Chương 10
Sofía was not an heiress in any useful sense, and there had been no society in town for years, but the article spread quickly. Former classmates sent Elena messages. Strangers found Sofía’s social media accounts and posted pictures of cages, snakes, and red dresses. Someone threw black paint on the hacienda gate.
Joaquín called Elena at dawn.
“The workers are afraid reporters will come.”
“They’re not reporters. They’re people with phones.”
“That is worse.”
He told her the used pump had failed after nineteen hours.
Elena drove to the groves and found him standing ankle-deep in irrigation water, cursing the motor, the seller, the Vargas family, and machinery in general.
“You said it was foolish,” Elena reminded him.
“I did not say I wanted to be right.”
They rigged a temporary line from the south well. It reduced pressure to the older trees but kept the young grove alive. Elena spent the day helping drag hoses and clean filters. By noon, the embroidered blouse was brown with mud. Joaquín’s granddaughter brought them tamales in a plastic container.
Elena sat beneath a lime tree and ate with dirty hands.
Her phone rang repeatedly.
She ignored it until Joaquín said, “If the army is calling, perhaps answer before they invade.”
It was Colonel Paredes, her commanding officer.
“You requested emergency leave for family medical reasons,” he said. “Now a newspaper is identifying you as the officer who led a police operation on private property.”
“I did not lead the operation.”
“There are photographs of you in uniform opening a cage.”
“My mother was inside it.”
“I understand that.”
“Do you?”
Silence followed.
Paredes’s voice became colder. “I understand enough to remind you that the uniform is not personal authority. Did you order local police?”
“No.”
“Did you identify your rank to influence them?”
“They knew who I was.”
“That was not my question.”
Elena looked toward the road. A man on a motorcycle had stopped beyond the trees and was holding up a phone.
“I asked them to conduct a welfare check.”
“As a daughter or as a major?”
“Both.”
“There is no ‘both’ in the regulation.”
She closed her eyes.
Paredes continued. “You are granted seven more days. After that, report or submit a formal request for extended compassionate leave. An inquiry will determine whether your conduct created the appearance of military interference.”
“My mother was locked in a cage.”
“And if that fact excuses every procedure, the inquiry will be brief.”
He ended the call.
Joaquín handed her another tamal.
“Trouble?”
“Yes.”
“Family?”
“Work.”
“They are the same thing if you dislike both enough.”
The practical cost of staying began to take shape. Extended leave would delay Elena’s promotion review. A formal inquiry could damage it further. Resigning would end the career she had built for twenty-two years. Returning to duty would leave Teresa’s care to professionals and lawyers while the family broke apart without her.
She had spent years believing that impossible choices were evidence of poor planning. Now she understood that sometimes every available plan injured someone.
At the rehabilitation center, Teresa’s cognition fluctuated. Some mornings she could discuss crop prices from decades ago with precise arithmetic. By afternoon she might confuse a shoe with a cup. The neurologist diagnosed probable mixed dementia, likely worsened by medication, stress, and dehydration.
Teresa listened to the explanation and said, “Probable means he charges full price for uncertainty.”
The doctor smiled.
When he left, she looked at Elena.
“Am I disappearing?”
Elena sat beside her.
“No.”
“That was too fast.”
“I don’t know.”
“Better.”
Teresa rubbed the gold watch, which now rested on the table because neither daughter would take it.
“I forget rooms,” she said. “Then I remember the feeling of being in them. Sometimes the feeling is wrong.”
Elena waited.
“I remember the cage.”
“I’m sorry.”
“You did not build it.”
“I left you with someone who did.”
“Sofía was not always that person.”
“No.”
“She became her slowly.”
Elena looked toward the courtyard. Purple blossoms had fallen into the dry fountain.
“Do you want to see her again?”
“Yes.”
“Are you sure?”
“No.”
The second supervised visit was quieter.
Sofía brought no gifts. She sat in the chair near the window. Teresa asked whether the pump had been fixed. Sofía said no. Teresa scolded her for buying used machinery without inspection.
“Elena bought it,” Sofía said.
Teresa looked delighted.
“Then that sounds right.”
Elena crossed her arms.
Sofía smiled despite herself.
For a while, they discussed the groves. Teresa remembered which field flooded during heavy rain and which foreman stole fertilizer in 1998. She did not remember signing the power of attorney.
When Sofía mentioned selling the western acreage, Teresa became agitated.
“No houses.”
“The company offered relocation.”
“No houses.”
“We cannot keep everything.”
“No houses.”
Sofía leaned forward. “Mama, the estate owes more than it earns.”
“Then sell the big house.”
Both daughters stared at her.
Teresa pointed vaguely toward the window, as though the hacienda stood beyond the jacaranda trees.
“Sell that ugly thing.”
Sofía laughed. “You love that house.”
“I loved your father. He loved the house. People confuse the chain.”
“The house is the center of the property.”
“The people are the center.”
“You say that now.”
Teresa’s eyes sharpened.
“What does that mean?”
“It means when Papa was alive, you let him borrow against the workers’ homes to save the main building.”
Teresa went still.
Elena looked between them. “What?”
Sofía’s expression showed that she regretted speaking, but not enough to withdraw it.
“After the hurricane. Papa took loans against the full property. Mama co-signed.”
“We had no choice,” Teresa said.
“There is always that sentence,” Sofía replied.
The room tightened.
Elena said, “Why didn’t I know?”
“You were fourteen,” Sofía said.
“I was twenty-three when he died.”
“And gone.”
Teresa touched her forehead.
“Your father said the harvest would cover it.”
“It did not,” Sofía said.
“He was trying.”
“So was I.”
May you like
Maribel shifted in her chair.
Teresa looked at Sofía with sudden exhaustion.
