Tres firmas: Dos Parejas, Una Imagen

Bianca ran her fingers over the crown’s diamond-studded frame. “Mom, look. Even the sides are shaped like my favorite white roses.”

My mother took her hand with shining eyes.

“My baby deserves the most beautiful induction crown the Bellini Family has ever seen. Everyone will be watching. We can’t give them anything to whisper about.”

So Mother understood.

She knew that even the slightest flaw in the induction crown would invite gossip.

Yet she expected me to walk into the same ceremony wearing a tarnished crown with half stone.

She understood the humiliation. She simply didn’t care when I was the daughter being humiliated.

Father stepped forward and kissed Bianca on the forehead.

“After your induction, you’ll be the crowned Principessa of the Bellini Family.”

“And once that crown is on your head, anyone who disrespects you answers to me.”

Only a week ago, he had told me something very different.

A Bellini woman did not complain. She handled her problems quietly and never embarrassed the family.

Apparently, Bianca was allowed to ask for protection. I was expected to survive without it.

I stood beneath the arched doorway, staring at the crown set with both our birthstones.

Even the gold band had been engraved with Bianca’s initials.

B.B.

For one foolish second, I wanted to ask, Am I not your daughter too?

The question rose to my lips, but I swallowed it.

What was the point?

I had asked it in a hundred different ways since childhood. The answer was always the same.

“Do you have to compete with your sister over everything?”

Or worse:

“Bianca has always been delicate.”

“You’re the older one, Elena. Act like it.”

Bianca and I were twins. I had been born seven minutes earlier and six ounces heavier.

Apparently, that was enough to make every sacrifice my responsibility.

When we were nine, Grandfather gave me a pony. Bianca wanted her, so Mother asked me to share. A month later, I needed Bianca’s permission to ride my own horse.

When I was named valedictorian, Bianca cried because the family celebrated me at dinner. By morning, Mother had convinced Father to send her to Paris for the summer so she would have “something special of her own.”

Each time, I had stepped aside.

When our induction was announced, I thought that, for once, there would be nothing left for them to ask me to surrender.

Then Bianca decided one diamond wasn’t enough for her crown.

So they took mine.

Across the room, Bianca looped her arm through Mother’s.

“Why isn’t my gown here yet? I need to look perfect for tonight’s dinner.”

Every capo had been invited to the induction. Several had flown in from overseas a week early, so the family was hosting a formal welcome dinner that evening.

Bianca’s gown had arrived from Milan that afternoon and was waiting at the designer’s Manhattan showroom.

Mother looked at me. “Elena, go pick it up.”

I glanced at the clock. “But if I leave now, I won’t have time to get ready.”

“You never take long,” Mother said. “You always wear something simple. Bianca’s gown is much more complicated.”

As though simplicity were my choice, rather than something I had learned after years of being told that Bianca always needed more.

I looked toward Father, but he showed no interest in intervening.

“All right,” I said quietly. “I’ll pick it up.”

By the time I returned, black SUVs were already lining the drive. I carried Bianca’s gown upstairs myself.

After delivering it to her room, I rushed down the hall, showered, and had barely begun drying my hair when Bianca called for me.

“Elena! I need help with the zipper.”

Mother and two attendants were already gathered around her when I entered. Bianca stood in front of the mirror in layers of ivory silk, the Bellini diamonds resting against her throat.

“The zipper’s stuck,” she said. “Pull it up.”

I held the fabric together and tugged.

Bianca suddenly gasped. “Too tight.”

I immediately stopped, but she pressed a hand to her chest.

Mother caught her by the arm. “Bianca!”

“I can’t breathe,” she whispered weakly.

“It was only for a second,” I said. “I barely pulled it.”

Mother turned on me. “You know how delicate your sister is. Would it have hurt you to be more careful?”

“I was trying to help her.”

“And somehow you always manage to make things worse.”

Bianca closed her eyes as Mother fanned her face and called for water. Everyone crowded around her.

The dinner bell rang just as I returned to my room.

My hair was still damp. My makeup was untouched, and my gown remained inside its garment bag. There was no longer time to put it on, so I slipped into a plain black dress and hurried downstairs.

The formal dining room was already full.

Bianca sat at Father’s right hand, glowing beneath the chandeliers in the ivory gown I had collected for her.

My place card stood on Father’s left. I had almost reached it when he looked up.

His eyes moved over my damp hair and simple dress. “You can’t sit there looking like that.”

I stopped. “There wasn’t time to change.”

Father frowned as though that were another failure of mine.

“The Morettis are here. We can’t have Don Bellini’s daughter seated beside him looking half-dressed.”

He gestured to one of the servants. “Move Elena’s place to the end of the table.”

The servant picked up my name card and carried it away from Father, past the capos and their wives, to the far corner beside two distant cousins.

No one objected.

I took my new seat while Father lifted his glass toward Bianca. “To the future of the Bellini family.”

The room filled with applause. Bianca smiled beneath the chandeliers.

I looked down at the place card that had followed me to the corner. Even my name seemed to belong wherever they had space left over.

After dinner, I heard my parents discussing the following day.

“The family portrait will be taken at noon,” Father said. “We’ll use the council chamber. Bianca should wear her induction gown.”

I stopped beside the table. “But my college interview is at noon. I told you yesterday.”

Although I had already been accepted, the interview was for a highly selective first-year program.

He did not look up. “Then do your interview.”

“But the portrait is supposed to be for the entire family.” I said.

Marco gave me an impatient glance. “We can’t rearrange Don Bellini’s schedule around a college call.”

“So you plan to take a family portrait without me.”

Mother sighed. “Elena, please don’t start another argument. The portrait is for the induction announcement. You hate social events anyway.”

That was their favorite lie. They excluded me, then called my absence a preference.

Bianca touched my arm. “We can take another one with you later.”

We both knew we never would.

Father finally raised his eyes. “We will not delay the portrait. Make your own choice, Elena.”

He said it as though missing the portrait would be my decision, not theirs.

Back in my bedroom, I locked the door and opened my laptop.

MIT’s acceptance portal was still on the screen. Beneath the green confirmation banner was a checklist for incoming students.

For months, I had left every section blank because Father insisted I belonged in New York. He said family came before everything else.

Apparently, that rule only applied when I was the one being asked to sacrifice.

I selected the earliest move-in date and paid the housing deposit from my own competition winnings.

Then I booked a one-way ticket to Boston.

Departure: 9:10 a.m., the morning of the induction.

By the time the Bellinis realized I had never shown up for the induction, I would already be gone.