Chapter Sixteen: Antonio:

How long has it been? Six hours? Twelve? Two? I don’t care anymore. *******’s probably already gone by now. I just want to go home and take a nap. I didn’t even want to go to the wedding. I don’t even think anyone wanted to go to this wedding. Only two people were excited about it. The bride wasn’t too enthusiast about her wedding. Probably the reason why she ran off.

Don’t get me wrong. Ben’s a nice guy and all. He’s just… Yeah. We couldn’t understand what ******* saw in him. He’s a nice guy, but… Yeah. I still don’t understand why we are out looking for her. If she wanted to get married, then she wouldn’t have run off. I pressed back my hair from my forehead. It’s just so pointless really.

Suddenly, my phone rang in my shorts pocket.

“Hello?” I asked.

“Have you seen her yet?” T.J. asked.

“Nope.”

“Hm.”

“Hey, why are we doing this?”

“You know why.”

“Yeah, why? Even you couldn’t understand she was with Ben.”

“Well, true, but…”

I raised an eyebrow. “But?”

“I’ve got nothing. Help me out here?”

“Naw, man.”

“Never mind. The girls haven’t heard anything from her either. She won’t answer her phone.”

I brushed back my bangs from my forehead again. “You think she might be hiding because she doesn’t want to get married?”

“Antonio!”

“Hey, think about it. We could never understand why they were dating and she didn’t look too happy to marry him.”

“Well, yes.”

“I think she ran away on purpose.”

“But where?”

“I don’t know. Maybe an old boyfriend or something?”

“No, I don’t think so.”

“And why is that?”

“We don’t really know anything about *******. She never talked about her family or where she came from.”

“Where did she come from?” I watched a mailman dropping off mail in the mailboxes at the apartment complex across the street. His shorts looked rather uncomfortable. Is that a wedgy?

“I have no idea.”

“Is ******* even her real name?”

“I don’t know.”

Another crazy idea came into my head. “Maybe she’s not only running away from the wedding, but she could be running away from the mob.”

“What?”

I shrugged my shoulders. “Makes sense to me. Why else would she be evasive about her life and be on the run?”

“Really?”

“At least I think so,” I said. There was a pause over the laugh before we broke into laughter. I placed my hand on my forehead.

“Nah,” I said. “It wouldn’t be that stupid.”

“Let me know when you find *******, okay?” T.J. said.

“Yeah, yeah,” I said. I hung up and walked further down the street. ******* running from the mafia. What kind of a stupid thing is that? Right?