Cast aside and forgotten by the family who should have celebrated them, a young person disappears without a trace for three years. When they finally return, they are no longer the overlooked child everyone dismissed—and those who wronged them must face the consequences.
Manhattan is close to home, and I thought it'd be easier to come back and study on weekends, so I brought a few things I said nothing. I just looked at her. My father had built that desk himself for my tenth birthday. He'd worked late into the night. A screw had cut his finger.
But he'd still smiled and patted my head. Our Elena's going to college someday. She'll have lots of books, needs a big After my mother died… Father, if I don't have a mother, does that mean nobody will ever love me?
Who told you that? He stroked my hair. You have a father. Father will always love Elena. But eventually, both my father and Marco forgot what they had promised.
One brought a stepmother into my life. The other started choosing my stepmother's daughter over me. Elena? Elena? Sophia called my name again, her eyes turning red. Are you upset? I can move everything out if you want. That was what she said, but her hand never left my closet.
My father walked in carrying a plate of fruit. The moment he saw Sophia standing beside my he frowned. Elena, are you giving Sophia attitude again? I looked at him. I haven't said anything. You don't have to. That look on your face is enough to scare anyone. Sophia's sensitive. Stop making her feel like an outsider. I laughed. Four years have passed, and
I was the one who had become the outsider. Sophia had lived in our home for four years. Yet she still called my father Don Vittorio. The more she treated herself like an outsider, the harder my father tried to prove that this family had never treated her like