Chapter 17 - LUCIA’S FAMILY TREE
Police recovered a notebook from Lucia’s house.
No financial crimes.
No hidden accounts.
Pages of family structure.
My name.
Serena’s.
Gianna’s.
The twins.
Old relatives.
Birthdates.
Marriages.
Deaths.
Lines connecting households.
Near my name:
TWO SONS = STRONG BRANCH.
Near Serena:
NO CHILD = END.
She had circled it.
Then:
MOVE ONE BRANCH FORWARD.
The language was almost anthropological.
Not maternal.
Lucia had been raised in a family where children were treated as continuation.
Names mattered.
Who inherited houses.
Who sat where.
Who cared for elders.
She believed she had been sacrificed too.
At twenty-three, she married my father partly because two families wanted peace.
No one asked whether she loved him enough.
She learned to make meaning out of obedience.
Then demanded the next generation do the same.
That explained her.
It did not excuse her.
A trauma can become a worldview.
A worldview can still harm babies.
Then one note about Gianna:
She thinks motherhood is private ownership.
That sentence made my wife laugh bitterly.
“Private ownership?”
She looked at Nico.
Then Luca.
“Apparently thinking I get to decide where my own newborn sleeps is selfish.”
I said:
“My mother does not understand the word boundary.”
Gianna looked at me.
“Neither did you.”
Fair.
Then:
May you like
“You’re learning.”
Maybe.
