6. Adriana
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Adriana
The words hang in the air between us, ugly and raw.
Rafael flinches like I’ve slapped him. He’s still fumbling with the sheets, trying to cover himself, trying to find some dignity in a moment that has none.
“Adriana, please. Just let me explain.”
“Explain what?” I hear my voice rising, cracking at the edges. “What could you possibly explain? I just walked in on you. With her. In your bed.”
“It’s not… it wasn’t supposed to happen like this.”
“Like what? You weren’t supposed to get caught?”
He runs a hand through his hair, and I notice the way it’s mussed. The way there are scratch marks on his shoulder. The way the room smells like sex and perfume and betrayal.
“Okay, look.” He takes a breath, trying to compose himself. “Viviana just showed up today. Out of the blue. I didn’t know she was coming. I didn’t plan any of this.”
“So she just appeared in your bedroom? Naked? And you, what, tripped and fell into her?”
“That’s not fair.”
“Fair?” The word comes out like a laugh, sharp and broken. “You want to talk to me about fair?”
Viviana sits up slowly, wrapping a sheet around herself with the casual grace of someone who has all the time in the world. She’s not scrambling. She’s not apologizing. She’s watching me with that same satisfied smile, like this is all going exactly according to plan.
“Oh, calm down,” she says. “It’s not like you were using him.”
The words hit me like a physical blow. I turn to stare at her, this sister of mine, this stranger wearing my sister’s face.
“What did you say?”
“Seven months, Ana. Seven months and you never even slept with him.” She tilts her head, mock sympathy dripping from every word. “What did you expect? That he’d wait forever?”
“I expected him to be faithful. I expected him to keep his vows.”
“His vows to you?” Viviana laughs, high and sharp. “He made those vows to me first. You were just the replacement. The backup plan. Did you really think he wanted you?”
“Viviana.” Rafael’s voice is strained. “That’s enough.”
“Why? She should know the truth.” Viviana looks at me, and there’s something cruel in her eyes, something that’s always been there but that I’ve spent my whole life pretending not to see. “Rafael was my fiancé in the first place. Mine. You were just keeping his bed warm until I came back.”
“You ran away.” My voice is shaking now, trembling with something that might be rage or might be grief or might be both. “You disappeared on your wedding day. You left me to take your place. You left me to marry a stranger because you couldn’t be bothered to show up.”
“And you did it, didn’t you?” She examines her nails, bored. “Like a good little Ana. Always doing what she’s told. Always cleaning up my messes.”
“I didn’t have a choice.”
“There’s always a choice. You just never had the spine to make one.” She looks up at me, and her smile sharpens. “Until now, apparently. Look at you, making a scene. Father would be so disappointed.”
The mention of our father makes something twist in my stomach. She’s right. He would be disappointed. Not in her, never in her. In me, for making problems, for not accepting my husband’s indiscretions quietly, for failing to be the obedient daughter he raised me to be.
“I don’t care what Father thinks.”
“Sure you don’t.” Viviana stretches, the sheet slipping off one shoulder. “That’s why you’re shaking. That’s why you look like you’re about to cry. Because you don’t care.”
I am shaking. I can feel it in my hands, my arms, my whole body trembling with the effort of holding myself together. But I won’t cry. Not in front of her. Not in front of either of them.
“To what? To marry a rich, handsome man? To live in a mansion? Poor Ana, always the victim.” She rolls her eyes. “I did you a favor. You should be thanking me.”
“Thanking you?”
“You got seven months of playing house with my fiancé. Seven months of pretending you were somebody. Seven months of living a life you never would have had otherwise.” She shrugs, casual and cruel. “Now I’m back. And you can scram.”
The word hits me like a slap. Scram. Like I’m a dog being shooed away from the dinner table. Like I’m an inconvenience, a nuisance, a thing to be dismissed. Like I’m nothing. Like I’ve always been nothing.
I turn to Rafael. He’s managed to pull on pants, at least, though his chest is still bare, still marked with evidence of what they were doing before I walked in. He won’t meet my eyes. He’s staring at a point somewhere over my shoulder, his jaw tight, his expression closed.
“And you?” My voice comes out steadier than I feel. “Do you want me to scram too?”
He doesn’t answer.
“Rafael. Look at me.”
He raises his head slowly, reluctantly. His eyes meet mine for just a moment before sliding away again. And in that moment, in that flicker of contact, I see the truth.
He’s not going to fight for me. He’s not going to tell Viviana to leave. He’s not going to choose me over her.
