Mafia Kings: Valentino: Chapter 2

I was the middle child of five kids. Our house was crazy – total chaos. The only peace I found was with my grandmother in the kitchen. She lived with us and cooked for the entire family.

My father was a bricklayer, and my mother was a schoolteacher. With so many mouths to feed, their salaries didn’t stretch nearly far enough.

My father was very serious. People used to joke that he was more German than Italian.

Always be early. If you’re on time, you’re five minutes late.

You owe your employer your very best efforts.

Never, EVER give less than 100%.

My mother prized getting good grades above everything else.

I was not serious at all, which irked my father – and I was terrible in school, which exasperated my mother.

Me?

I just wanted to cook.

My grandmother passed away when I was 11, and it was the saddest day of my life…

At least for another ten years.

But I kept on cooking and preparing all the family’s meals by myself.

I didn’t mind. I actually loved it. Working in the kitchen made me feel close to Nonna, like she was still with me.

I’ll say one thing: my parents never complained about my cooking. That was the one thing they didn’t criticize about me.


When I hit 12, I developed another obsession:

Boys.

I went boy CRAZY.

All I could think about was the cute boys at school. I would fantasize about kissing them.

I dreamed up ways of getting them to notice me. At first I tried making cannoli for them – hard pastry shells stuffed with sweet ricotta cheese and things like chocolate or nuts. They loved them, but they didn’t do anything but ask me for more cannoli.

When I finally got the attention I craved, it didn’t come from the boys in my own class – but older boys in school.

Much older.

I’m joking! They were only two or three years further along than me.

But they still seemed so worldly and cool.

Some of them even smoked.

Oooooh!

Real bad boys.

And I got plenty of their attention!

All it took was getting boobs.

I ended the school year flat-chested and came back the next fall more developed than every other girl in my grade level. All the older boys came flocking to me after that.

It was uncomfortable dealing with grown men leering at me, which felt icky and gross –

boys a couple

Bring it on.

kissed a boy for the first time

sex for the first time when I was

was all downhill

was all I could think about. Which distressed my parents

kept my romantic activities secret by sneaking out

years before she got married. She got pregnant at 18 from her boyfriend, which – since my parents were devout Catholics – meant automatic marriage. Her boyfriend

want to settle down yet, so I sure as hell couldn’t get pregnant. As a result, I always

so we wouldn’t snitch on her. Once she moved out, the candy stopped. But when I started sneaking

but I

both yelled at me non-stop, telling me I was ruining my life. But I already knew I didn’t want to go to university. University was for people who wanted to read and study – to become

Bleh.

go to university, you choose a profession while you’re a teenager and go to a school specifically for that.

hospitality industry – an istituto professionale. That was the closest I could get to being able to cook all

me there would be tons more cute guys at university, I might have done


activities.’ We lived in a small town, and people talked. Probably some boys bragged about sleeping with me, their parents overheard, they started

to hear from other people that my

That stunned me.

he’d

that he would

horrible to hear

It’s not like I was the lone sinner in a sea of saints. And I wasn’t sleeping

to stay in relationships

parents knew, they clamped down hard. I couldn’t sneak out anymore at night, which

unfavorably to my brothers and sisters – my grades, my behavior, the way I dressed – but

more like your sister and

the sister who snuck out just like I did, but got knocked up by one of the guys she was banging?” I said

me in

stared at her, stunned

ran back to the bedroom I shared with my little sister and

have never done that, I

that moment, I vowed to move out as soon


who aren’t on the university track graduate at 17. It’s not like I

over, I went looking for a job

I came from a small town in Tuscany, the vast countryside in central Italy. Our town wasn’t a tourist attraction, so there wasn’t a lot of

moved to Florence, the nearest big city with

me go. They made a lot of snarky comments about my sex life, but I just

with two roommates in

guys as I wanted. And there were plenty

discos, drank too much, had fun

Except

and make 2000 gallons of spaghetti

but that wasn’t even a possibility. Everybody I interviewed with said I had to go to a

to cook from my grandmother, but they

how to cook from her grandmother. You

the money for a culinary institute, and I couldn’t ask

to owe them anything or give them any sort of

They’d say that if they gave me

they didn’t have

day and tried to save my money

at saving as I’d been

did! It’s just that what little money I had left over

in Florence, life was great… until it

felt trapped in

boys, but I never fell in

began to

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