Chapter 1

Twenty years later.

Lilian

"Oh, shit! I am late again! I don't believe!" I said waking up scared. "Aaahhhhhh..." Then, I was lying on the floor, the fall made me lose my breath, I managed to look at my legs and realize that I wrapped myself in the sheets again. "Awesome! It´s already becoming a habit, isn't it, Lilian O'Neill?!"

So, I saw my bedroom door open, it was my friend, Sophia.

"Good morning, clumsy lady! Bad day?

"Good morning, Sophy! Let's say that, one more time, Zephyr and I got into the sheet!"

"So, we started well today, huh!" She talked smiling with a cup of coffee in hand, legs crossed and leaning against the doorframe.

"Yeah!" When I got up, I felt my foot crack and hurt. "Ouch!"

"My goodness, what was that crack?" She opened your eyes wide.

"I don't know, but I think I twisted my foot" I said making a face.

"Get ready and let's go to the hospital."

"I'm not to go to the hospital, are you crazy?"

"Now, Lilian! The ballet season will start in eight weeks, you can't afford to make fun of your foot right now, Madame Françoise will kill you!"

"Don't exaggerate!"

"It's not an exaggeration!" She said widening her clear eyes. "Come on, get ready, I'll take you to the doctor!"

"And who said I want to?"

"I didn't ask, friend, you go, period!"

"You are so boring!" I said pretending to be mad. "I was born without parents to come you in my life and to piss me off? You don't rule me, you know?!"

"I am not your parents, but I'm your friend, which is why I care about you and I want your good. Let's go to the doctor now, Lilian, or I'm going to speak to Madame Françoise!"

I opened my mouth and narrowed my eyes in indignation, it did not hurt that much after all!

"This is blackmail!"

"I know! Let's go!"

I dressed up, brushed my teeth and picked up my purse and papers, Sophia was on duty in the hall waiting for me with her arms crossed and stamping her foot impatiently.

"Look, for a friend, you are more annoying than a mother and look that I don't even know what it's like to have a mother!"

"We don't know, do we? Now shut up and let's go"!

She pulled me and we got out, got in the car and went to Saint Mary Hospital.

"Sophia, I don't have money to pay a quarter of the value of the consultation!"

"Shut up! This is the hospital closest to our home. Go for it!"

"You want to chip me, you can only!"

She parked the car and helped me to go to the emergency, I didn't know if I limped or jumped on a foot, I only know one thing, my foot felt like a bread and it was aching so much.

"Sit down here in the chairs while I do your medical report." She said putting me sitting in the armchair.

"Sophia, let's go to another hospital, my dance teacher salary doesn't pay even ten minutes of consultation in this hospital."

"Shut up and let me take care of you, you ridiculous!" She said angrily and rolling her eyes.

I laughed, she always calls me ridiculous and rolls her eyes when she wants to take care of me, and I do not let. Sophia Marrie Scott Carter is more than a friend to me, she is like a sister, we have known each other since we were little girls. We grew up in a boarding school, different her that come from of a wealthy family, I was left at the door of the school on a winter night, with a white knit blanket with purple accents and a birth certificate with my name, Lilian Anne O'Neill, the date of birth and unknow parents. How is this possible? I do not know! Superior mother Mary is the director of the boarding school. Despite being a Catholic school, Sophia had ballet classes, when she asked the superior mother Mary and her father so that I could take ballet classes with her too, after all, she was the only student there who had no parents and Sophia, at her father's orders, took classes alone. We grew up together, we did ballet together, our friendship got stronger and when we left school, Madame Françoise, who taught us all her life, invited us to teach ballet in her studio to the children. I stayed with the four years old beginners and Sophia with the older ones, as my friend has no patience with small children, I already love them! We went to the same college, she does law and I do medicine, I got a scholarship because the superior mother sent a letter to the rectory of the college and they granted me a full scholarship for my excellent and notorious performance in school, after I did it all the rigorous exams to enter the institution. The superior mother was more rigid with me than with the other students:

"It is precisely because you have no parents and are born at a disadvantage that you will have to be the best. I do not want to know about low grades, Mrs. Lilian O'Neill! Is I dream that you have a score below ten, I will get you out of ballet!" She told me the day that Sophia's father authorized me to take ballet classes with her.

"No, superior mother, please."

"You know that to study medicine you have to be an excellent student, don't you?"

"Yes, superior mother."

"So, my dear, be the best and you will be rewarded!"

"Yes, superior mother."

"Now you can go to your enclosure and go back to study."

"Excuse me, superior mother."

