Topic: How to Make a Monster

Antonia Skinner

Date: 2015-04-30 16:04 EST
April 30th, 2015

?Help me understand.?

?I?m trying, Jacob, but it would be easier if you weren?t giving me that look. I haven?t seen you for years and this is what I?m greeted with??

?What you?re greeted with? I get out and I find out my sister is a ghost. I thought you were dead! Then, when I find her, she?s? who are you again? Tonya??

?Antonia Salvato.?

?What the hell, Juliet!??

?Can you drop the Juliet? Honestly, I?m not that person anymore.?

?You?re not that- what the hell do you mean you?re not that person!? You don?t just get to decide you?re not yourself anymore!?

?It?s easier than you think.?

?It?s always been easy for you. Good to see some things don?t change and you?ve still got your lies.?

?Stories.?

?You?re a pathological liar.?

?Actually, I?ve looked up the definition and I?m not. Pathological liars tend to be unaware they?re relaying false stories.?

?So you?re just the normal sort of liar.?

?I guess so.?

?You guess so. Yeah, you guess so. What else have you been telling these people??

?Lots of things. Nothing.?

?Stop talking in circles! Be straight with me! What do these people know??

?My name is Antonia Salvato. I was born May 1st, 1990. My Father is a hardworking man-?

?Are you kidding me??

?Do you want to hear it or not??

?Fine. Continue.?

?My Father is a hardworking man who owns his own painting business and refuses to retire. My Mother is a housewife who taught me to cook same as her Mother taught her. They are madly in love to this day. I have a younger brother named Luca, such a lady killer. He got into cars early on in life as a hobby and I followed in his footsteps. My older brother?s name is Santino and he?s a cop. He?s married with two children, a boy and a girl. Around seventeen or so I fell in with the mafia. This shifted to specializing in being a transporter for majority of the families in Boston. After many years Santino discovered what I was and he told me to leave the city. He banished me, promising me that the family would never find out. And here I am. End scene. Roll credits.?

?That is? the most elaborate lie that I?ve ever heard. At least you remembered our birthday. Am I Luca? I can deal with being a lady killer. So long as you didn?t mean it in the literal sense.?

?Not in the literal sense. Luca is charming.?

?Right. Yet that means nothing because your fairytale parents were actually an abusive drunk who ditched us and his victim of a wife. What? That?s not as good of a story? And how the hell did we get an older brother? A cop!? Actually, if I?m getting answers here, let?s focus on the important one. What happened in Boston after I got pinched??

?It?s a long story, Jacob.?

?You got somewhere to be? I don?t. I want to know. What happened to you, Juliet??

?Antonia.?

?Speedy.?

?? That?s fair.?

?What happened??

Antonia Skinner

Date: 2015-04-30 16:08 EST
I remember the night of the raid like it was yesterday. We were seventeen. Do you remember how much we thought we knew at seventeen? We didn?t know a thing. I was getting ready to hit the town to pick up a couple ladies that were in demand when my phone exploded. Message after message came spilling in, everyone who hadn?t been at the shop telling each other to drop back. Take cover. I didn?t hear anything from you and I knew if you were capable you would have been the first to light up my phone. I was in denial for a long time. I waited for you to come strolling up out of nowhere, complaining about how it had been a close one and telling me my patience had been good, I did right. Seconds turned into minutes, into hours, then days and weeks.

I fell off the radar. Anyone who didn?t get pinched did. I knew it was procedure and what we had planned, but that doesn?t mean it felt right. I wanted to find out what was happening to you, I wanted to go to the station and demand answers, I wanted to visit you. But I remembered what you told me; never walk into one of those places by choice. Not for you, not for anyone. I hated you for it.

With Dad MIA and you put away, I had no one. No one from the ring gave a damn about me. For a while I tried pretending that Mom was watching over me, talking to her and asking for guidance like I had heard people do. I never got a response. Instead I took up smoking. I remembered how quickly the cancer ravaged her body, somehow managing to jack her up even worse than Dad ever could. I hoped that maybe someone would have pity on me and just let me follow in her footsteps because I was too weak to do it myself. I?ve been smoking ever since. As fate would have it, God either loves me or hates me enough that I haven?t died yet.

All the chop shops in the area went quiet. There was no point in me picking up cars because there was no one to turn product over to, so I had no way of making a living. I managed to pick up an odd job here and there, but every day was a struggle to get by. I had nothing stable. Just when I was at the end of my rope I was tapped as the errand girl for The Luciano Family. It was a blur of recommendations, meetings, and tests, but in the end Charles ?The Cigar? Luciano, their fearless leader, put his faith into me.

