Chapter 3 : What Revenge?
Chapter 3: What Revenge?
“Poor Arianna, who didn't notice her younger sister taking revenge.” Helena chuckled as the laugh echoed inside the spacious room.
“What revenge? Leave revenge for the little children because what did I even do to you?” I asked. But I knew that she was always insecure since she was the illegitimate daughter, born out of wedlock.
“Two years ago, I found out that you have loved Justin Moretti for a very long time and this is my opportunity to get revenge because a broken heart can hurt you, Arianna.”
“What are you saying, Helena?”
“I made Aaron fall in love with me in order to get closer to his older brother, Justin. Then I stole Justin’s heart from you or rather he jumped into my arms without having to put much effort. I made him fall deeply in love with me over the past two years, I consumed his heart and soul as there would be nothing left for you when you and him married.” She said in utter amusement.
“We had an ongoing affair for the past years because he resisted my charm in the beginning. Aaron knew my intentions with his older brother, he didn't care because he only wanted me to stay by his side even if I was fucking his older brother.” She muttered with a laugh.
“I love my life,” she continued.
“I would have killed myself if I was in your place, Arianna.” She smirked and her smirk provoked my anger.
“What is wrong with you?” I spoke, sighed yet not entirely surprised by her viciousness.
“What do you have against me?” I pressed, noticing a shift in her expression which was a bitter resentment towards me.
“If only you weren't born, if only I was the oldest daughter in the family.” She said under her breath, her words dripping with hate.
Both of us were born in the hospital and the same day, we are only sixty minutes apart. My father's mistress gave birth to her and my mother, who is the legal wife, gave birth to me. We were born of a different mother on the same day, complicating our family dynamic. That was why my mother held resentment towards me. She wishes that she had given birth to Helena since father seemed to love her a lot even if she is an illegitimate child. But my mother knows the reason why father holds a lot of love for her because she was in love with Helena's mother.
“Soon, you will understand how I feel as the illegitimate daughter once you marry Justin. A man who is in love with me and has no place in his heart for you which will always leave you as the second choice.” She giggled while turning away from me.
“And Arianna, father won't take your side so don't try to go to him. He has never once helped you, nobody will help you.” She added slyly before heading into her changing room.
After the argument with my susy, there was only one place I could go to solve my problem, my childhood home. I had arrived a few minutes ago and after these years, the house still felt suffocating. Its familiar walls closed in on me as I prepared for the confrontation I had been dreading ever since I left the ballet studio. With a short breath, I stepped inside the dining room where my mother and father were sitting at the long dining table that can fit more than twenty people.
At the head of the table sat my father, his expression stern and diem and by his side was my mother. I went and sat down in front of my mother. My younger siblings were nowhere to be seen which meant that they were at their private high schools and had not finished their classes yet. It was good that they were not home since things were about to get ugly between me and my father.
“I will get straight to it, you know what I came here to discuss and it is about the door marriage…” I began to express my feelings but they were left ignored.
“Arianna,” my father cut me off, his voice was commanding yet filled with disappointment.
“We have already made our decision, you will marry Justin Moretti.”
I clenched my fists, my heart pounding with a mixture of anger and despair because it had seemed like father, mother and Helena had already talked about this without me. She really wanted to get her revenge on me for something that wasn't my fault. It was not my fault that my father chose to cheat on my mother.
“But Helena is supposed to marry Aaron, isn't that why you went through all the trouble to make the engagement work? The Moretti family didn't want an illegitimate daughter-in-law but you convinced them in the end. Was that all for nothing?” I asked, the bitterness dripping into my words despite my efforts to remain calm.
He didn't say anything for a while as he knew that my words were the truth. He went through a lot of trouble to get the Moretti family to accept an illegitimate daughter-in-law because the Moretti lived by old-fashioned customs. So it was extremely tough to convince them. But all of that was for nothing since she didn't want to marry Aaron in the end, not because she was feeling unwell or wanted to focus on her career as a ballerina. But it was because she wanted to spite me, to take her revenge against me. She was not only born in the upper class, but also into a mafia family where her father was the underboss of a Mexican crime organization and in the association, the children who were born out of wedlock are frowned upon. After the silence, my father spoke again.
“Helena is feeling unwell and she wants to focus on her happiness. There is nothing I can do about that, she is my daughter after all.”
“She is feeling so unwell that she had the energy to practice for her next show?” I asked, crossing my arms to defend myself.
“Being a ballet dancer is healing for her, she must put her happiness, that is all that matters.” He commented.
My father doesn't care about my happiness, he never did.
“She doesn't have to marry him because she wants to he happy? What about my happiness, don't you think that your other daughter also wants to be happy?”
I was already boiling with rage.
“It is not a matter of wants, Arianna.” My father said, his tone cutting through the air like a knife.
