#also I REALIZED WE NEVER GOT A NAME FOR HIS GANG JFHDKSJ so I wrote it as “XXX” for now 🤣

[ava-young]

Loyalty. It was the one thing he’d had to prove his entire life. Loyalty to his members, loyalty to his leader, and loyalty to the way of life. There was nothing that he could do to stray from it; he had proven himself many years ago and through deep loyalty, he got to be where he was now.

They had many interesting dealings. They worked just under the surface of the bright, beautiful world. Darkness tore through everything he did. Every decision he made, every person he spoke to, it was all calculated to best further their agenda and keep their line of work safe. He’d thrown himself into the line of fire by making the wrong choices one too many times and he reaped the consequences of it. He took the punishments as they came, any one that they saw fit to give him, and that was exactly how it worked.

They had to prove their loyalty or things would go wrong. Very wrong.

So when Jonathan Russo had become a problem, he had had no qualms about proving his loyalty. Not only did the man’s less then stellar actions prove to be dangerous for them, they also put everything Ricky had built at risk. The life he had won for himself fighting tooth and claw to get here, the life he’d given up so much to get. And yes, he lost a lot in the process but it was worth it to be where he was now. It was worth it to become the man he was, no matter how deeply entrenched in blood and violence he was.

Loyalty had to be proven, so he had not hesitated to pull the trigger on Jonathan.

And it was a shame, really. Jonathan had, for the brief period before he turned out to be a snake beneath the flowers, been an otherwise nice man. He’d almost fit right in with them and offered more connections to them. He’d been charming and intelligent and cunning. It made perfect sense that he would think he could double cross them; the man had shared stories of dealings in many walks of life, from something simple in their vibrant but dark town to as far as the pretty Italian countryside. Places Ricky could only ever dream of going.

But the thing Jonathan Russo had that many of them didn’t was his caramellina. A love. A person he went home to at the end of the day. A person who knew him as he wanted to be known.

Ricky could only hope for such a luxury; a being on this Earth who would look at him and see the man he wanted to be. A good man who did good deeds. A good man whose little acts of good could outweigh the far larger sins he committed when the sun had set. He was jealous of Jonathan in that regard, jealous that he could find something saintly and warm, something easy to be when his caramellina looked into his eyes and held him. 

He never asked about this girl. He didn’t care to — he didn’t see a picture or hear a name or ask for either — but as he sat in the bar now, eyes watching Ava as she regarded him with doe eyes, her touch tantalisingly close, he thought of having his own caramellina . A girl he might’ve taken home with him if he didn’t see the flashing sign behind her — a sign in the bar but a warning sign too. A warning to heed. 

(”Look out for the scrappy ones,” Jonthan had warned him one night. Just a few days before everything would fall apart and Ricky would commit the worst sin to protect his people. “They’re the ones who take your heart.”

Ricky said nothing as he looked at the man, as he eyed him, and then shifted back to slotting the bullets back into his magazine. Slowly, meticulously. A warning of sorts, one he hoped Jonathan would understand — run back to your caramellina, he was begging, so I don’t have to do this.)

Ava would be, by all accounts, the complete opposite of scrappy. She seemed intelligent and cunning. She seemed charming and easy to follow down a dangerously dark rabbit hole. He was letting her grasp his hands and drag him down into a world he wouldn’t get out of without clawing his way through the beings who lay there. 

“Me…” His words came out a little amused, his head shaking. He wasn’t a heavy drinker nor was he easily swayed by having some alcohol dancing on his tongue but here he was, willing to offer up any scrap of himself because he could, perhaps, have his own caramellina. “You are much too forward, Ava. And if it were that easy… the whole world would know who I am and perhaps… Perhaps that would spell my doom.”

His words lingered in the air between them, sitting heavily on his shoulders. He could not take them back once they had been spoken and this — whatever it was between them was becoming dangerous. It was becoming thick with need and desire for something more. He could spill his heart out to Ava here and now, speaking only to her in this crowded bar, and he could confess his sins. He could kneel before her altar and ask her for forgiveness for things she could not forgive him for. She had no authority to cleanse him and she had no sense of what he had done.

(This has to be some kind of joke.

The gun weighed heavily in his hand. You knew what you were doing.

I know you’re better than this. Better than them. 

You don’t know me. 

Fine. But I — I never said goodbye to her. My caramellina, my A—

The burst of the shot. The recoil travelled up his arm. He would feel the sensation for weeks, months, years after.)

Her laugh. Sweet and kind. The joke of the world tourist being applied to her. They’d called Jonathan that a lot, until it no longer applied, until he was as much a Los Angeles boy as the rest of them. Until he was on the ground and the life left him quicker than life should have left somebody.

Ricky didn’t want the same to happen to Ava. He doesn’t want her caught up in their world.

As she extended her hand, a light offering that should have been simple, he felt a tug at his stomach. His phone. There was more in that than he cared to admit to but — but he couldn’t spend his entire life wary of strangers, worried that they would find some way to disrupt him and his life. What reason did she have to search through his texts? His emails or the images he took to confirm deals? What reason would she have to search for that right in front of him too.

So, Ricky relented.

Their exchange of phones was much like a deal; he handed his over, the passcode already put in so she would have no trouble, and he accepted hers. There was a brief hesitation in his actions; he wasn’t sure how to do this. He was a man of brief, casual encounters. He’d never expected to be the kind who would give his number to another. It seemed so permanent, as though he were setting her up for a life that she wasn’t ready for. A life she couldn’t enter without getting hurt. 

