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بيت / The Test Was Over. I Was Already Dead / Chapter 4

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Chapter 4

مؤلف: Felicity
When Matteo came in, I moved aside out of habit, leaving him the side of the hall he always preferred.

He took Viola’s empty glass and handed his coat to a waiter. His cufflinks were dark silver; his tie clip sat exactly where he always wore it. I’d once thought that knowing someone that well meant they’d never leave you.

An older shipping associate stopped him with a glance at Viola. “Should we expect another announcement from our two families?”

She lowered her eyes, her fingers hovering by the glass stem. Matteo didn’t smile. He stepped aside, leaving a clear gap between them. “There’s been a misunderstanding. I’m engaged to Elena. That hasn’t changed. Viola is her sister. Nothing more.”

The man hastily said he looked forward to the invitation. Viola’s smile faded. She reached for Mom as though she’d suddenly felt a chill, but Matteo was looking at his watch and calling me again.

This time, the call wouldn’t connect. My phone’s old battery often died with one bar left. I’d planned to replace it next month.

[If I’d had a next month.]

“She never used to keep people waiting,” Matteo said.

Mom glanced toward the entrance. “She never used to have this much reason to be hurt.”

[Then why did you let it go on for five years?]

She couldn’t hear me.

Anthony, our butler, took a call from the driver. His expression changed as he listened. When he’d delivered the dress earlier, the landlord had said I’d just finished a night shift and needed sleep. The driver had left the clothes outside my door. Now he was back to collect me, but I wasn’t answering.

“Could she be at work?” Mom asked.

“The depot says she took today off, ma’am.”

Dad set down his glass, raising his voice for the first time. “Then get someone to open the door. She lives alone. Why is he still waiting downstairs?”

Anthony turned to call back. Viola caught Dad’s sleeve. “Maybe Elena just needs space? She said last time that she didn’t want us interfering.”

Dad hesitated, but Matteo was already reaching for his coat. “I’ll get her.”

I followed him to the door. Five years ago, I’d followed him like this, except I could still take his hand.

Mom hurried after him and pressed the leather case into his palm. “Don’t start by telling her to be reasonable. Tell her I’m ready to apologize.”

He nodded and had gone down two steps when Anthony’s phone rang again. The butler answered the unfamiliar number, identifying the house. The caller asked for Elena Romano’s next of kin.

Dad took the phone. “I’m her father. What’s happened?”

Conversation faded around us. Outside, I could hear an engine idling.

“Sir, I’m the detective at a scene on the South Side. We need you and her mother to come down and confirm an identity.”

Dad tightened his grip. “What scene? Is she hurt?”

The detective paused. “We’ve found a woman’s body at her address. There’s a bank-transfer receipt beside her. You’re the recipient.”
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  • The Test Was Over. I Was Already Dead   Chapter 12

    Nina took my ashes to the coast. For the first time, I saw a stretch of open water without a dock fence in the way. She sat on a quiet ledge of rock and told me she’d kept her wedding dress safe. One day, she wanted her daughter to see it.Mom and Dad stood farther up the shore. Matteo stayed beyond them and didn’t come closer. No breeze carried an embrace from me. No seabird brought them a message. They waited until dark and heard nothing but the tide.Afterward, Mom’s voice gradually stopped pulling me back. Sometimes I saw nothing for long stretches. When I opened my eyes again, the trees by the lake had changed their leaves several times.Mom always bought two birthday presents on the same day. She sent one away and put the other in the east wing. Then she sat beside my cutting table, slowly choosing thread for me. When she picked the wrong color, no one corrected her.Dad put the ledger away, but he couldn’t forget its figures. For a long time, he’d stop in the middle of dinner an

