Lester, our pride and failure, leaned against the fridge and shouted across the kitchen, “Hey, Ma. Wash my clothes, yeah? My wife is busy right now. And bleach the white ones this time, unless you wanna ruin another set.”
“I’m not your maid,” I murmured.
“What was that?” he snapped.
“I said I’m not—”
He threw a half-empty soda can at the floor. “Then what the fuck are you? Because you sure as hell ain’t doing anything else in this house! You don’t bring money in.”
My blood boiled.
“I raised you,” I snapped. “Fed you. Stayed up when you had fevers. I’ve been working since before you were born.”
“Well, maybe you should’ve worked on smelling better. You smell like a rotten corpse,” one of the twins piped.
“Yeah,” snickered his brother, Nash. “It’s embarrassing just seeing her. Our classmates said she’s so ugly, they get scared when she shows up to pick us up. Like some cast member from The Walking Dead.”
They both burst into giggles. Then Edmund grabbed his pistol off the mantel, inspecting it like it mattered more than me.
“We got money, Doris,” he muttered. “You know that. But I’m not wasting it on some useless help. You’re here. You got two hands. Why the hell would I hire a maid when you’re the woman of the house?”
The woman of the house. That was whatever he called me.
But I didn’t own anything. Not a car. Not a card.
Every cent I needed, I had to beg for. And if I asked for more? He’d demand an itemized receipt. Penny by penny.
---
That night, when the noise died down and the family disappeared into their rooms, I walked to the bedroom, pulled out the old red suitcase from the closet. The one he bought me in Naples before our wedding.
Before the world twisted into what it is now.
I looked down at my hands. They didn’t look like mine anymore. Lined. Broken. Tired.
I used to be someone. A Rossini. The daughter of a mafia king. The girl born with gold on her tongue and fire in her spine. But I gave that up for love. I disowned myself from my family, thinking Edmund’s love was enough.
And now?
Now I was just the ghost in the house.
No kingdom. No crown. I have enough already. Maybe, leaving this family is the best birthday I could give to myself.
The next morning…
I heard about the dinner from Lyle—he blurted it out while stuffing potato chips in his mouth.
“Elizabeth rented the whole top floor of the Luciana Hotel! Fancy, huh? Dad says she booked it just for us. Big celebration.”