Chapter 16
The foundation opened in September.
We turned the old upstairs rooms above Bellagio into offices.
Legal aid in one room.
Emergency housing support in another.
Counseling in the smallest room because it had the softest light.
Sofia’s photograph hung in the entrance.
Not as a ghost.
As a founder.
I hung my waitress apron beside it in a frame.
Dante raised an eyebrow.
“That is an unusual family artifact.”
“That apron survived the night your baby grabbed it.”
“Fair.”
Nico pointed at it and yelled, “Mine!”
I laughed.
“He does have a claim.”
The first woman who came to us had two children and no papers.
My mother helped translate for her.
I watched from the hallway.
Elaine was gentle.
Careful.
She did not touch without asking.
She did not promise things she could not guarantee.
When the woman left with a safe phone and a hotel voucher, my mother sat down and cried.
I sat beside her.
“You did well,” I said.
Her face crumpled.
“Thank you.”
I still called her Elaine some days.
Mom on others.
Neither name fit perfectly.
Maybe names need time too.
Dante changed as the family changed.
He still had the scar.
Still had the dragon tattoos.
Still made dangerous men lower their voices.
But Nico climbed over him during meetings now.
And Dante let him.
One afternoon, I found Dante in the dining room teaching Nico to say Sofia.
Nico kept saying “Fia.”
Dante smiled through tears.
“That’s good, little lion.”
I stood by the bar, watching.
He looked up.
“I want him to know her.”
“He will.”
“I want him to know you too.”
“He does.”
Dante’s eyes held mine.
“So do I.”
My breath caught.
There were too many ghosts between us for easy romance.
But something living had begun there too.
May you like
I did not run from it.
That felt like a victory.
