It was on the eighteenth day of my isolation, my nineteenth day in Italy and the twenty-sixth day of me being with the Valastros’, that I finally snapped.
Nearly an entire month of doing nothing had started to drive me mad and I had not been ready to let myself succumb to madness, to let myself break because I had to leave Italy, the Valastros’, in one piece, somehow.
The day had started like any other, I had woken up before sunrise and went to watch the new day being born, I had then gone to take a shower, gotten dressed and waited for my escort; it had been Dante.
I had gone through the routine of greeting him with a smile trying to ignore how uncomfortable his piercing gaze had made me, before we walked to breakfast.
Like always, when I had gotten to the table I was greeted in varying manners and I had eaten breakfast to the sound of an Italian discussion amongst Alessandro, Nikolai and Rosy. Antonio had taken me back to my room quietly which I had found odd but had not thought too much into it.
Breakfast was at seven, lunch at one and dinner at seven.
In the five hours I had had before lunch I had spent the two in front of the vanity table assessing the clear difference of how I had looked then from how I had looked before I had met them all.
Though I had still looked healthy, I had lost some weight, there had been dark circles under my eyes that though not prominent, had certainly drawn attention enough for one to see how dull my eyes had become.
The rest of the three hours had been spent with me debating whether I could, should, stay in my room for much longer.
Time had passed in a blur with me trying to decide how I would go about leaving my room when the call announcing lunch had come through and I had found my answer when that sweet lady’s voice—Mina, I would soon learn—had asked if she should bring my lunch up, like she had always asked, I had told her not to bother because I would come down.
Fifteen minutes had never felt longer as I questioned my discussion and whether someone would fetch me or I had to go by myself, the latter was the case.
Thirteen minutes into my waiting I had decided to go by myself, it had been the first time I had opened that door with no one on the other side and the first time of many more to come when I had walked out on my own.
When I had walked into the dining room the first person who had seen me had been Mario, he had been laughing at something, his eyes bright with laughter as he chuckled but when he had spotted me coming through the door his expression had shifted from that of delight to that of annoyance doing with something that till this day I do not know.
The change had been sudden like water vapor losing all it’s head and sublimating, his expression—the one directed at me—had been cold as ice and hard as stone. It had made me uneasy.
The next person who had noticed my presence had been Dante and unlike his brother, his expression had shifted from amusement to shock and confusion which was then replaced by something dark and devious that had not made sense to me then much like everything pertaining to him and his older brothers.
The rapid change in the two brother’s expressions had made me falter in my steps thinking that leaving my room had been a bad idea. However, the way Geovanni’s expression went from surprise to absolute delight when he had seen me and the way, Alessandro simply regarded me with an impassive look as if I was not worth paying attention to, surprisingly, made me continue walking towards the table which only had four occupants.
Their seating arrangement made it hard for me to choose a place to sit. Alessandro as usual was sitting at the head of the table, the immediate seats next to him on either side empty with Geovanni sitting on the left side opposite Dante with Mario next to him.
I had not wanted to sit next to Dante and opposite Mario but I did not have a chance so I sat down shiftily. With a small greeting the first out of the four brothers to speak had been Geovanni.
“Clearly our lighting needs updating because now that I’m seeing you in mid-day light I can see that these unnecessarily expensive lamps of ours have not been doing your beauty any justice.” The comment had been light, said with an exaggerated expression and it had made a small smile carve itself on to my lips.
“Oh great Jesus, that smile deserves to be in a museum, where there’s proper lighting. It’s just too precious.” My smile widened, he was amusing. Geovanni looked at his brothers with a troubled expression, as if bad lighting compromising my beauty was the worst crime they had been doing.
In another time, if I'd had enough energy to be angry, I would have been furious at how they thought my life was a game. However, in that moment I had not cared because his voice, his expression, his words and just his presence alone, had lifted that heavy burden that had been weighing me down.
There are many things that could explain why on that day during lunch Geovanni had grown on me but I like to stick with the simplest explanation; when I was feeling alone, invisible and terrified he had made it his job to make me feel known, noticed and safe.
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Rooted from Betrayal
ActionI would have had a normal life, with mundane problems and simple joys. I would have started practicing as a general doctor by the age of 24 with intentions of specializing and later becoming a neurosurgeon. I would have lived a normal life far from...
