MARENGO

1 | Ancestry

Victoria's POV

"Do you think this is easy for me, Victoria?!" my mom looked down at the marbled floors and shook her head in disbelief. I struggled to hold in the tears; I could feel my eyes filling up to the brim by the millisecond, and before I knew it, the tear fell. I couldn't help but cry. When you realized that your whole life was some sort of a lie, a facade - you really couldn't help it.

My family was not as perfect as it was displayed to be. I knew this because I felt it.

The whispers.

I was at the age where I deserved to know who my biological father was. The fact that this had only been known to me at age 18, was disappointing. Especially because I expected more from my parents.

"But why now, mom?! I should have been aware of this growing up!" I cried, wiping off the teardrop with immediate effect.

"What would you have done, huh? Let's say I told you at a young age that Nickolas wasn't your biological father, what would have happened?" My mom glanced at me with a stern look in her eyes. I didn't know how to answer that question with all the rage built up inside of me during this ten-minute conversation we'd been having. I breathed heavily and focused my attention on my dad, who was coming down the spiral staircase. He paused as he approached the landing, and felt the tension in the room. You could cut it with a knife.

"You guys seem serious," he smiled. "Everything good?"

I fixed my posture and faked a smile. "Yeah, it's all good."

Clearly, dad was not convinced, but I didn't have time to sit here and discuss this sensitive topic. I could already imagine the scenery, mom and dad on one couch, me on the other, Alejandro listening in with his stupid spy contraption and the awkwardness of the whole thing slapping me across the face. I rarely had these conversations with my parents and I didn't plan to either.

"Vic, try getting your brother off his computer," Dad stated, placing his hands over mom's shoulders. "We're having dinner in an hour. Pops is coming."

I scrambled up the stairs, and into the bathroom in my room, opening the faucet with as much pressure as possible, and splashing the glacial water all over my face to hide any appearance of weeping. To my disbelief, the lights in the bathroom were on, and I could look in the mirror as a whole new person. I started to unpick any features I thought were similar to my dad's and wondered why my eyes were a lurid, dark brown unlike the other members in my family with their light, ocean eyes.

Subsequently, there was a knock at my door. I dried my face off with a towel and went to see who it was. To my surprise, it was Alejandro. He stood tall and leaned on the wall.

"What?" I asked, noticing his worried glance. "It's quite rare to find you here especially since this is the peak of your 'HackerCommittee' meetings."

"Yeah," he chuckled. "I uh- I need your help with..."

"Spit it out, boy," I crossed my arms.

"A girl," he laughed nervously. "I need help asking a girl to be my prom date. I was gonna do something special but I don't know-"

"Say no more, I'll help you," I dragged his arms into my room and laughed. "But we gotta hurry up because we're having dinner in an hour. Popita's coming."

"Good! She can probably give us a better insight into this since she got asked out to prom too. I'm not trying to fuck this up."

Scarlett's POV