Chiara Rose

tredici

"Yeah." Gi responds softly, his voice so quiet I can barely hear him. And from there, the room goes dead silent once again.

Personally, I'm trying not to throw up. The thought that my daughter had to go through that, whilst living with her mother makes me feel sick. And I was over here, living my life a-okay whilst she wasn't. If anything, she was going through absolute hell.

The silence is quickly broken when Rocco stands up suddenly, winds his arm back, and ditches the stuffed toy he was holding across the room. That is then followed by the shattering of a vase, which Rocco would've done on purpose because he has excellent aim. And normally I'd find myself getting mad at Rocco for breaking a vase, but right now, I can't find the energy to care. All the anger currently inside me is strongly directed towards my ex-wife and her husband.

"They're definitely dead? We're sure? I can't murder them for a second time can I?" Rocco says. He's struggling to keep everything under wraps right now, and I can tell that based on the rapid rate his chest is rising and falling, and how he's clenching and unclenching his fists.

But at this moment, I can't help the small burst of pride that I feel for him. Normally he'd be long gone, causing a path of destruction wherever he went off to. But right now, he's still here with us, and he hasn't had a massive outburst which shows me he's trying. He's trying for Chiara.

"They are very dead, Dad and I are going to Australia next week to double-check as well." Tino says smoothly, trying to fool everyone into thinking he's okay. But he can't fool me, his left eyebrow keeps on twitching which is a telltale sign he's on the verge of a fat panic attack.

"I feel sick." Enzo mutters, his face looking scarily pale. I switch my attention from him to his twin brother sitting beside him and find Bruno slumped into the couch rapidly flicking at the band on his wrist.

"What do we do now?" Bruno croaks, finally looking up from the floor. His eyes are bright red, with an odd tear flowing down his face. But just as I'm about to respond to him, a bunch of giggles come from the kitchen.

"Shut your ass up, they'll hear you dumbass." A voice I quickly recognise as Chiara says, which is then followed by another fit of giggles. The boys and I go silent, anxiously waiting to hear what happens.

But then it goes silent, so I just assume they've gone back into one of their rooms. Clearly, Agostino doesn't agree with me, as he quickly stands up to go and check on them, probably the anxiety in him thinking they've died within the past 2 seconds. But Gi reaches out and tugs him back onto the couch, gently shaking his head.

"Okay, okay, I've got the goods." Carlo exclaims a bit too loudly, clearly ignoring Chiara's previous statement. I then hear the freezer shut, so I presume they've got themselves a tub of ice cream.

"We're going to need more than one spoon." Chiara responds, and I can basically hear the frown in her voice.

"Why can't we just share?" Carlo responds. I just don't think he can be bothered going back and getting another spoon. I do another once-over of the room, and find all of us very invested in their conversation, Tino, Gi and Enzo even have a small smile on their face.

"No. I don't know where your filthy mouth has been so I'd rather not." Chiara tells Carlo, and based on the way she found it hard to finish that sentence, she's trying hard not to laugh at her own remark.

"Fair point. Actually, I don't want to share a spoon with you either, I don't know where your filthy has been." Carlo snaps back, and I raised the kid, so I can say with certainty that he rolled his eyes at the end of that sentence.

"Wow, real original." Now I haven't known teenage Chiara for that wrong, but if her personality is anything like it was 14 years ago, that also ended with an eye roll. The two are more similar than they seem, then most people think. They are twins, after all, they spent 9 months, well they only spent 7 months, in the womb together.