And every time I looked at Valentina, I wondered what her twin might have looked like.
Twenty years after my parents rejected me, I decided to come back.
I thought I was going back to show them that I had survived without them. I wanted them to see the woman they had abandoned.
I arrived in a black Mercedes and stopped in front of the house of my childhood.
The house seemed smaller than in my memories. The gate was rusty, the walls cracked, and the weeds invaded the court where I had played before.
I approached the front door and knocked.
A young woman opened.
For a few seconds, we remained silent.
She looked like a stroke.
She had my eyes, my cheekbones, and the same little mark above her left eyebrow that Valentina has been wearing since she was born.
My heart started to beat the chamade.
“Who are you looking for? ” she asked.
Before I could answer, my parents appeared behind her.
My mother covered her mouth.
My father became livid.
I looked at them and I sketched a cold smile.
“Do you regret leaving me? »
The young woman suddenly grabbed my mother’s hand.
“Grandma,” she whispered, staring at me, “Is this my real mother? »
Time seemed to stop.
“What did she call you? “I asked.
My mother collapsed.
Her knees fell and she collapsed in a chair.
My father tried to shut her up, but she yelled at her.
“No! We’ve hidden this enough! »
Then she confessed the truth.
The second baby was not dead.
My parents followed me after learning where I lived. My mother wanted to take me home, but my father refused. When they found out that I had given birth to twins, he bribed a clinic employee to report the death of one of the babies.
They took my daughter away while I was unconscious.
My father thought he could raise her without anyone discovering that she was the daughter of their “disgraced” teenage daughter. They told the city that the baby was the baby of a deceased distant relative.
They called her Sofia.
My mother had spent twenty years pretending to be Sofia’s grandmother at home and her mother in public.
I was breathless.
“You stole my child,” I whispered.
My father looked down.
“We gave him a good life,” he said.
“A good life? “I shouted. “You have allowed me to carry an empty coffin in my heart for twenty years! »
Sofia began to cry.
She told me that she had always felt that something was wrong. My mother had finally confessed that she was not her biological mother, but she refused to reveal her identity.
I called Valentina.
When she arrived, as soon as the sisters saw each other, they froze.
It was like attending the long-awaited meeting of two unfinished souls.
They had the same smile. The same nervous mania of spinning a ring around their finger. Even their voices were similar.
Valentina walked up and stroked Sofia’s face.
“I always felt like I was missing someone,” she whispered.
Sofia held her in her arms.
That day I did not forgive my parents.
Some wounds are too deep for simple excuses, and some crimes cannot be erased by tears.
The truth came to erupt. The clinic records, the hidden documents and my mother’s confessions proved everything. My father had to face legal action, while my mother agreed to testify against all those responsible.
Sofia chose to leave the house with us.
As we crossed the rusty gate, my mother called me.
“I’m sorry,” she sobbed. “I was afraid of losing my husband. »
I turned around and looked at her.
“And because of that fear, you lost your two daughters. »
I then took Valentina’s hand in one hand and Sofia’s in the other.
I came back to show my parents what they had lost.
Instead, I found the girl they stole from me and finally brought her home.
