"𝐖𝐞 𝐬𝐡𝐨𝐮𝐥𝐝𝐧'𝐭 𝐛𝐞 𝐭𝐡𝐢𝐬 𝐤𝐢𝐧𝐝 𝐨𝐟 𝐭𝐢𝐫𝐞𝐝 𝐚𝐭 𝐨𝐮𝐫 𝐚𝐠𝐞."
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Alyssa, Alessandro and Alessio Smith have gone through hell.
They've been fighting to survive from the moment they'd first opened their eyes. Six...
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MY HANDS ARE clutching onto my brothers' tightly, anxiety coursing through me as the last echoes of the doorbell reverberate throughout the gigantic building.
My teeth are gnawing at my lip, and where usually my brothers would stop me, they are now too focused on their own worries to even notice. Which means something, because they always notice. But I know it's because their minds are as plagued by loud, screaming voices shouting their opinions about what's happening as mine is. It's all over their faces. Although only for schooled eyes. Outsiders wouldn't see the crease in their brows, or the slight downward tilt to their lips.
But despite their own conflicts, they still manage to stand protectively in front of me, their shoulders shielding the majority of my body from view. Or maybe it's because of their conflicts. With the juggled mess my emotions and nerves have formed, it's hard to tell.
I still suddenly when the door is pulled open, my heart dropping to my stomach.
Swallowing thickly, my gaze locks onto the tall form of a man. His gaze mirrors that of my brothers', cold and guarded, and unnervingly enough, his face does too mirror my brothers'. My eyes flit over the entirety of his face at least three times, my insides clenching at the resemblance between him and my brothers.
He's really related to us.
I think for a while, something inside of me still clung onto the thought I had earlier this day while ascending the staircase and leaving the house we grew up in a last time. That all of this was just a dream, or a joke. A trap maybe. Set up by our pa- our mother and her boyfriend, to punish us, or to lure us into a different location without raising suspicions.
I don't know. It doesn't make any sense. That part of my brain doesn't make any sense. But it had stopped the thought of having more relatives other than my brothers from fully registering.
But now, staring into the unfamiliar yet oh-so familiar pale green eyes of a man at least ten years older than my brothers and me, I can't help but choke up. My throat clogging as the realization finally sinks in. And then, new questions arrive.
Did they know about us? Why didn't mother tell us about them? Have they ever searched for us? Wanted to know where we are?
I startle out of my daze when I spot the man's lips moving.
"-re the triplets?"
San hesitates, his fingers growing cold at the tips as they dig into the back of my hand before he eventually nods.
The man's eyes waver, sweeping over us quickly, fleetingly, as if uncaring of who we are and what we look like, before he nods to himself and opens the door to let us pass.
The knots in my stomach tighten further.
I'm conflicted. I don't know whether to feel good or bad about his reaction to us. Technically speaking, it's good, he seems disinterested which might mean that he will ignore our existence altogether, resulting in one less person possibly posing as a threat. But on the other hand, something inside of me - that fucked up part of my brain probably - feels a hint of... discouragement? Disappointment?
