Lena gently pulled Vincenzo back, her voice soft as silk. “It’s okay, Vincenzo. Let it go. If it belongs to Gabriel, Noel shouldn’t touch it.”
Vincenzo gave a short, mocking laugh.
“This is my house. I decide what happens here.”
I bent down, picked up the urn, and held it against my chest so tightly it hurt to breathe. Then I turned and walked away without another word.
Behind me, I heard him scoff. I heard the judgment in it. I heard how small I’d become in his world.
And then—like I was nothing more than an inconvenience—he escorted Lena and Noel out as though they were honored guests leaving a banquet.
That night, the mansion was too quiet.
I sat alone in the bedroom Vincenzo no longer shared and packed my things in silence. My hands shook the entire time. I filled out the divorce papers one page after another, forcing my fingers to obey me. Gabriel’s urn sat beside me on the bed the whole time, like he was still keeping me company.
I didn’t sleep. I just waited for morning.
**
That night, I dreamed of Gabriel again.
He was walking through a long hallway made entirely of glass—no walls, no shadows, no reflections that made sense. His small feet moved slowly, hesitantly. He was crying, holding his stomach like it hurt again.
He kept calling out for him.
“Dad? Dad, where are you?”
Not me. Never me.
Vincenzo.
Even in the dream, that truth cut deeper than anything else.
I ran after him, shouting his name, begging him to stop. But no matter how fast I moved, he drifted farther away, like smoke slipping through my hands.
Eventually I collapsed.
“I’m sorry,” I cried. “I’m so sorry, baby… I should’ve saved you. I should’ve never let you go alone…”
I kept repeating it until I couldn’t breathe anymore.
**
When I woke up, I was already on the floor.
My hands were still folded like I’d been praying in my sleep. I didn’t even remember doing it. But I was praying—begging for peace for a child who no longer had to ask for anything.
The mansion stayed quiet around me, too perfect, too empty. Vincenzo’s world was built on power and fear, but to me it had become something else entirely—just a beautiful cage with no warmth inside.
Then everything came back in pieces.
Vincenzo’s distance. The way his affection faded without warning. Lena’s return, and how quickly he turned colder than I had ever seen him before.
He started comparing.