I remember I said as if it were today, I should have been around seven years old. For as long as I can remember, I have an interest in forensic medicine, even though I am a ballerina, I want to discover bodies, solve murders, do tests on victims… Have you ever seen a ballerina forensic doctor? Of course, not?! Me neither!

I used ballet to save money for Medicine course, because it did not matter to me how long it would take me to get into college, what mattered was that I was going to arrive! So, I got a call from the dean's secretary, he wanted to do an interview with me because he had received a letter from the superior mother and my grades in the exams required by college across the country were the best. I left there enrolled for the next medical class and Sophia, a few weeks later, joined the law class.

"Damn it, Sophy!" I said when I read the list of books and materials from this first year.

"What happened?" She looked at me after putting a spoonful of pistachio ice cream in her mouth. We were in a coffee shop; she ate ice cream and I had a cup of coffee with English cake of dried fruits that I love so much.

"Look at that list of books! I will have to work overtime in the dance studio. I want to die!" I said almost crying in despair putting my hand on my forehead while reading the huge list.

"Let me see!" She took the list. "I think my uncle must have these books; I can see with him if you want."

"Would you do that for me?"

"Sure! Although my uncle Ryan is kind of… complicated. That is it, I'll ask grandpa!" She said snapping her fingers, took out her mobile. "Hi, grandpa!"

"Hi, sweet, how are you?"

"Good and you?"

"Good. Say, my cutie, what can grandpa do for you?"

"Grandpa, Lilian needs some books."

"Is everything okay with her?"

"Yes, it's okay! She needs some books and I would like to know if you can lend the books her."

"Of course, my sweet! Give me the list that grandpa gets from the library and if I don't have it, I'll buy it."

"You don't need to buy" I said embarrassed. Every time she called Grandpa Tristan, she put my ear to her mobile.

"Shut up, Lilian!" She told me. Grandpa Tristan and Grandma Mirella adopted me as a granddaughter, they treat me the same as Sophia.

"What, Sophia?"

"Nothing, Grandpa, it's not you, it's Lilian."

"Send a kiss to her, to my fake granddaughter, a week before classes start your books will be here at home waiting for you."

"You are awesome, grandpa!"

"I know honey! Grandpa loves you too!"

"I love more!" she said laughed.

"To infinity!"

"Bye, grandpa!"

"Bye, my sweety!"

"Say I'm sending him a kiss!" I said.

"Lilian sent a kiss."

"Send another one!"

"Fine!"

She turned off the call and said to me:

"Did you know that it is not ugly and much less shameful to receive help from others?"

"Grandpa helps me so much that I'm even embarrassed!"

"Don't stay!"

"Lilian O'Neill." A voice called me, and I left my memories.

"Me!"

"Come on, I'll help you!" Sophia said coming over to me, then looked at the doctor. "Hi, Uncle Mark."

"Hi, my sweety! Why are you here?" He asked hugging Sophia and giving her a kiss on the forehead.

"I came with Lilian; she sprained her foot and as I know you are the best orthopedist in the family…"

"The only one, you mean, isn't it?!" He said giving a smile like a kid who did.

"That's why, uncle!"

"Come on, I'll help your friend, get her things."

The doctor Scott put one of my arms around his neck and helped me walk to the doctor's office.

"And the college, girls?"

"The classes come back in September, uncle!"

"Great!"

"You know we're in the fourth year, right?! That I study law, don't you know?!"

The doctor Mark Scott was kind of out of touch with a lot of things, including Sophia's tenderness.

"Another lawyer? Nobody deserves!" He said rolling his eyes. "Of course, I know! I am pissing you off. Your mother was a doctor, she was doing specialization in gynecology and obstetrics, you know?"

"And daddy is a lawyer, so everything is at home!"

"Do what?" he said conforming and helping me to sit down on the stretcher. Then he put his amused blue eyes on me. "And you, Lilian?"

"Medicine, I have the fourth and fifth years ahead."

"Awesome! Finally, a sensible girl!" He turned to Sophia. "You should have followed your friend's footsteps."

"Noway! I'm out! I can't stand to see blood!"

"And how do you do when you are menstruating?"

"So, uncle, that's different!"

"I know!" He looked me again. "Let's look at that foot." He sat in his chair and came over to my foot, picked up carefully and observed. "tell me if it hurts, okay?!"

"Ok!"

He began to make light movements and the a little more firmly, I frowned and bit my lip.

"Lilian, it's to talk if it hurts and not make a face!"

"Shut up, Sophia!" I said making a face of pain.

"Uncle, you can bandage that foot over there and give eight weeks to this stubborn bitch!"

"Are you crazy? I will miss the ballet season and Madame Françoise will kill me!"

