Wretched Mirrors
Summary: the night before Nina and Tommy’s marriage, Maria Ferrante talks to her daughter.
Word count: 700(ish)
A/N: happy Mother’s Day to mama Ferrante. This is based on a deleted scene from Act One’s epilogue. It’s just a quick little thing.
HBS MASTERLIST
The air was different, that night. As if the world somehow knew that as soon as the sun came up, nothing would ever be the same.
Nina’s grip tightened around the cup of tea in her hands, welcoming the stinging heat in her palms. In a desperate attempt to quell the agitation raging inside of her, she focused on the rhythmic thud of her mother’s knife against the chopping board. She was facing away from her, busying herself with the food she was packing for her and Tommy’s upcoming departure.
There were only a few hours left until dawn.
At sunrise, she would be married. Shortly after, she would be on a boat that would take her away from her home.
As she sat in the low lamplight, all the things she had always taken for granted felt somewhat new. The late summer breeze drifting from the open window, gently stirring the lace curtains. The scent of citrus and jessamine coming from the garden. The dent in the kitchen cabinet her brothers made when they came to blows over something none of them could remember anymore.
“You’ve always been like this,” her mother broke the silence, turning to place some sandwiches in a bag. “You don’t think things through. You throw yourself in them without caring about the consequences.”
“I know the consequences-”
“No you don’t,” she said sharply, fixing her piercing gaze on her. “I’m not talking about honour, or scandal, or whatever your recklessness will bring down upon our name.” She paused, leaning with her hips against the wooden table as she pondered her words. “Marriage is forever. It’s not like the stuff you start and abandon the second you get bored.”
Nina suffered the blow, stirring the teaspoon in her cup. If part of her was upset that her mother thought her naive enough not to know what she was signing up for, the other part was well aware that what she was about to do was leap into the void. “You’ve been all over me about marriage for months. What changed?” she asked, feigning indifference.
Her mother’s expression turned stern. “You’re not a fool, Nina, so don’t act like you don’t understand what I’m saying. This is different, you know it.”
A tense silence filled the room. Nina shifted in her chair, keeping her eyes low. “This isn’t a whim,” she murmured. “I don’t expect you to understand. But I need you to trust me. I… I love him.”
When she raised her head, her mother’s gaze had softened. “What do you know about love?” an almost playful smirk tugged at her lips.
“I know how I feel about him,” Nina frowned, unable to help the defensive inflection in her voice.
“You’re in love with him. That’s not the same thing as loving. Only when you’ve seen every side of him, only when you’ve fought and surrendered and forgiven, only when you’ve seen him at his worst, only then can you say you love him.” Her mother looked right into her eyes, as if silently begging her to understand. “Love is a choice you make every day, even when you have every reason to walk away. And I’m not sure you’re ready to make that choice.”
Nina looked away, clenching her jaw. It was hard to pretend those words hadn’t had an effect on her. Especially since her mother seemed to be reading right into her soul, unraveling her in a way that made her feel like a stranger to herself.
Her silence caused a bitter smile to appear on her mother’s face. “But I guess it’s too late for this. There’s no going back now.” She pushed herself away from the table, going back to her sandwiches. “It’s partly my fault, anyway. I saw the way the two of you looked at each other, I just pretended not to. I didn’t think you’d actually go and ruin us all.”
There it was. The resentment. Crawling out of all that unusual motherly love like a beast kept at bay for too long.
Her mother didn’t wait for an answer, nor did she leave space for any. She just turned her back on her again, a silent warning that the conversation was over.
Once again, the wall between mother and daughter stood tall.
