12th May 2000.
As the warm light of the sunrise gently washed my face I closed my eyes. The buzzing of the motor acted as a lullaby while the trees flashed before my eyes. My dad was driving me to the old abandoned house; famous for the ghosts that allegedly lived there, but I ignored the warnings and decided to go anyway. I had also heard rumors that the house was full of antiquities and old pictures, which you could consider my hobby. Dad pulled over at the fence and I jumped off the car while my dad waved at me.

I strolled to the black fence that moved slowly with the wind. A big willow welcomed you to the house and its leaves projected intricate patterns on the ground, a ground covered with the fallen leaves that were being crushed underneath my shoes. I went up the stairs embedded in moss, the door creaked loudly as I pushed it inside. The interior of the mansion was just the ashes of what it once was; the stairwell and floors had red carpets that were now nibbled by mice, and the oak floors had lost all their shine and cracked at each step; the room was poorly illuminated because the windows were filled in mold and dust.

I pushed the doors that stood in the back of the room, slightly open; behind them, ebony bookcases went from floor to ceiling filled with ancient books. In the middle of the room, elegant furniture stood facing a majestic fireplace that didn't contain the fire but homed spiders and ashes. I laid my eyes on a big green book that rested on the coffee table and walked to it; I lifted it and sat on one of the sofas, which released a cloud of dust while I coughed and opened the book slowly. 

The first page showed in very elegant handwriting the words “The D’Angelo family”. My stomach twisted, that was my last name. I passed the pages and all of them showed people in this very same house having fancy parties over the years; the dates started in the early 19th century and as I passed the pages the years were getting closer and closer to the present; soon I stumbled across the new year party of 1986. In the pictures, the main character was a young lady, probably in her 20s, wearing a slim emerald green dress and her slightly curly ginger hair reached her waist; in all the pictures she was laughing and holding a glass of champagne accompanied by a young lad in a light brown three-piece suit and messy brown hair. Then, I recognized them, they were my parents back in the '80s when they met. An uneasy feeling washed over me and I kept passing the pages, hungry to know more. A couple of pages later there were only two pictures, family ones. The first one, dated February ‘86, had my mom on it and the next one, dated April ‘86, didn’t. I closed the book, put it underneath my arm, and ran to the car. 

“Hey, Moni!” Dad smirked, waving at me.

“Hi, dad. I found this” I said as I slammed the book against the arm rester.

His smile vanished and he stuttered “Where did you find that?”

“In the house,” I said dryly.

He sighed and gulped “Me and your mom met in the 70s, she was the oldest of the D’Angelo family, and I was the son of the cook. We soon became good friends and her family approved of it, strangely, because they were a very conservative family. At the new year party of ‘86 stuff… happened, and when her family realized that she was pregnant with you, they took her out of the will and out of their house.”

“Why?” I muttered, not angry anymore.

“She’d had relations outside of marriage, with the son of the cook and had stained the honor of the family forever…”

The 20-minute drive home was spent in silence, the only sound was the soft humming of the motor and the occasional honk of a car near us. 

Dad parked on the driveway and I jumped out of the car, kind of nervous. He opened the door and Milo barked and came to receive us, rubbing himself against our legs. Mom arrived from the kitchen with an apron on and flour on her cheeks, holding a tray full of chocolate chip cookies that smelled delicious.

“Hey, mom!”

“How was it darling, did you find interesting stuff?”

“Actually, yes. I found this photo album and I wanted to ask what really happened to my grandparents; dad told me what happened to you”

Her smile dropped and she sighed in resignation when I showed her the album.

“After I left home I cut contact with them, the last thing they told me though was that they would leave the house and destroy all evidence of their existence and move to another country. Looks like they forgot that album.” 

“Can we… Can we go there and search for them?” I inquired.

“Let me think about it, ok? It's been fourteen years and I don't know if I'm ready to see them again.”

I nodded and changed the subject, “What’s for dinner?”