I think it was mostly because he wanted to put more inside me, the rumors floating around that The Cigar had a thing for the less than legal variety, but a job was a job. I started carrying a butterfly knife and practiced with it every night, mentally preparing myself if the day ever came when I would have to cut off a man?s dick. I also took it upon myself to learn Italian. It wasn?t for their benefit, mind you. I never told anyone that I picked up the language. It was so that I knew what they were saying about me, my skills, and my body while I was standing in front of them awaiting orders. It made me sick. I lost faith day by day.

There was a period of time after all of this happened when I still tried to find out about you. No one would give me details. Anyone with information knew you and that you would have wanted me to focus on myself rather than dwelling on you being locked away. They did it to protect me like you would have wanted, but it only went that far. No one wanted to help me past withholding information and they especially didn?t want to cross paths with me because they didn?t want to give Luciano some reason to go after them. Luciano was ruthless about anything he considered his; his family, his lovers, his employees, his property. Even the supposedly lucky souls that fell into any of those categories couldn?t escape his wrath. One wrong word or move and that stub of a cigar that he always had shoved between his slimy lips would be leaving its mark on your skin.

For anyone else he preferred going for the face, because he wanted people to know you messed up and to warn them to not be as stupid as you. I was special. I screwed up a lot and he considered me too pretty to damage, so instead he would leave his burns on my chest. I think he wanted to scare away any man stupid enough to want to be intimate with me. He wanted them to know that my body belonged to him even if he hadn?t gotten to touch me like that despite his efforts. He wanted men to be disgusted when they were with me. Maybe he wanted me to be disgusted with myself. He succeeded in making me miserable, no matter what his plan had been. Years passed in a blur leaving me a shell of my former self. I worked. I sometimes remembered to eat. I rarely slept. That was all I knew in life.

Antonia Skinner

Date: 2015-04-30 16:12 EST
Until one day. I was between drops and stopped to grab myself a coffee when I saw him. Christ, I remember that first time so clearly. He was tall with blonde hair, blue eyes, and the perfect amount of muscles so that the outline of them could be seen through his button up without it being too much. I didn?t know how old he was, but I knew he had years on me. The corners of his eyes crinkled with crow?s feet and the smattering of stubble across his jaw couldn?t entirely hide the laugh lines engraved on his features. It didn?t matter. Something in me that had been dead for a long time stirred while I watched him reading his newspaper.

Our paths kept crossing. It began with sharing smile. A small greeting or even a joke. It blossomed into comments about the weather, the crowd in the coffee shop, current events. Benign small talk turned into actual conversation. I learned that his name was Nicholas, but I could call him Nick. He was divorced with no children. He had only been in the city for a couple years. Because of how my luck leans, he was a cop.

If I had any sense I would have stopped talking to him right then. I should have packed up my things, packed up my heart, and continued on my way. Instead I told him about myself, too. Little things at first, bits of truth sugar coated in stories to make them easier to swallow. I would always think, this is it, this is the one that will make him walk away. He never did. It was addictive. It made me want to tell him more. The good, the bad, the ugly, the worst. I wanted to share it all with him and have him tell me it would eventually turn out okay.

No matter what I told him, he kept coming back. He kept seeking me out and I did the same with him. Between my drops and the added responsibilities I was gaining in my job, I looked forward to my time with Nick. We even moved outside of meeting at the coffee shop. Diners, his car, eating sandwiches on a park bench. I don?t know what we were doing, and despite how wise he was I don?t think Nick knew either. We never spoke of it. We treated what we had like glass, worrying that too firm of a touch would cause it to shatter. Of course, no matter how hard you try to protect delicate matters, someone always comes along to throw rocks.

Antonia Skinner

Date: 2015-04-30 16:16 EST
Nothing seemed out of the ordinary. Isn?t that how it always goes? That?s how it was when the raid happened. When Dad went to the store for a pack of cigarettes and never came back. When Mom took her last low rattling breath. I went to see Luciano at one of his warehouses to get my orders for the day like I always did. I was greeted with Luciano flanked by a pack of his soldiers, and one sorry sonofabitch beaten bloody and kneeling execution style between them and me. Nick.

I had never seen anyone put in that position that lived to talk about it. The thought instantly registered in my mind but I gave nothing away. Luciano asked me if I knew who this man was, this pig who had been asking too many questions about him and his business. Of course everyone in Boston knew about Luciano, but no one was stupid enough to actually try taking him on. All the cops turned a blind eye on what he was doing in the city. Yet here was Nick, who wasn?t even trying to bring Luciano down. I guess he was trying to find out more about me, maybe trying to find a way to help me. Acknowledging that I knew Nick meant I would have been down on the ground beside him. Maybe I should have owned up to it. Maybe that would have been the happiest moment of my pathetic life, kneeling next to him.

Who is he, Juliet?

I don?t know.

Don?t you lie to me.

I?m not.

Tell me if you know him.

