Chapter 20 #3
My throat closed. Pressure built behind my eyes, hot and insistent.
“He asked me something that night,” she continued, her gaze unwavering, as though she were placing something priceless and fragile in my hands. “He said, ‘If we have a girl… can we name her Alessia?’”
The world stopped.
The sound that came out of me wasn’t dignified. It wasn’t quiet. It broke free.
I folded forward, a sob tearing out of me as tears spilled unchecked, hot and relentless. I pressed my hand to my mouth as though I could stop it, but it was already too late. My shoulders shook. My breath fractured.
My father loved me.
The thought wasn’t just a concept. It was a physical warmth, flooding a cold, empty space inside my chest I hadn’t even known was there.
Someone had loved me from the very beginning.
He had named me.
Her hands found mine across the table. They were warm, slightly trembling, and they held on with a fierce, desperate grip. “I am so sorry I didn’t tell you this before. I thought you’d think I was making it up to manipulate you. That was my mistake. I should have told you before.”
My fingers tightened around hers. And I let go. The fresh, piercing grief for a father I’d never known. The confusing, painful empathy for the woman whose hand I was holding. I let the sobs shake through me, ugly and unfiltered, until my ribs ached.
She didn’t let go.
She held on through the wrenching sobs.
She held on as they subsided into silent, shuddering breaths, as the tears slowed from a river to a stream, then to occasional, hot tracks on my cheeks. She held on until the last tear dried, leaving my skin tight and salted, my chest hollowed out but strangely calm.
I took a deep, ragged breath, the first full one in minutes, and finally looked at her. Her eyes were red-rimmed, her makeup ruined, her expression one of open, raw hope.
“Do you think,” she asked, her voice barely a whisper, “you could ever give me a second chance?”
I wiped the last of the dampness from my cheeks with the heel of my free hand. “I don’t even believe in giving people a first chance anymore.”
She laughed too, a small, sad, understanding sound. She gave my hand one final, firm squeeze before releasing it. “That’s fair.”
A part of me was still the child hiding behind the pillar, waiting for her mother to come and take her away from the bad place. That part of me had never moved. I’d grown around her, learned to function, learned to survive—but she stayed there, frozen in hope.
I didn’t want to be stuck there anymore.
I wanted to turn around, reach for her hand, and lead her out myself.
I swallowed hard, the decision settling in my chest like a deep, clean breath. “Maybe,” I began, my voice rough but clear. “In the distant, distant future, I could have dinners with you. Ones that don’t make my skin crawl.”
Her eyes, still damp, ignited with a fragile, shimmering hope.
“But it cannot be now.” My voice firmed, finding its anchor. “You can’t keep crashing into my life. The wound is still open. It’s raw. I can’t… I can’t keep letting you tear the scab off. You have to give me space. Actual, quiet, uninterrupted space. Do you understand?”
She nodded, a single tear escaping to trace the path of so many others. “I do.”
I gave her a small smile. It was tired, and it was sad, but for the first time in my life, it was real when I looked at her. “Then maybe… I’ll see you in the future.”
She returned the smile, hers trembling but bright with a love that, for the first time, felt like it might be real. “Yeah.”
A weight I had carried for a lifetime finally lifted. I wasn’t hiding behind that pillar anymore. I wasn’t even in that house. I felt the grip of that little girl’s hand in mine, and for the first time, I was leading us both toward the door, into the light. I was finally free.
In that new space, a question floated up, simple and unbidden. I looked at my mother, her face softer in the aftermath of our honesty.
“Did you ever come to the house?” I asked. “The one Cassian and I lived in?”
She shook her head, a faint, amused smile touching her lips. “No.”
I frowned, genuinely puzzled. “Why not? Don’t tell me you couldn’t get a key. I find that hard to believe.”
A soft look settled on her face. “Oh, I found them. But Cassian stopped me.”
The world tilted. “What?”
“At your wedding reception,” she said, her voice low with memory.
“He pulled me aside. He told me I needed to leave you alone. That if I ever wanted to know you—really know you—I had to be brave enough to come to you directly. To tell you the truth, with no excuses. And until I could be that person… I needed to stay away.”
She looked down at her hands, a sad understanding in her eyes. “At the time, I thought… good. You had someone who saw you that clearly. Someone who would guard you like that. I was relieved. I thought I didn’t need to be brave after all. That you were already taken care of.”
Her expression dimmed. “And then I read about the divorce. I thought, ‘She needs someone now.’ I forgot… I’d never actually become brave enough to be that someone.”
‘Cassian The Neglectful Husband’ did that?
I frowned, the contradiction turning in my mind like a key in a stubborn lock.
With every new piece of information, the rigid portrait I’d painted of my past self—the desperate, foolish woman clinging to a man who didn’t care—began to crack. Maybe she’d seen something in him worth the fight, worth the patience, worth the devastating hope.
Maybe I judged her too harshly.
We stayed until we finished our coffee. The silence this time was different—not empty, but comfortable. I didn’t feel the old, itchy irritation at her presence. The space between us simply existed.
When we got up to leave, she paused, hovering for a few seconds in that uncertain space between strangers and family. Then, cautiously, as if approaching a skittish animal, she wrapped her arms around me.
I stood frozen, my body rigid with the shock of it. Then, slowly, I raised my arms and hugged her back. I didn’t hug the mother I’d never had. I hugged the warm, living, flawed woman in front of me. I hugged the fragile warmth of having her here, now.
When I finally returned to my apartment, I stood outside the door for a long moment, staring at the keyhole.
I slid the key in. It turned with a smooth, familiar click.
Maybe, just maybe, I didn’t need to change the locks this time.