"That sad! We will all go to your funeral!" Sophy said rolling his eyes.

"You'll have a cast on your leg, but not for eight weeks!"

"Awesome!" I said relieved.

"What a shame!" Sophia said shaking her head and blinking her eyes as if she were sorry.

I squinted and pouted, she saw it and laughed.

"Fool!"

"Ridiculous!"

"Do you always praise yourself like that?" The doctor asked without taking his eyes off my foot.

"Since we were seven, uncle!" Sophy replied.

"After thirteen years of living together, the intimacy is great!" I completed it.

"Huge!"

"Too much!" I was sorry.

"Shut up, Lilian, you love me!"

"They never told you how deluded you are, did they?"

She laughed.

"Let's get a plate out of that foot, miss O'Neill."

"Call me Lilian, please, dr. Scott."

"You can even call it a witch, uncle, if you want."

"Shut up, Sophy!"

He laughed, we went to make the plates and when we got back to the doctor's office, after looking carefully, he said surprised:

"A little more and you would have broken your foot, Lilian! We will put your leg in plaster, you will have to stay at home for a week, preferably lying down, then don't walk around for about three weeks!"

"Will she have to use crutches?" Sophy asked with eyes shining as I squinted with one eyebrow raised.

"No!" He said starting to prepare the plates and bandages.

"Ok..." She looked disappointed. "And a cane?"

"Neither! Why all this interest, Sophy?"

"I wanted to trip her up, uncle, because of one time she tripped me in the sand when we went to the beach."

He laughs a lot.

"You two don't exist! If they were from the same family, they would not be so friendly."

"How do we not exist?" I asked.

"We do exist, uncle. If we were from the same family, it would be worse."

"It was going to be blow after blow!" He said and I pointed to him in agreement. "Let's start plastering that foot, young lady!"

"Do what?!"

"Nobody told you to be clumsy." Sophia said absently.

"Be quiet for me, please, bitch!"

"Uncle, do you know she managed to profit that foot?"

"How?"

"Shut up, Sophia!" I said speaking lower than I should and covering my eyes with shame.

"She, every night, manages to make her legs and sheets become one and when she gets up, she falls to the floor looking like a premium shit pack, you know?"

The doctor laughed, placing his hand on his belly.

"Oh, Sophia, how can you be so…" I said embarrassed.

"Uncle, you need to see her giving ballet lessons!"

"Is she too clumsy, Sophy?"

"Worse than not! If she were clumsy at ballet class, it would not be at home and it wouldn't be so much fun! She manages to trip over her own feet."

"Wow, my friend, how boring you are! You should be studying journalism and not law, you are the perfect social column for some newspaper. Who needs an enemy when you have a friend ?!"

The doctor was laughing a lot at our antics that he out his hand full of plaster on his belly, soiling his lab coat.

"I'm not gossip, I only bring truths! Accept that it hurts less." She looked at her uncle. "You need to see, these days she came down the stairs as quickly as I have ever seen in my life!" Said widening his eyes.

"Sophia!" I slapped my forehead. She loves to embarrass me!

"How?" He asked, to my despair.

"She stumbled so beautiful that she came down the stairs on her ass, like the cartoons, you know?!

"I will kill you, Sophia!"

"Neither! You love me!" Said smiling and blinking eyes.

"Girls, you are so much funny!" Doctor Mark said laughing. "But, now it is serious, a week of rest and three weeks of light movements. In a week and half, you will back remove the plaster and see if everything right, ok?!"

"All right and nothing resolved, doctor!" I said smiling and saluting.

"Good girl!" He finished plastering my leg. "Ok, Lilian!"

"Thank you, uncle!" Sophy said smiling.

"You're welcome, my sweety, no need to thank!" He said getting up, went to the sink to wash and dry his hands, then kissed Sophia's hair and mine. "Take care, miss Lilian!"

"Ok! I have a watchdog to take care of me!" I said pointing my finger at Sophia, who narrowed her eyes at me.

"Watchdog is your mother!"

"Sophia!" He scolded her.

"I don't care, uncle, I really don't have any parents!" I said with a fun shrug.

"Come on, fool!"

"Let's go! Thank you, doctor!"

I stood up while he changed his coat.

"I accompany them to the reception."

"No need, uncle, we know when they are expelling us!" She said amused.

"Of course, we know! You don´t close what you call mouth, then you bother others and we are expelled!"

"Me?"

"No, me! Call me a bitch and say my watchdog ir my mother, how can Sophia?"

"Shut up, Lily!"

We came home laughing. Good thing we were on vacation, leaving the third to fourth year of college, I still had that year and one more until I graduated. Why did this happen to me?

