Chapter 2
1356 Words
"What?" The word left me before I could think. I stared at the lawyer like he spoke another language. "Repeat that, Mr. Ynez. Because what’s written there is impossible." My voice shook on the last word. I hated that. Dad always said Bella Ramos didn’t shake.
Across from me, Enzo sat still. Perfect posture. Ankle crossed over knee. Hands resting on his thighs. Like he belonged in a boardroom with glass walls, not my father’s library with its faded books and the smell of old paper.
He arrived that afternoon. We waited for him. The lawyer insisted Enzo be present for the reading of my father’s will. I didn’t ask why. I was too numb for questions. Too tired to fight.
But Enzo didn’t need an inheritance. Everyone in San Miguel knew De Silva Company was worth millions. Buildings with his name in gold. He wouldn’t care about whatever was left of my father’s estate. A mortgaged house. A bankrupt business.
Still, I agreed. I agreed to everything lately. What was one more thing to lose?
"Ms. Bella," Mr. Ynez pushed his glasses up his nose. The gesture looked tired. Like he’d done it a hundred times that day for other broken families. "Your father mortgaged this house and lot to H. Dela Serna Bank. Bella’s building was sold after he was scammed in a new venture. Even this house, he mortgaged it to recover. But it was too late."
Mortgaged. Sold. Too late.
The words landed one by one. Heavy. Final.
My fingers dug into the sofa arm. The fabric was worn under my nails. Dad bought this when I was ten. We picked it together at a second-hand store. "Good enough for us," he said then, squeezing my shoulder. Now, it felt like it was pulling me under thread by thread.
Mr. Ynez looked at me. Kind eyes. Hard words. "Your father still had monthly payments to the bank. You need to pay that debt every month. Without fail."
Every month.
The room went quiet. Not peaceful quiet. The kind of quiet that crushed your ribs until breathing felt like a mistake. Hollow. That’s all I felt. Empty, in a way, grief hadn’t touched yet. Grief was hot. This was cold.
"If you have questions, Enzo can answer them," Mr. Ynez said, snapping his briefcase shut. Papers shuffled inside. Too loud in the silence. "That’s the end of my work as your father’s lawyer. I gave Enzo the letter your father left two days ago. He knows what to tell you."
Goodbye. Then the door clicked shut behind him.
His footsteps faded down the hallway. Fast. Like he couldn’t wait to leave this house of debts and death.
"What?" The word meant nothing now. Just air.
I turned to Enzo. He hadn’t moved. Not one inch. "What letter did Dad leave with you?"
He exhaled and leaned back. The leather chair creaked under his weight. A small sound. Too loud. His eyes met mine. Brown. Dark. No pity in them. No judgment, either. He was just waiting. Like he had all the time in the world while mine was running out.
"Before that," he said. Voice low. Controlled. "What’s your plan?"
Plan?
Dad was gone. The house was gone. Now, there was debt. Monthly payments. To a bank. For a house I couldn’t afford to lose. A house full of Dad’s books and my childhood drawings on the fridge.
Where would I get money? I was eighteen. No job. Second-year Accountancy student. Tuition was due next month. Dad always paid on time every semester. He said education was the one thing no one could take from me. The one thing that was mine.
He was wrong.
"I don’t know," I said. The words tasted like ash and dust.
"No solution?"
"None." The answer came too fast. Too honest. Dad was an only child. Grandparents gone years ago. His cousins borrowed from him for years. Money for business. Money for hospital bills. Money for everything except giving back.
Now, I was just the daughter of a man who died in debt. The girl who inherited nothing but bills.
"I can’t believe this," I whispered. My voice cracked. "Dad just died. Now this."
Anyone would cry. I was losing my home. The walls I grew up in. My room with the window that stuck in the rain and the crack in the ceiling shaped like a star. And I still owe money for it. Money I didn’t have.
"I’m eighteen," I added. Tears fell hot down my cheeks. "I’m just starting."
"Is that what you’re thinking about?" Enzo’s voice cut sharp. Cold. Like a blade.
I glared at him. Anger flared through the grief, bright and sudden. How dare he sit there so calm? "What did Dad leave you?"
He pulled a white envelope from the table beside him. Plain. No markings. No name. He pushed it toward me across the polished wood. It slid halfway across the surface and stopped, like it didn’t want to reach me.
I opened it. One page. Dad’s handwriting. I recognized it immediately. The way his F’s looped. The way he crossed his T’s too hard, pressing the pen into the paper.
I read the first line. Stopped. Went back. Read it again.
My hands started to shake.
Slowly, I looked up. Enzo watched me. Stone-faced. Unmoving. Like he was made of marble, not flesh.
"Did you read this?" I asked. My voice was barely a whisper.
"Once," he replied. One word. Enough to confirm my worst fear.
I read it again. Start to finish. Every word. Every period. Every damning sentence my father wrote before he died.
"What?" I whispered to the empty air. The word meant nothing. It couldn’t change what I read. Couldn’t make it disappear.
"Did you read Uncle Franco’s letter properly?" Enzo asked. Formal. Empty. Like we were strangers in a business meeting.
I nodded. My throat was too tight to speak. I set the letter down on the table like it might burn me. It might explode if I held it too long.
"This can’t be," I said. I looked at Enzo. "What Dad wants is impossible."
"I agree." No hesitation. No doubt. Then he stared at me. Dark eyes. Steady. Unblinking. "How will you pay his debts? The house? The bank? Do you have a way?"
I stared at his jaw. At his rolled-up sleeves showing veins and the watch on his wrist. Expensive. Cold. Even now, with my world collapsing, I noticed how far away he looked. How untouchable.
Formal. Restrained. From another world entirely.
"Bella Ramos." My full name. A warning. A verdict.
I had no answer. I had no idea how to pay the debt. I had no idea how to keep the house. I didn’t even know how to keep myself alive, let alone pay for the life my father left behind.
I looked at my hands. They were trembling against my knees. Three days, but it felt like only yesterday I heard him:
"Bella, sweetheart, come eat." Warm voice from the kitchen. Garlic and stew. The sound of his slippers on the tile.
Gone. No one would cook it again. No one would ask if I finished my homework. No one would tell me to sleep early before exams.
Aunt Imelda was gone, too. No one would fix my hair for school pictures anymore. No one would say I looked pretty when I didn’t believe it. No one would hug me tight when I cried over boys who didn’t matter.
"I don’t know," I whispered. Head down. Defeated.
"What does Uncle Franco’s letter say?" Enzo asked again. Patient. Dangerous in his patience.
I lifted my head. Met his eyes. Brown. Endless. Dark enough to drown in. I took a breath. Felt like the last one I’d take as just Bella Ramos. Student. Daughter. Free.
"Enzo..." My voice shook. For the first time since Dad died, what I was about to say felt worse than death itself. Worse than grief. Worse than debt. Worse than losing everything.
"You’re going to be my guardian. And we have to get married."
- Writer
