The hall felt too small for the truth now.
Air pressed against my lungs, heavy with disbelief, awe, and something far sharper—fear. Not mine. Theirs.
Luciano stood frozen a few steps away, his earlier fury cracking apart like cheap varnish under heat. His eyes flicked from Luca to the judges, then finally—reluctantly—to me. For the first time since I’d known his name, he looked… small.
When Luca declared Lonely Sunset an original Rosa, it was as though the floor itself had given way beneath the room.
I watched it happen from a strange distance, like I was standing outside my own body, observing the ripple effect of a truth I’d carried alone for years.
Gasps collided with shouts.
Questions stacked on top of disbelief.
And in the middle of it all, my name—Ella—was being rewritten in r
