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“She fell asleep, Grazi and Carmen took her to her room,” Giovanna hurries to answer, probably reading in my gestures the size of my despair.I breathe a sigh of relief, knowing she is well, safe, protected, and out of reach of those who will never be called her grandparents.
“Thank you,” I say to her and turn to Marcos. “Let’s say goodbye and we can leave,” I warn, leaving no room for discussion, he frowns, after all, the party has barely begun, but he nods.With the same gesture, I bid farewell to his parents, still at the table, and despite their confused faces, no one asks anything.
I begin to walk away with my heart racing in my chest somehow, knowing that my prediction will come true, and I will be compelled to see her.I don’t want to, God, I don’t want to see her.Seeing Mario was bad, but seeing Rosana will be a thousand times worse.I take a deep breath, walking normally and holding my head up high, but before I have taken ten steps, a warm, large hand holds mine, I turn my face, finding Marcos there beside me, and I never thought I would feel as grateful for Asshole Marcos’ presence as I do now.
We walk in silence, however, it does not last long.As soon as the hallway ends and we turn right to reach the elevators, the tall, blonde, well-dressed, and made-up figure appears before us.I can’t contain the shudder of my body at the sight of her, it’s almost as if the last five years haven’t passed, it’s almost as if I’m still a seventeen-year-old girl, pregnant, refusing to have an abortion, and being kicked out of the house on a rainy night with nothing but the clothes on my body.
“Antonella...”
“No!” I refuse to give her the courtesy of any other word and keep moving forward, determined to go walk by her exactly as she is, a ghost.
“My daughter...”
“Don’t you dare!” The words seem to travel the way beyond my lips, faster, even, that my thoughts reach my own consciousness.I squeeze my free hand into a fist, trying to relieve the violent tremor that shakes my body and needing the feeling of control over something, anything, even the pain I feel when digging my own nails into the thin skin of my palm. “I’m not your daughter, you’re not my mother!” My voice is surprisingly firm, despite all the feelings that riot and duel within me. “I don’t know what got into your heads to think it was a good idea to show up at my wedding, but let me be very clear here: if you don’t want a scandal about a judge who wanted to force his underage daughter to have an abortion stamped on the front pages of tomorrow’s newspapers, you’re going to disappear from my life and forget I exist, or I swear to God, I’ll remember you exist and that won’t be good for anyone!”
When I finish speaking, Rosana’s eyes are wide and her mouth open, shocked by my words, nothing has changed.It’s just as I remembered it.And an angry laugh leaves my mouth.
“What is your husband... what will he think, Antonella?” she starts stuttering, but, as always, in the name of appearances, she finds her own voice, and the last words come out as if she were talking about the weather.I shake my head, denying it.
“He won’t think, Rosana, he’ll know! He will know that for you I am dead, and it is better that it remains so, because for me you are far beyond dead and nothing will change!”
This time, when I walk again, she walks away, as if the mere possibility of touching me was dangerous, I pass through the doors of the elevator, already open, with Marcos beside me, in complete silence, and when the metal sheets unite, isolating us inside, I let my body loose on the cold wall and close my eyes.I take a deep breath, pulling the air through my nose and releasing it through my mouth, the burning in my eyes borders on the unbearable, as well as the urge to scream.
I keep my head down, dealing with my own emotions one by one and feeling an unstoppable need to hold my daughter in my arms.I don’t look at Marcos, what he’s thinking is just another one of the many worries that surround my head.But when the elevator rings stating it arrived on the floor of the suite where I know Isabella is, I raise my shoulders and my head.
I get out of the elevator.In a few steps I knock on the bedroom door, Grazi answers.By her wide eyes, I’m sure she saw them.My friend hugs me, giving me the comfort that only she could give me.She whispers kind words in my ear, says that everything is fine, without giving a damn to the audience formed by Carmen and Marcos.
“Is everything ok?” She gets away from me, planting her palms on my cheeks.
“Is Bella okay?” I answer, and she nods, saying yes.
“They didn’t even see her.As soon as I saw them come in, I left there with her, I don’t think they saw me either.”
“Great...” I sigh, relieved, kiss her two hands, before getting rid of them and walking to the inside of the room, where I know I will find Isabella, without caring about anything else.
My little girl is lying on the huge bed, already with her hair loose and a pajamas with crowns and dragons print.I crouch beside the bed, since my dress is not a great friend in terms of mobility, and caress her hair, her cheek, take her small hand and sigh, feeling at peace just by touching her.
