Chapter 2 - Shadows of the Past
The drive back to the house later that evening was silent, save for Mateo’s soft, even breathing from the backseat. He had fallen asleep exhausted, his pale face resting against a small hospital pillow, completely unaware of the bomb that had just been dropped on his parents’ lives.
We didn’t go straight home. Instead, Luis drove us to a small, quiet park on the outskirts of the city, pulling the sedan under the sprawling branches of a jacaranda tree. He turned off the engine, but he didn’t get out. He gripped the steering wheel so hard his biceps strained against his shirt.
“Luis,” I began, my voice trembling as I reached out to touch his shoulder. “You can’t possibly believe what that doctor—what my mother—insinuated.”
Luis turned his head slowly, his eyes bloodshot and haunted. He didn't look angry; he looked hollowed out, as if a vital piece of his identity had been violently ripped away.
“Elena, look at me,” Luis whispered, his voice cracking. “My mother has spent four years treating that little boy like a plague. Whenever I asked her why she was so cold, she would look away, mutter something about bloodlines, and tell me that I was blind. I thought she was just a bitter, traditionalist old woman who hated you because you came from a smaller town. But today… today she looked at him and said, ‘Are you sure you can call him your son?’ She knew something, Elena. Or she thought she did.”
“She’s lying, or she manipulated something!” I cried, tears finally spilling over my lashes. “You know me! You know every single day we’ve spent together since the day we met at the university! I have never looked at another man, Luis! Never!”
“I know that,” Luis murmured, burying his face in his hands. “God help me, I know your heart. But my mother is obsessed with family legacy, with blood, with the Cárdenas name. If there’s a discrepancy in medical records or family history, she would dig up the earth to find it.”
“Then we find out why,” I said, steel creeping into my voice, replacing the shock. “We don’t cower in a car parking lot. We go to the source. We go back to that house, and your mother is going to tell us everything she thinks she knows.”
When we arrived at the Cárdenas family home, the lights were still on. Through the wrought-iron gates, we could see Doña Teresa sitting majestically in her velvet armchair by the front window, sipping chamomile tea as if she were waiting for a carriage to arrive.
We stepped out of the car, waking Mateo gently and leaving him safely strapped into his booster seat with the windows cracked and the radio playing softly. Hand in hand, though our palms were slick with nervous sweat, Luis and I marched up the stone walkway.
Luis didn’t bother knocking. He turned the brass handle and shoved the front door open, the wood slamming against the interior wall with a loud crack.
Doña Teresa didn’t even flinch. She set her teacup down on the saucer with agonizing slowness, adjusted her lace shawl, and looked up at her son with eyes as cold as winter stone.
“I was wondering how long it would take you to come back,” Doña Teresa said, her voice dripping with venom. “And you even brought the woman who disgraced our family name.”
“Shut your mouth, Mother,” Luis roared, stepping forward so fiercely that Doña Teresa’s eldest sister, Aunt Beatriz, scurried out of the hallway with a terrified gasp. “You sit there and play games, but today you nearly killed my son. And then the hospital told us something that makes me think you’ve been orchestrating a nightmare behind my back for years.”
Doña Teresa raised her chin, her expression hardening further. “Ah. The blood test. So the truth has finally found its way out of the dark. You see, Luis? I tried to save you from her. I tried to spare you the shame.”
“Save me from what?” Luis yelled, slamming his hand against the mahogany sideboard. “Explain yourself right now, or I swear to God I will cut you out of our lives forever.”
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Doña Teresa stood up slowly, leaning heavily on her carved wooden cane. She looked at me with a hatred so pure it felt tangible, before turning her cold gaze back to her son.
“She is not the one who betrayed you, my foolish boy,” Doña Teresa hissed. “The betrayal happened thirty years ago. And it wasn’t committed by Elena.”
