12. Rocco
— ? —
Rocco
I call Fiorella on a Tuesday morning and ask her to meet me at the house.
It’s been over a month since Senna left. Over a month of empty rooms and unanswered calls and the growing certainty that something about this collaboration has been wrong from the beginning.
“Finally,” she says, her voice warm with relief. “I’ve been worried about you, Rocco. You’ve been so quiet since-”
“We need to talk about the collaboration.”
A pause. “Of course. I have some ideas for the next single that I think you’ll love.”
“That’s not what we need to talk about.”
Another pause, longer this time. “I’ll be there in an hour.”
She arrives in forty-five minutes, dressed in something elegant and understated, her makeup perfect, her smile firmly in place. I lead her to the living room, where I’ve set out coffee that neither of us will drink, and I wait until she’s settled on the couch before I speak.
“I’m ending the collaboration.”
The smile doesn’t waver, but something in her eyes goes very still. “I’m sorry?”
“I appreciate everything you’ve done. The showcase was a success, and I couldn’t have broken the slump without your help. But I can’t keep working with you.”
“Because of Senna?” Her voice is still pleasant, but there’s an edge underneath it now. “Rocco, I understand that you’re going through a difficult time, but letting your marital problems derail your career would be a mistake.”
“It’s not about my career.”
“Then what is it about?”
“It’s about the fact that I spent so much time working with you that I forgot to be a husband. I neglected my wife. I made her feel invisible. And I can’t fix that while you’re still here.”
Fiorella laughs, and the sound has a sharpness to it that wasn’t there before. “So I’m the scapegoat? That’s convenient.”
“You’re not a scapegoat. I’m taking responsibility for my own choices. But those choices included prioritizing this collaboration over my marriage, and I can’t keep doing that.”
“Rocco.” She leans forward, her expression shifting to something softer, more sympathetic. “I know you feel guilty about Senna. But she walked out on you. She couldn’t handle your success, and she punished you for it. That’s not your fault.”
“Don’t.”
“Don’t what?”
“Don’t talk about her like that. You don’t know what she went through. You don’t know what I put her through.”
“I know she abandoned you at the peak of your career. I know she couldn’t stand to see you happy with someone else.”
“Happy with someone-” I stop, staring at her. “What does that mean?”
“It means she was jealous, Rocco. Jealous of what we built together. Jealous that I could give you something she couldn’t.”
“The only thing you gave me was my music back. There was nothing else between us.”
“Of course not. I’m not suggesting there was.
” But there’s something in her smile now, something knowing and cruel, and I feel a chill run down my spine.
“I’m just saying that Senna has always had…
insecurities. About her talent, about her place in your life.
She’s never been comfortable in your shadow. ”
“My shadow?”
“You’re a star, Rocco. And she’s - what?
The woman who manages your calendar? The supportive wife who gave up her own music to prop up yours?
” Fiorella shakes her head, still smiling.
“It must be hard for her, watching you succeed while she fades into the background. No wonder she couldn’t take it when you finally started to shine again. ”
The words land like blows, and for a moment I can’t speak. Because there’s truth in them - ugly, painful truth that I’ve been avoiding for weeks. Senna did give up her music for me. She did step back, fade back, until she was barely visible even to me.
But that wasn’t her failure. That was mine.
“Get out of my house.”
Fiorella’s smile finally falters. “Excuse me?”
“You heard me.” I stand up, and my hands are shaking, and I don’t care.
“Senna is more talented than either of us. She’s more talented than anyone I’ve ever met.
And I spent seven years watching her shrink so that I could grow, and I’m done.
I’m done letting anyone talk about her like she doesn’t matter. ”
Fiorella stands, her face flushed, her composure cracking. “You’re making a mistake, Rocco. The label won’t be happy. You cared about them a month ago when they were praising your comeback and calling you a genius.”
“I care about my wife more.”
“Your wife who walked out on you? Who couldn’t handle seeing you succeed?” Her laugh is bitter now, all pretense of warmth abandoned. “Your wife who never had the talent or the courage to make it on her own?”
The silence that follows is absolute.
I look at Fiorella, at the woman I trusted to help me rebuild my career, and I see something I should have seen weeks ago - the jealousy underneath the helpfulness, the calculation behind the warmth, the lifetime of resentment she’s been carrying toward a sister she never stopped competing with.
“Senna,” I say quietly, “has more talent in her little finger than you’ll ever have. And I was too blind to see it. Too lost in my own problems to notice that she was disappearing right in front of me.”
“That’s touching. Really. But it doesn’t change the fact that I’m the one who broke your slump. I’m the one who gave you back your music. Without me-”
“Without you, I might have eventually figured out that the music I was looking for was right there in my own house. I might have remembered that my wife used to write songs before I met her. I might have noticed that the woman I married was dying of neglect while I chased a comeback that didn’t mean anything without her. ”
Fiorella goes very still.
“What are you saying?”
“I’m saying goodbye. And I’m asking you to leave.”
She doesn’t move. For a long moment, she just looks at me, and there’s something in her expression that I can’t quite read - calculation, maybe, or the early stages of a plan forming.
“You’ll regret this,” she says finally. “You know that, right? You’ll regret throwing away everything we built together.”
“Maybe. But I’ll regret losing Senna more.”
She picks up her purse, her movements deliberate and controlled. “If that’s what you want.”
“It is.”
At the door, she pauses and looks back at me, and her smile is smooth and cold.
“Just so you know,” she says, “I’m not the one who destroyed your marriage. You did that all by yourself. I was just the convenient excuse.”
“Goodbye, Fiorella.”
“Goodbye, Rocco. I hope Senna appreciates the sacrifice you’re making. I really do.”
She leaves, and I stand in the empty living room, listening to the sound of her heels on the hardwood floor, the click of the front door closing behind her.
Then I pick up my phone and dial Senna’s number.
It goes to voicemail, like it has every time since she left.
“It’s me,” I say. “I just ended the collaboration with Fiorella. I told her I couldn’t keep working with her while my marriage was falling apart.
I know that doesn’t fix anything. I know I have a lot more to do before you’ll even consider talking to me.
But I wanted you to know that I’m done putting anything else ahead of you. From now on, you come first. Always.”
I hang up and set the phone down on the counter, next to the ring that’s still sitting where she left it.
Then I go back to the studio and start sorting through the collaboration materials - not looking for anything specific, just trying to understand how I got here. How I let Fiorella become the center of my creative life while my wife stood outside the glass.
At the bottom of the pile, I find a loose page I don’t recognize. Handwritten lyrics, crumpled slightly, like someone tried to hide it. The writing isn’t Fiorella’s neat script. It’s messier, more urgent - familiar in a way I can’t quite place.
I stare at it for a long time, trying to remember where I’ve seen this handwriting before. On grocery lists. On birthday cards. On the margins of sheet music left on the piano bench.
Senna’s handwriting.
But that doesn’t make sense. Why would Senna’s handwriting be in Fiorella’s collaboration materials?
I set the page aside carefully, my mind racing. Then I pick up my phone and type a text to Senna - not demanding, not accusatory, just honest:
Rocco: I found a page in the collaboration materials with handwriting that looks familiar. Lyrics from the song. I don’t want to assume anything, but I’d like to understand. When you’re ready to talk, I’m here.
I don’t expect a response. Not yet. Maybe not for weeks.
But at least I’ve asked.
I sit down at the piano and start trying to remember how to write a song about my wife.