Chapter 21 - One Year Later, Isabella Asked the Hardest QuestionA year after the garbage incident, Isabella turned ten.
She insisted on having her birthday party in the back garden.
Alejandro hesitated.
“Are you sure?”
“Yes.”
“You can choose anywhere.”
“I choose home.”
So the garden filled with balloons.
Friends.
Music.
A ridiculous pink cake Sunny nearly destroyed.
Isabella wore white sneakers.
Alejandro noticed.
Not because of their color.
Because the last white shoes he remembered in that garden had disappeared beneath mud.
These were grass-stained by the end of the afternoon.
Normal dirt.
Child dirt.
The difference mattered.
After her friends left, Isabella sat on the terrace swinging her legs beneath the chair.
“Dad?”
Alejandro sat beside her.
“Yes?”
“Is Beatriz still in prison?”
“Yes.”
“Does she have her baby?”
He paused.
“Yes.”
Rafael's daughter had been born seven months earlier while Beatriz was incarcerated.
Custody arrangements placed the baby with relatives.
Alejandro had deliberately avoided discussing details unless Isabella asked.
“Is the baby okay?”
“Yes.”
“Does she know Beatriz?”
“She's very little.”
Isabella thought.
“Will Beatriz be mean to her?”
Alejandro's throat tightened.
“I don't know.”
“Can people stop being mean?”
“Yes.”
“Did Beatriz?”
“I don't know.”
Isabella looked across the garden.
“Do you hate her?”
There was the hard question.
Alejandro could have answered easily.
Yes.
After everything, nobody would blame him.
But he wanted truth.
“I hate things she did.”
“That's not what I asked.”
He smiled slightly.
“You're getting good at that.”
“Dr. Martín says answer the question.”
“Of course she does.”
Isabella waited.
Alejandro exhaled.
“No.”
She looked surprised.
“I don't think I hate her.”
“Why?”
“Because hating someone takes a lot of space.”
She considered.
“Do you love her?”
“No.”
That answer came easier.
“Did you?”
“Yes.”
“Even when she was bad?”
“I didn't know everything she was doing.”
“But she was still doing it.”
“Yes.”
Isabella frowned.
“So you can love someone who is bad?”
Alejandro thought carefully.
“You can love someone who does bad things.”
“Then what?”
“You still stop them.”
Isabella looked down at her hands.
The blisters were long gone.
Faint marks remained only if you knew where to look.
“Did Mommy know Beatriz was bad?”
“She knew Beatriz had made some bad choices.”
“Did Mommy hate her?”
“I don't think so.”
Isabella nodded slowly.
Then:
“I don't hate her either.”
Alejandro said nothing.
“I thought I did.”
“You're allowed.”
“But I don't.”
“That's allowed too.”
“I never want to see her.”
“That's also allowed.”
Isabella smiled.
“Lots of allowed things.”
“That's the idea.”
She jumped down.
Before running toward Sunny, she turned.
“Dad?”
“Yes?”
“You know the first day?”
He knew which first day.
“Yes.”
“If you hadn't come home early…”
The unfinished question entered both of them.
What would have happened?
Switzerland?
Argentina?
More months in the storage room?
More stolen money?
Would Beatriz have succeeded in making Isabella look troubled?
Would Alejandro eventually have signed something because everyone around him said it was best?
He hated imagining it.
“I don't know.”
Isabella nodded.
Then asked:
“Do you think I would've told eventually?”
Alejandro looked at her.
“Yes.”
“How do you know?”
“Because you already tried.”
She frowned.
“The diary.”
“The recorder.”
“Grandma.”
“Maria.”
“Your teacher.”
“You kept trying.”
Isabella absorbed that.
The defeated child from the garbage had not actually surrendered.
She had hidden a bracelet.
Written a diary.
Recorded voices.
Called Grandma.
Asked questions.
Survival had looked quiet.
That did not mean it was weakness.
“You were brave before I came home,” Alejandro said.
Isabella smiled.
Then corrected him.
“I was scared.”
“You can be both.”
She liked that.
Later that evening, Alejandro received an email.
Sender:
Beatriz Reyes.
Prison communication was monitored and legally permitted.
He almost deleted it.
Instead, he read.
I know I have no right to ask anything from Isabella.
He continued.
I also know apologies can become another form of selfishness when the person apologizing expects relief.
Alejandro stopped.
That sounded different.
Beatriz wrote:
So I am not asking her to forgive me or answer.
Then:
There is one thing she should know.
Alejandro felt wary.
The day she dropped the garbage bag, I thought fear had finally made her obedient.
His stomach tightened.
I was wrong.
She kept saying “no” in every way she still could.
And finally:
Tell her I know now that she was never weak.
Alejandro closed the email.
He did not show Isabella.
Not yet.
Perhaps someday.
Perhaps never.
That decision would be hers when she was old enough.
May you like
For now, she was outside in the garden chasing a dog beneath strings of birthday lights.
That was enough.