In the middle of the following week, after all Sophia's care and bagging, we went back to Dr. Scott's office.

"Ready to remove that cast, friend?"

"I was born ready, my love! You respect me, see ?!" I said waving my hair with my hands.

"Ok!"

"Good morning, girls!" The doctor said entering the room

"Good Morning!" We answered smiling.

"Grandpa Tristan is in the hospital, Sophia!"

"Where?"

"In your uncle Ryan's office."

"I won't go there, but even if they pay me!"

"Why?" I asked weirdly. "After all, you will see your grandfather."

"Uncle Ryan is a man; how could I say?" She searched for the words looking at the ceiling. "Special!"

"Actually, Lilian, my cousin is a man embittered by the loss of his wife. She was about eighteen when she died under suspicious circumstances, they were only a few months married."

That hurt me.

"And how old was he at the time?"

"Twenty-five to twenty-six, he was going to be twenty-six in the week she died."

"Holy shit!" I covered my mouth. "Excuse."

"Don't worry, I said the same thing when I heard! He was the soul of that hospital, indeed the entire chain!" He said that and I was thoughtful. There was something Sophia hadn't told me. "She was the light of his life, he was totally dedicated to her, he treated her sister as if she were their daughter."

"And her family?"

"Well, the sister and the father died in a car accident, only the mother stayed."

"Oh!" I felt my heart ache.

"Complicated! My cousin, even after his wife passed away, dedicated himself to his wife's family, but with each passing day he sinks".

"How long ago did that happen?"

"Twenty years after her death, fifteen years after her sister-in-law and father-in-law died."

"Wow!"

"Yes!"

"And his mother-in-law?"

"He returned to live with his mother, the only living relative of their family". Then he looked at me after he closed the plaster. "Why the curiosity, Lilian?"

"Sorry!" I said blandly. "It's just that I'm too curious, the basics don't attract me, besides, it's a sad story. I learned that every cause has a motivation. Like a disease, you know?! You need to know the reason, right?"

"Yes!" He said giving a little smile and turning his attention to my foot. "And the studies? How are you?"

"We're on vacation, but Lily as always with her face in the books." Sophia replied.

"Great! And the notes?"

"As always, Lilian is the best student in college!"

"Don't exaggerate, Sophia!"

"Uncle, you need to see, she only scores ten in all subjects."

"Really? How nice! She will be an excellent doctor. If you have nowhere to work, we have a vacancy."

"What if I don't have a vacancy?"

"I create!"

At that, the door opened, and we saw a tall man enter, I recognized his marbled eyes and snow-white hair.

"Grandpa Tristan!" I said extending my arms like a child when asking for a lap.

"Hello, my girls!" He said fondly hugging me first.

"Hey, the blood granddaughter is me!" Sophia complained pouting.

"Big deal, I'm the granddaughter of the heart, die of envy!"

Grandpa Tristan kissed me and then hugged and kissed his jealous granddaughter.

"Both are my loves!"

"I feel privileged!" I said smiling.

"Feel yourself!"

"Die with envy!"

"Lilian, do me a favor?"

"What?"

"Shut up please!"

Grandpa Tristan and dr. Mark laughed.

"Are you always like this?" Grandpa asked amused.

"We are usually worse, until we are educated today, grandpa!"

"True, so far we curse each other a little, right, Sophy?"

"Yes, Lily!"

"And how's that foot, Mark?" Grandpa asked pointing to my foot.

"It is much better, she almost broke it. We already removed the cast and now we have to rest for three weeks, no effort and no pointe shoes, young lady!"

"Come on! But can I teach?"

"Yes!"

"Great!"

"But, sitting!"

"Really?"

"For only three weeks, then you will come back here and if everything is right, I will discharge you."

"Oh, uncle, then it will take time!"

"Why?"

"That one was never right in the head, the day she gets one hundred percent ..."

"Shut up, Sophia!"

He smiled shaking his head.

"Are they excused?"

"Yes, uncle! You can take them."

"Come your two crazy rattles, let's have a coffee."

"Awesome, free food!" I said.

"Beloved father, Lilian, you just had coffee!"

"Who told you that? What a slander!"

"I'm saying!"

"You should fix that, you didn't let me have coffee, bitch!"

"How not?"

"You didn't let me have another cup of coffee!"

"Dude, you already had two!"

"And?!"

"I'm not going to say anything else! Come on, grandpa, for the love of all the little angels."

I went out laughing and thanking the doctor for everything. Having coffee with Grandpa Tristan means going to that beautiful, huge mansion he calls a humble home. So, when we were at the reception, I heard:

"What is Sophia doing here, Mark? Did something happen?"