  • The Test Was Over. I Was Already Dead   Chapter 11

    The family’s guests weren’t invited to my funeral. Dad hadn’t suddenly figured out what I wanted. Nina had given them my hospice intake form, where I’d written down my wishes.[No religious service. No public viewing. If possible, take my ashes out of the city.]There wasn’t much to it. When the social worker asked for someone I trusted, I’d thought for a long time before writing Nina’s name. She’d promised that, if I got well enough to travel, she’d take me to the town where she’d spent her honeymoon. I could see the ocean.I’d still been making plans for next season.Mom folded the form, then opened it again. She wanted me dressed in something formal, but the staff told her I’d already set aside an outfit: the cream sweater I’d altered myself.She sat holding it for an entire afternoon. After that, she stopped mentioning all the new clothes waiting in my old wardrobe.Matteo wanted to leave his watch with me. Nina stopped him and pointed to another line on the form.[Only the brass t

  • The Test Was Over. I Was Already Dead   Chapter 10

    Dad canceled every remaining event connected to the dinner. A few days later, he called back everyone who’d attended.I stood in the hall as they arrived. Out of habit, they looked toward the high-backed chair reserved for the head of the family. It was empty. Dad stood below the steps with no drink and no speech in his hand.He told them Viola and I were both his biological daughters. The story about a hospital mix-up had been a lie.Someone quietly asked whether it had been a way of keeping the girls safe.“No,” Dad said. “It wasn’t.”He didn’t leave it at the fact that I’d died of cancer. He told them about the money, the postponed marriage, and what they’d called a test. Mom sat in the front row, holding a printout of her calendar from my nineteenth birthday. She offered no excuses and made no attempt to hide her tears.An old adviser stood up. These were private matters, he said. Dad’s men would question his judgment. His rivals would take advantage.Dad looked at the people who’d

  • The Test Was Over. I Was Already Dead   Chapter 9

    When they came to clear out my room, Nina stayed by the door. She wouldn’t let the household staff pack my belongings. Instead, she handed them to Mom herself: two work uniforms, a sweater with a mended cuff, and a canvas bag missing one strap.I’d brought a few sketchbooks when I moved in. As the damp got worse, I’d tied them inside a plastic bag and put them on the highest shelf.Matteo climbed onto a stool to get them. The knot took him a long time to undo. Eventually, he crouched on the floor with the books spread across his knees. The first still had the name of my New York school on its cover.He turned the pages and found my wedding-dress designs. The earliest had a long train. Later, the trains grew shorter, and fabric prices appeared beside the sketches. I’d marked what I could do with every scrap, working out whether there was enough left for a little bag.Mom leaned over and found a note on one page.[Nina. September. Beach wedding. No charge—she saved dinner for me after my

  • The Test Was Over. I Was Already Dead   Chapter 8

    Viola had changed into flats by the time she was called into the study. I remembered the shoes she’d worn when she first arrived, the soles coming loose. Mom had knelt to tie them and cried, promising she’d never suffer again.I’d been standing on the stairs, wondering if she’d like half my shoe closet.Dad pushed the reports across the desk. “Luca says you gave him this information.”Viola didn’t sit. Her eyes went from Mom to Matteo. “I didn’t want everyone worrying. Elena wouldn’t see me, so I asked people she worked with—”Matteo laid another page on top. Last month’s report said I was getting regular checkups, maintaining my weight, and planning to apply to school again in the spring. “Which school?” he asked.Viola’s lips parted. “I don’t remember.”“Which doctor?”She said nothing. Mom read the report, then found a picture Viola had sent her four months earlier. I was leaving a bakery with a bag of food, looking perfectly calm. “You said she’d settled in. That she was treating h

  • The Test Was Over. I Was Already Dead   Chapter 7

    A few dinner guests had stayed behind at the house. When we returned, Viola was sitting in the living room, her skirt spread across the rug. She sprang up at the sight of the detective behind Dad. “Did you find Elena?”Mom went straight into the study without answering. That night, for the first time, I watched them spread out the details of my life and actually read them.The medical records arrived over the next few days, after the necessary authorizations. I followed them from room to room as my five years became more than a monthly summary.Mom put the pay stubs beside the ledger and worked through them with a calculator. When she finished, she started again. Six day shifts and four nights a week, hauling, scrubbing, cleaning kitchens after everyone else went home. “These shifts run into each other.” She pointed at a line. “When did she sleep?”No one could tell her. Sometimes I slept on the bus after work. Sometimes I curled up in the depot’s changing room, blocking the light with

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