(“You shouldn’t have done this, for your caramellina’s sake.”)

He typed his number in easily, saving it under as his own name before he handed it back to Ava. The phone placed in her hand and his fingers brushed her palm. Soft and sure, yet there was a roughness to it, like she was used to using her hands. Soft but rough. A gentle brush but a spark that shot up through his arm and irritated the dull ache from pulling the trigger.

He doesn’t move right away, instead hesitating with their hands joined. His stomach clenched and it felt like his world was seconds from erupting. “He’s going to ask either way.” He spoke casually, as though his whole world hadn’t been thrown into a tailspin. “He’ll wonder why such an… interesting girl wants to spend time with me.”

It hurt to smile then — he didn’t think he deserved to — but he did and slipped his hand out from Ava’s. His own caramellina. “I hope you know what you’re getting yourself into, Ava.” Ricky warned but his voice was gentle, like honey to draw in even the smartest, most cunning predator. “Or you just might regret this.”

@ava-young

Perhaps that would spell my doom. 

The words Ricky uttered caused her to hesitate, to bite her tongue in a time where she'd pry a little more. Most patrons like him would have continued with a joke, or made a vague, passing comment to avoid the topic, but Ricky… He was different. He was unexpected and Ava, for all her wits and clever words, was at a loss at what to say. 

In a world such as theirs, the truth –no matter how little, no matter how diluted– was a perilous little thing that was rarely ever spilt or said. The truth, in a world constantly built and fashioned upon the facade and shifting shadows of men, was almost always too high a currency to dabble and trade in.

Thus, most would rather pay to silence the truth instead, for bloodshed and the life of another seemed cheaper than the cost of their sins being exposed by the light, despite knowing how it could free another or themselves from their own chains and bondages. Selfishness disguised as self-protection seemed prevalent in the veins of those who lived and walked on this earth, and so, for a man seemingly shrouded in darkness as Ricky was to have possibly spoken a truth... It was rare, so very rare.

(And there were nights and days when Ava silently wondered if Jonathan had withhold the truth, just as he did with her when he'd said it was merely just a quick trip. Did he say something he shouldn't have? A truth? Or maybe... A lie? That costed him his life?

Just the thought of it haunted her.)

 “Mm… I’m sure you can handle whatever comes your way, though.” She said, voice sweet and blithe, perfectly concealing the burning words and questions that were trying to claw its way out of her throat. It was truly as if Pandora’s box had cracked ever so little, showing her a glimpse of what could be before closing itself tightly again.

Countless of questions floated through her mind, but as her eyes naturally glanced at Ricky’s tattoo once more, a lump in her throat began to form.

As he took her phone, and she took his, Ava began punching in her phone number, swiftly filling her contact details in when a notification popped up. She initially hadn't meant to look, this much was true, but the words of "sorry! Give me a sec" and "I'm not used to your phone." naturally flowed out of her lips the moment her eyes skimmed over the content of the message.

[ TEXT: "Yo. XXX meeting tonight at 11. You coming?]

Ava felt something drop in the pit of her stomach. Her calm stature belying the way her heart was beating in that moment.

It was as if time, the one thing that spared her no mercy all this while, had finally stopped moving. Finally found the grace to let her process what she'd just seen, to let the very fact sink in that everything she'd wondered (hoped) about Ricky was answered in just one text message.

Ricky, the man that had caught her attention ever since he came into the bar, the one who made her heart beat differently than all the others she'd come across, was the missing piece she'd been searching for all this time. He was the one she'd been looking for ever since she came to Los Angeles seeking answers from anything or anyone that she could find or dig up.

It took everything in her not to grab his hand when he placed back the phone in her hand, took everything in her entire soul not to beg him for the answers she'd been searching for all these years in exchange for anything he wanted. Patience, she reminded herself shakily, for if he held the very thing she needed, then what was waiting for an hour more? Or a day? Or a month, or even a year? For as desperate as she might have been, who was she, ultimately, to barter and negotiate with someone like him? Who was she to think and assume he'd simply give her what she so desired simply because she begged and told him the truth? She'd been in this for far too long to act on impulse and emotions. Far too long to fully know that someone such as herself would add no value to Ricky's life (She was only but a girl just getting by in his eyes, a nobody in a city like theirs, afterall).

Ava knew better, and so, she'll play better. Take the slow and narrow road no matter how desperate she truly was or how painful it would be.

It'll be worth the wait, she repeats to herself, patience, patience, patience.

It took her entire being to not break in front of Ricky as she mustered a smile, finally passing him back his phone but, as Ricky passed hers back, their hands briefly joined; his resting atop hers.

Oh...

For a moment, it was as if her mind calmed. His touch and slight warmth stilling the storm raging about in her heart. She didn't know what to think of it, much less react, but there was undeniably something comforting about it. Something about it that made her want to hold on just a little longer, this comfort. This warmth that she hadn't felt in a long, long time.

And in that second, Ava couldn't help but wonder if, perhaps, Ricky longed for the kind of comfort and warmth she did too. And if he did... Then, maybe, just maybe, she might be able to find a way to slip into his life after all.

"Are you sure he wouldn't be wondering the opposite?" She hummed, tilting her head. "Why such an interesting guy would be giving attention to the likes of someone like me."

With a renewed spirit and hope, Ava leaned against the counter, eyes glimmering as she smiled just as sweet (just as dangerous) as his honeyed words. "I think I do and... It's is a risk I'm willing to take."

"Message you later?"