"She came to bring her roommate, Lilian, to remove the cast from her foot."

"Come on, we need to talk."

I felt a funny sensation in my neck, like numbness, I had already heard that voice! But where? Well, it doesn't matter.

We got in the car and went on the road, the Emerald Island, it's not too hot in the summer, but it's cozy, I love the green roads, going to Grandpa's is a delight, we always know that we arrive at the huge property when we see the huge treetops welcoming us, the ocher smell of the trees mixes with the flowers in the mansion's huge garden. I love the topiaries that Grandma Mirella makes, whenever she ventures into it, Grandpa always has more white hair than he already has, well at least that's what he says, because his head is all white, it looks like a field of cotton.

When we arrived, Grandma was saying to the concerned gardener:

"Keep calm, Spencer!"

"Please, Mrs. Scott, get off that ladder before you get hurt. If anything happens to you, Mr. Scott is going to twist my neck!"

"Of course not!"

"Leave that stubborn old woman there, Spencer! If she breaks, what will not be missing is a doctor in this family to pamper her."

"And lawyers to sue me, sir. Scott." The boy said.

Sophia and I laugh.

"Now, be quiet, Tristan! You know I topiaries lover."

"And you love trying to break your neck since you were young, don't you, my love?"

"It's just that I expect the prince charming who turned my husband to come and rescue me".

"Oh." Sophia and I said together drooling on that beautiful and cute couple.

"I envy you, Sophy, for having grandparents!"

"I envy the love of my grandparents."

"They are very cute!"

"Make no mistake, girls! This abused old man wants something." Grandma said irreverently.

"I really want you to come down, give me a kiss and serve us a breakfast worthy of a king and his beautiful princesses."

"I did not say?!" She said rolling her eyes. "Hello my loves!" She told us giving the hand to grandpa coming down the stairs, received a chaste kiss from him on the forehead and came to hug us. "I missed you both. Finally came home, huh, Lilian! We have been waiting for your visit for some time, by the way!"

"I was blackmailed, Grandma!"

"With what?"

"Food!" I said widening my eyes

"Ah, yes, of course, of course! I bet Tristan has been blackmailing you for quite a while."

"Yes! For about..." I started doing some math on my fingers and looking to the right side, I looked at Grandma's brown eyes again. "half a second!"

"I knew it!" She said smiling. "Come on, you two tomboys, are going to tell me all about college. Sophia, call your dad! Richard called for the third time today, he's driving me crazy, said you don't answer your mobile."

"Okay, Grandma!" She looked at her cell phone. "Oops, he called several times.".

We went to the side garden, it was a beautiful place.

"Sunflowers" I said with my mouth open. "Wow!"

"Never noticed?"

"No! And look that every year I come here."

"For you to see! Do you like?"

"I sunflowers lover, Grandma!"

"Fell free at home dear. My daughter-in-law loved sunflowers too, I kept this garden as a way to honor her. If she were alive, she would be digging in between them and the other flowers." I noticed the pain in your eyes. Sophia's aunt seemed to be very loved by her family, even though she left so early. When I said I had kept the garden in honor of her, it touched me deeply, I wanted to cry, because my heart jumped and I felt a chill in my belly, a joy that was not mine.

"Can I go over there?"

"Sure!"

I ran like a child to that huge patch of sunflowers that welcomed me, I got lost there, so my eyes went out of focus ...

"Ah, there you are! I knew I was going to meet you here.

"Hi my love!" I smiled and he hugged me, his smell made me intoxicated and his arms protected me, I felt safe. I had my back to him. "How did you know I was here?"

"I had a little tip!"

"What?"

"Sunflowers seem to love you more than the sun itself, so they were telling me bright yellow where you would be."

"Lie!" I said smiling, he laughed, turned me around, I could not see his face, and kissed me.

"Come on, my little flower of life, the guests are coming for our engagement."

He took my hand and I followed him, I could see his back, that summer Saturday was giving way to autumn, the sun in my eyes just let me see his huge, strong back, he was wearing a black turtleneck sweater, jeans and black Italian leather dress shoes, I knew I was smiling…"

"Lilian?" I heard them calling me, I felt a warm hand on my shoulder.

"Yes?!" I said like I came out of a dream. Was that real? I could still feel the kiss, my lips were warm and tingling.

"I scared you?"

"No, granny!"

"Come on, my sweety, the breakfast is served." She said looking me worried.

I smiled and said:

"Good, I'm hungry!"

"Awesome!" She smiled. "Let´s go, my dear!"