The Monster In Us

26- bluEbird iN mY heart

"Sure, we can go to my place," He eventually confirms.

We both get into his expensive Aston Martin with the plan that I'll spend the night at his house and just get my car tomorrow from the casino. That sounds like a very good plan to me.

His house is only about a twenty-minute drive away and, unsurprisingly, guarded by an iron gate that Dante opens by entering a pass code into a keypad and then there are guards standing their guard outside of the tan castle-like house that towers in front of us.

"You have a lot of security," I feign surprise at all of the security guards and passwords that go into just getting onto his property. It's not surprising though—I have the same security system set up at my own house.

"My dad is paranoid," Dante shakes it off as he parks his car in a five-car garage on the side of the house and then he leads me passed a few guards and into the marble foyer of the fancy house.

"This is beautiful," I tell him, looking around in awe. Granted, my house is just as big and fancily decorated but in different ways. Both of our fathers are very drawn to their heritage. My father has decorated our walls with dark colors, grand arches, and golds that go with classic taste in Russia.

The inside of this house is very Tuscan with wrought iron, lots of antique-looking wood furnishings such as cabinets, chairs, and tables, and beige colors. It's all very open too; I can see the huge kitchen from the foyer along with a hallway that, as we walk through, I can see leads to a comfortable-looking living space.

Dante leads me up a grand staircase, "It's like we never left Italy," He says as we ascend the stairs.

"I can't believe you haven't shown me this place yet," I tell him as we pass a very classy framed map of Italy in the open hallway upstairs with a balcony that overlooks the living room that we had just walked through downstairs. "Especially considering how you love to use your money to impress. Because I am very impressed."

"It's not much of a home," He tries to explain to me. "Just a really big house and I know that it's nice and I'm grateful but it's suffocating and given the choice, I'd much rather spend my time in your apartment."

"Alright, well I can't say that I understand but okay," I say and I really don't understand that. I love my house because although my father lives there with me and it is always under a guard's watch, I have more freedom there than I do anywhere else. I have my own room and it's fairly big so I can just lock myself away for hours, days if I'm lucky, and draw or do whatever I want. It's my only sanctuary.

Maybe, to Dante, his sanctuary is my apartment because it's closed off from his father and the business that he does. But before he had my apartment, I wonder what he considered to be his place to go to just be himself without the fear of his father or any other people. Sure, the lake house, but that's too far away to visit frequently.

Dante opens one of the doors and it's like an entirely new world from the Tuscan theme of the rest of the house. His bedroom is very modern with clean lines, black, white, and silver are the main colors. The space is wide and open with a queen sized bed, made to perfection, a couch seat built into the wall, and a TV hanging on the wall opposite of the bed. A book shelf is built into the left wall of the room and it's filled with even more books.

"Don't be fooled by the cleanliness," He tells me as we both walk deeper into the room and he closes the door behind us. "We have a staff that does all of the cleaning, I'm actually a mess."

I watch as he peels off his sports jacket to reveal the tight fitted white t-shirt. He tosses his jacket onto the chair sitting in the corner of the room where he also rests his briefcase. I put my stuff down beside the chair too because I don't know what else to do with it.