He never was.
“I didn’t plan this,” he says again, like repetition will make it true. “Viviana showed up out of nowhere. I didn’t know she was coming. And then one thing led to another, and…”
“One thing led to another.” I repeat the words back to him, tasting their bitterness. “That’s your explanation? One thing led to another?”
“I’m sorry you had to see it. I’m sorry you’re hurt. But Viviana and I… we have history. You knew that. You knew we were together before.”
“You were engaged. That’s not the same as…” I gesture at the bed, at the tangled sheets, at the evidence of their betrayal spread out before me. “That’s not the same as this.”
“Ana.” He takes a step toward me, reaching out like he’s going to touch my shoulder. “Let’s just calm down and talk about this. We can figure something out. The three of us, we can…”
“Don’t.” I step back, away from his hand, away from him. “Don’t touch me. Don’t come near me.”
“You’re overreacting.”
“Overreacting?” The word comes out as a laugh, wild and broken. “I walked in on you fucking my sister and I’m overreacting?”
“It didn’t mean anything.”
“It meant everything!” I’m shouting now, my voice echoing off the high ceilings, bouncing back at me from the walls. “It meant you never wanted me. It meant everything you said was a lie. It meant I was nothing to you, just a placeholder, just a warm body until she decided to come back.”
“That’s not true.”
“Then tell me what is true, Rafael. Tell me one thing, one single thing, that wasn’t a lie.”
He opens his mouth. Closes it. Opens it again.
Nothing. He has nothing.
Viviana sighs, examining her nails like this whole scene is boring her. “Are you done? Because this is getting tedious.”
“Shut up.” I turn on her, all the rage I’ve swallowed my entire life rising up in my throat. “Shut up, Viviana. You don’t get to talk. You don’t get to sit there in his bed and act like I’m the one being unreasonable.”
“You are being unreasonable. You’re making a scene over nothing.”
“Nothing? You stole my husband.”
“He was never yours.” She says it simply, like she’s stating an obvious fact. Like it’s something everyone knows, something I should have understood from the beginning. “He was always mine. You were just borrowing him.”
I stare at her. At this person I grew up with, shared a house with, shared parents with.
All those years of being compared to her and found wanting.
All those years of watching her take everything she wanted without consequence.
All those years of telling myself she didn’t mean it, she was just spoiled, she didn’t understand how much her careless cruelty hurt.
She understood. She always understood. She just didn’t care.
“I want a divorce.” The words come out flat and hard, surprising even me. They feel like stones in my mouth, heavy and final. “I want a fucking divorce, and I want both of you to stay away from me. Don’t call me. Don’t text me. Don’t ever come near me again.”
Rafael’s face changes. Something flickers in his eyes that might be panic, might be calculation. “Adriana, wait. Let’s not do anything hasty. We can work this out.”
“There’s nothing to work out.”
“Think about what you’re saying. A divorce would be complicated. Both families, everything our fathers arranged. Your father would…”
“I don’t care about my father.” The words feel foreign in my mouth. I’ve never said them before. I’ve never even thought them before. “I don’t care what our families want. I don’t care about any of it.”
“You don’t mean that.”
“I do.” I’m backing toward the door now, putting distance between us with every step. “I’m done. Do you understand me? I’m done being the good daughter. I’m done being the obedient wife. I’m done pretending everything is fine when it’s rotten underneath.”
“Ana, please…”
“Don’t call me that.” It comes out quiet, quieter than the shouting, and it cuts deeper for it. “I gave you that name. I let you in, and you didn’t even bother to ask what it meant. So no. You don’t get to call me Ana. Not anymore. It’s Adriana to you now, the way it should have stayed.”
I reach the doorway, my hand finding the frame, solid wood under my fingers.
I turn and walk away.
Rafael calls after me. I hear his footsteps, hear him stumbling as he tries to follow. But I don’t stop. I don’t turn around. I don’t look back.
The hallway stretches out before me, that same long quiet hallway I walked down with so much hope just minutes ago. The carpet still muffles my footsteps. The light still filters through the windows at the far end. Nothing has changed.
Everything has changed.
I reach the stairs and descend, my hand gripping the banister so tightly my knuckles go white. One step, then another, then another. I count them in my head, giving myself something to focus on, something to keep me moving forward.
The foyer opens up below me, all that cold marble and dark wood. All those expensive things that were never mine, that were always just borrowed, just like Rafael was borrowed, just like this whole life was borrowed.