I Let My Sister Have the Man Who Broke My Heart novel · Chapter 26 of 32

Chapter 26: The First Time I Died

The priest listened to all of it standing, with the candle dripping on his wrist.

When I finished, he looked at Carla for a long moment.

"You've been to confession twice in ten years," he said.

"Yes, Father."

"Tomorrow you can do it out loud, on the steps." He turned to me. "The bell rings at six. It will ring a little late if I'm not satisfied that the right person is holding the lamp."

"Thank you."

"Don't thank me. Your mother has given this parish a new roof, and I have never liked what the roof cost."

We left by the side gate, and Luca drove us back to the waterfront hotel through the falling snow.

Carla took the small bedroom of the suite and shut the door.

I stood in the other room with my coat still on.

Luca took it off my shoulders and hung it up.

"You haven't said a word since the church," he said.

"I'm thinking."

"About the vestry."

"About the truck."

He went still.

I had never told him about the truck.

"What truck?" he said.

I sat on the edge of the bed, and I looked at my hands.

"I'm going to tell you something, and I need you not to say anything until I finish."

"All right."

"I have lived this year before."

He sat down on the bed beside me.

He did not touch me, and he did not laugh.

"In the first life I chose Cesare, and it ended on Atlantic Avenue, when a truck ran the light."

"I was twenty-nine."

The room was silent.

"And then I woke up at Mother's table with two files in front of me, and a sister saying she wanted whatever I took."

"And you took mine."

"I took the photograph of the man laughing on a boat without a coat."

Luca breathed out slowly.

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