Chapter 7
I confronted Bianca in my study.
No audience.
No Evelyn.
No Ethan.
She sat where she had sat during hundreds of family conversations.
My older sister.
The woman who held me after our father died.
The woman who carried Ethan through nights when grief made me useless.
That history remained.
So did the hidden room.
“Where are Clara’s letters?”
Her eyes changed immediately.
Good.
No denial.
“Raffaele…”
“Where?”
She looked toward the bookshelf.
Not there.
I waited.
Finally:
“Mother’s summer house.”
I stared.
Still existing.
Still hidden.
“Why?”
Bianca cried.
“Because Clara hated me.”
Not answer.
“Why?”
“She thought I wanted Ethan.”
“You did.”
Silence.
Then:
“I wanted to protect him.”
“From his mother?”
“She was dying.”
Her voice sharpened.
“She could barely stand. She hated that I could calm him when she couldn’t.”
Cruel way to describe a sick mother.
Maybe true in moments.
Not the whole truth.
“What did Clara write?”
Bianca knew most of it.
Because she had read the letter intended for me.
Clara accused Bianca of trying to become necessary before death finished removing her.
She wrote:
If I die, Raffaele will be grieving. Bianca will call control help. Please make sure Ethan grows up knowing the difference.
I closed my eyes.
Clara knew us.
Too well.
“Why hide the letters to Ethan?”
Bianca’s answer came softer.
“Because every envelope kept Clara in the room.”
There.
Not strategy.
Pain.
She wanted Ethan eventually to remember her as mother figure.
Not Clara.
Not Evelyn.
Her.
When Evelyn arrived, that dream collapsed.
Ethan loved her.
Called her Mom.
The wedding would make it permanent.
Then Evelyn found the letters.
If she gave them to me, Bianca’s role in my house would be reexamined from the beginning.
Everything she had done after Clara’s death would be placed under suspicion.
So she chose the same method she had already practiced emotionally.
Erase the competing woman.
Clara through hidden letters.
May you like
Evelyn through hidden rooms.
My sister had been building motherhood out of absence.