“Shepherd's Pie.”

I smiled and went up the stairs to wait for dinner.

20th May 2000.
“Richard, come on! Let's go!” Mom screamed from the car, “The flight’s in two hours!”

I smiled, we were on our way to the airport to visit my grandparents; we had tracked them down thanks to a Facebook group for families with a noble heritage. I wasn’t sure if they were going to talk to us but it was worth trying, and the tickets were half-price.

The lights on the plane dimmed as the clock struck ten and I tilted my head toward the window while I listened to music, bored of the small variety of movies available on the little TV. We were just two hours away from landing and my nerves were eating me alive. The questions that I wanted to ask my grandparents boiled inside me and kept me awake for the past eight days, leaving black circles around my eyes but I didn't care.

21st May 2000.
A dull muffin and hot chocolate rested on the table, half-eaten. We were waiting for them to pick us up. A cold draught came from the door and all three of us looked over; there they were, the same tense faces and well-brushed hair, now grey, with piercing black eyes. My grandparents. 

They looked around with slightly superior grins, but when they found us in the crowd their faces dissolved into relieved smiles and mom ran into their arms, crying of happiness. Dad smiled, grabbed our suitcases and we walked to them.

“Simone, we are so happy to meet you. I’m Ida and he is Amos.” 

All the words that I had planned for the past week vanished from my tongue and I just hugged my grandma.

Their car was a red Cadillac that shined underneath the spring sun; we jumped in and drove fast outside of the airport and through vast fields of a variety of fruits and vegetables while listening to the radio. 

We pulled into a cobbled round driveway that led to a big mansion with beige forefront and white columns. We got out of the car and walked up the stairs to a 6 feet oak door. The inside of the house was scarily resemblant to the house back at home. The same red carpets and rococo molding. My grandparents walked us to the kitchen and started boiling water for some tea.

“Biscuits, darling?” Amos asked with the characteristic posh accent of wealthy families.

“Yes please,” I murmured.

“How have you been Richard?” asked Ida.

“Well, thank you.”

“Do you have a good job?” 

“Yes actually, I own a couple of restaurants in the center.”

“Fantastic.”

“Tea?” asked Ida.

We all accepted and a few minutes passed by in silence; only interrupted by the soft sipping of the teacups and the crunch of a biscuit.

“I think you know why we’re here,” I said abruptly, “I found the photo album and I want to know the full story.”

Ida gulped, “ok, what exactly do you want to know?”

“Why did you banish my mom out of your house and cut all contact with her; you even moved countries!”

“We were different people fourteen years ago, we were blinded by old-fashioned traditions and we were ashamed of your conception.”

“But what exactly happened?”

“It all started with the New year party of ‘86; your parents were good friends at the moment and no one suspected more than an innocent friendship. But at some point during the night they disappeared for no more than thirty minutes; I never addressed it at the moment but in march, her belly started to grow and we confronted her about it, she admitted that yes, she was in fact, pregnant. We didn't know how to act and the fear of being excluded from the social scene preceded our love for our daughter and her well-being. So we packed our bags and destroyed all evidence that we ever lived there, and we left.”

I didn't know what to say, all the facts were still being processed by my brain. Minutes passed by in complete silence.

“Angelica?”

“Yes, mom?”

“I'm sorry” she dissolved into tears and hugged her daughter tight; I joined the hug and were soon all crying.

10th April 2000.
The sprouts were finally growing, thriving under the spring sun and Scottish weather.

“Moni, time for dinner!” Grandma yelled from the house.

“Coming!” I called back from the garden, covered in dirt. 

I walked back to the house to wash my hands and I thought about what had happened in the past weeks.

A week after our visit we moved with them, it's not like I had friends back at home and dad could manage his restaurants from home. Also, mom had started college and was getting a writer’s degree. 

I was happy now, exploring old buildings and gardening with grandma. 

All asperities had been smothered and everything was forgotten.