Mista was probably going to have a fit. She glanced up again, suddenly feeling shy. "Abbacchio?"

"Yes?"

"Can I stay here tonight?"

He smiled. It wasn't Bucciarati's smile, even on his face. It had the look of something rare, like a flower that only bloomed at night. But that just made Trish like it more. "As long as you paint my left hand."

The knot inside her finally came loose. "Deal."

For anyone who's paying attention to tiny details yeah ig my version of Vento Aureo takes place over like 3 weeks, because... it just does?

- Wesley H.