I don?t.

Look me in the eye when you say it.

I don?t know him.

Look him in the eye when you say it again.

I don?t know him.

Say it louder, Juliet.

I don?t know him.

AGAIN, JULIET.

I DON?T KNOW HIM.

The single gunshot echoed off the high walls of the warehouse. It entered through the back of Nick?s soft blonde hair and exited out the front of his face, destroying those beautiful features that always managed to be so gentle despite his underlying strength. With the pull of the trigger Luciano destroyed the first love of my life. I jumped at the sound of the gunshot but nothing else was given up for them to see. I wanted to cry so badly, to rush to Nick and cradle his limp body in my lap, but I couldn?t. I held back the tears and locked them away forever.

With Nick?s lifeless body in a pile on the floor and everyone waiting for a reason to make me kneel next, I asked Luciano if we were done and if I could have my orders for the day. I was given my directions and free to go. Just like that. That day I worked as I always had done. For the days that followed I continued in the same way, until days gathered into passing weeks. They watched me, waiting for me to crack and show some sign of emotion, but there was none for them to see.

Nick was dead and the last remaining shred of my humanity died along with him.

Antonia Skinner

Date: 2015-04-30 16:24 EST
It was months later. Every day since Nick?s death seemed like the one before it. The same drops, the same issues, the same results. Nothing new. On this day, Luciano had put in his long hours of work calling the shots from his warehouse and was getting ready to go home. He piled into his sleek black car with his driver and three soldiers, two of them sitting on either side of him in the back seat.

The SUV I had found for myself was a monster, the preferred ride of the Grim Ripper if he had to pick one. Big, black, dark tinted windows. I had to find the sweet spot when I t-boned their car with my newly acquired ride. It had to be gentle enough to not completely destroy their vehicle since I had something better in mind, but hard enough that I could force their car into the brick wall they were parked beside. I managed to successfully pin every single door shut with the five men dazed and trapped inside. I climbed out of the SUV, too numb and pumped up on adrenaline to worry about the way my body jolted violently on impact. I was focused.

I walked in front of their car and I stood my ground. Some of them slowly regained consciousness enough to see a woman dressed in black standing in front of them, holding a red canister and a Molotov cocktail. The smell of gasoline was already infiltrating the air. It?s when the shouting began, Luciano?s angry howling, that I stalked towards the car. Rising up onto the bumper, heavy steps crossing the hood, gas sloshing out of the jerry can as I moved. From the hood to the roof of the car, stupidly dumping fluid at my feet. More onto the trunk when I jumped down onto it. When I landed on the pavement behind the car I continued walking, the scent of gas clinging to me. I knew I had gotten some on myself and I could go up in flames just like them, but I didn?t care. So long as they were ashes by morning, there was no reason for me to stick around.

With a sharp snap of my zippo the flame sprang to life, attracted to me but miraculously keeping its distance even if I deserved to burn. We all deserved to burn with the sins that weighed on us. The rag stuffed into the whiskey bottle was lit, weighed in my hand, then I threw it at the back window of the car where the men inside were cursing me so much it made their throats raw. Raging. Begging. Calling me a slut and bitch. Crying. The bottle broke through the glass with the sharp sound of their worlds shattering. Everything was replaced with the mighty whoosh of flames exploding and the sound of wailing. I watched the flames consume them, watched their burning blackened bodies flailing, skin crackling and melting from the bone. I watched it all, wanting the memory to keep me warm at night.

Their cries of agony still fill my ears, but I?m not haunted by them. They sing me to sleep like a lullaby.

Antonia Skinner

Date: 2015-04-30 16:29 EST
I couldn?t stay in Boston. I couldn?t even risk trying to get word to you because there was no one I could trust. When Luciano burned it singed a bullseye on my back that plenty of people would be happy to hit. Sure, they might shake my hand first for getting rid of the toolbag, but I wouldn?t be allowed to walk free and they would use my dead body as a stepping stone to power.

I had the kerosene soaked clothes on my back and a duffle bag full of the money I made off Luciano. That?s it. That?s what I left town with. I wired myself a Ducati and was on the road around the same time I heard fire engines peeling through the streets. According to the news, the fire spread wildly, devouring Luciano?s warehouse and moving onto the surrounding buildings he owned. The firefighters did their best to contain the flames, but they were all just a little too aware of who that area belonged to. Such a shame to have so much of Luciano?s stock burn like he did.

I left Juliet Tucci behind in Boston. I buried her in a shallow grave beside Nick?s. I had no destination in mind as I fled, but I eventually found RhyDin. It?s in this town that I found Antonia Salvato. I could waste a lot of words trying to explain her to you. What you might hear about her, the half-truths and the outright lies.

All you really need to know about Antonia Salvato is that? she?s a monster.