For minutes, I watch her sleep.In silence, I enjoy her presence, her warmth, her sweet smell, and when I feel recharged, ready to face the whole world for her, I get up, give her a kiss on the forehead, put the blanket over her body, and leave the room, knowing that outside there are many lions to defeat.
And, too soon, I come across the first one.After carefully closing the door, I turn around and find the suite room almost empty, Carmen and Grazi are no longer here, there is only Marcos, holding a glass of whiskey that he looks at, watching the amber liquid spin.
“Well, wife, I believe it’s our time to talk…” I exhale and make my way toward him.Without any ceremony, I take the glass from his hand and turn it once in my mouth.I need a drink to have this conversation. “Now that makes a lot more sense,” he murmurs to himself, but that doesn’t stop me from listening.
I savor the drink, let it flood my palate, my tongue, and every bit of my mouth before ripping off the band-aid.
“Five years ago, a month after my seventeenth birthday, I found out I was four weeks pregnant.It was a nice gift, you know?Despair like I’ve never felt…” I say, making my way to the bar and pouring myself a double shot of the whiskey. “I had no idea what to do, how to tell my parents, what would happen after that and, while I reproached myself and tried, in vain, to organize my own thoughts, my mother, by a great chance, entered my bathroom without knocking and caught me with a pharmacy test in hands and three others in front of me, all positive...” I take a sip of the drink, but it does not come close to being as bitter as the memory. “She gave me a warning, told me to get rid of the exams and told me that she would make an appointment for me, because a Rodrigues Machado did not get pregnant at seventeen” another sip of drink, this time, a longer one “when I asked her what would happen if I did not want it, she repeated the exact same phrase, a Rodrigues Machado did not get pregnant at seventeen.The next day, I refused to leave my room when she called me to go to the doctor, locked myself inside and only opened the door when I saw my father’s car leaving him at the entrance of the house.I ran to him as soon as I saw him come in, certain that he would help me put some sense in my mother’s head, it rained a lot that night.It felt like the weather wanted to match my state of mind.I was terrified, regretting about being inconsequent, I had no idea what my life would be like from then on, but I could not even conceive what my mother imposed on me.” I shake my head from side to side, almost feeling everything again, the fear, the cold, the exhaustion, everything. “I told my father, tears and sobs, longing for a hug and anit’s going to be okay, instead, I heard from his mouth, with something bordering on disgust, the same words as my mother and a choice, either I gave my word that the next day, in the first hour, I would be in the doctor’s office, or I would walk out the door at that moment never to return. It was never a real choice, you know?I just couldn’t, not with her.Even though at that time I didn’t know it was her, Isabella wasn’t to blame for my actions, and I couldn’t …” The salty taste mixes with the bitter in my mouth as the first tear slips down my cheek and reaches my lip. “So I left.With nothing but clothes on my body, in the rain, alone, pregnant and terrified, I looked for the one person I knew cared enough to help me, Grazi.My best friend of my whole life...That night, her parents were not at home, she welcomed me, took care of me, hugged me and cried with me, then gave me money and put me on a hotel, our parents were friends and we had no idea how her father and mother would react to my presence in her house, two weeks later, we moved to São Paulo...For almost five years, we lived together while she was in college.Nine months ago, she graduated and had to go back to Rio, that’s how I got to your house...
After dumping everything at once, I finally take my gaze to Marcos, he watches me carefully, and I raise my eyebrows in a silentthat’s it!
“I’m sorry that you went through all this, Antonella, I’m sorry that they thought it was their right to show up here today, I’m sorry that you were forced to remember all this, but you should have told me.”
I laugh, I deny with my head, and look away.
“Why?What would that change?”
“You lied to me…” The seriousness in his tone makes me look at him again. “I asked you before we signed the contract if there was anything important about you that I should know about, and you told me no, that’s important, and you know.Which means you made a choice; you chose to lie to me.” There is not the accusation I expected in his voice, nor disappointment, it is more like a warning, perhaps. “If I had known, what happened today would never have happened, they would never have come near you or Isabella,” he assures me, and I believe him.I blink, confused by the certainty that hits me that he’s serious. “Who is Isabella’s father, Antonella?” He retraces the question asked weeks ago, I tilt my head, surprised that he is not treating me like a fragile ornament.
Not that I wanted to, but definitely, I expected it.I expected Marcos to think that I would need space, time to deal with the ridiculous situation that unfolded just a few minutes ago, before asking me questions, but he surprises me, and I like it.I give him a crooked smile, bring the glass of whiskey once again to my mouth, and finally give him exactly the same answer as before.
