Chapter Text
Mirabel didn’t know how she made it a quarter-way up the mountains of the Encanto. As stated before, the mountains were impossibly high. This should be taken literally. After walking for at least another half-hour the niñita was tired. Really tired. She took breaks and constantly contemplated going home, but each time she told herself that it was too late to go home and she would look like a fool. She was dirty, muddy, and gross. She had scrapes on her knees from falling over more times than she’d like to admit, little cuts on her arm from pricking herself on thorns, and her dress was slightly torn from being caught on said thorns.
One thing that Mirabel overlooked was the food situation. It wasn’t something that occurred to her in the moment. But, of course, she was getting hungry. How could she forget food? She took another break. She looked back down at the Encanto. Why would she even want to leave the Encanto? It had her mamá’s delicious healing food, all the villagers had always been nice to her, her older sisters would always manage to make time for her, her primo always cheered her up, and her prima would always comfort her when she was sad. It couldn’t have been that bad if she stayed. Besides, her mamá y papí would never let her get sent away.
Just as she was about to give up she heard a loud cracking noise that made her flinch. The ground began to shake as if an earthquake were about to happen. Mirabel held the small bag she brought with her over her head. It wouldn’t do anything, but it was a slight comfort. The earth trembled and kept making loud noises that Dolores would definitely disapprove of. It was odd. There had never been any earthquakes in the Encanto. The earth only shook if tía Pepa was having a really bad day and even then, it never shook this much.
Suddenly, a big crack in the mountain formed right beside her. She grabbed onto a rock nearby to make sure she wouldn’t fall down the steep hill. When the loud cracking noise stopped Mirabel slowly brought the bag back down from over her head. There was a large hole in the mountain that wasn’t there before to her right. It leads outside of the Encanto. She pondered going back down the mountain again, back to her mamá. But as much as she wanted to go back, this big hole in the mountain was clearly a sign from her abuelo Pedro. Maybe he was giving her his blessing?
She recalled all the scary stories Camilo would tell her about the world outside of the Encanto. Thieves, fire, scary people like the people who hurt her abuelo. Logically, she knew that Camilo knew as much as she did (which was basically nothing), but it was still scary. But…If she never went she’d never know what it was actually like. Mirabel walked towards the hole in the mountain. When she peeked through it she saw a pretty river with a bunch of greenery. There were blooming flowers and she could hear the crickets in the bushes. The scene reminded her of her eldest sister, Isabela, with her grace and beauty. Mirabel started to make her way through the hole. The outside world didn’t look nearly as bad as she had thought. In fact, it looked just like the creek she and Camilo would play in when they were bored.
It was quite steep and she tried to go down as carefully as possible, but her foot slipped on a particularly wet rock. As she slid down the slope slanted towards the river, she hit a few rocks and thorns, causing her to bleed and bruise which made her tear up. For the 100th time on this journey, she wished she had brought some of her mamá’s food.
When she finally reached the end of the slope her little chest was heaving with the effort. This had been the longest she had ever walked. Ever. She painfully got up and walked closer towards the river. When she reached the river, she collapsed from exhaustion. This is as far as her legs would take her for today. She curled up into a little ball and sobbed, her emotions finally catching up to her. She let it all go, the feeling of rejection, the confusion, the helplessness. Was her abuela really just going to make her leave? Just like that? Nothing made sense anymore! Mirabel ended up crying herself to sleep, humming a broken tune that her abuela would sometimes sing to her.
Dos oruguitas enamoradas
Pasan sus noches y madrugadas…
—-
It would be fair to say that Julieta was having a rough week. First of all, her clumsy (but lovable) husband fell down the stairs. Twice. Secondly, her oldest and middle child got into a huge fight and it ended with a lot of tears. Third of all, her youngest’s gift ceremony happened which was quite stressful. And then said youngest’s gift ceremony failed for some reason (which was odd. No one in the family had ever not gotten a gift). Lastly, she got into a huge fight about her youngest daughter, Mirabel’s, future. Apparently, Julieta’s hermano, Bruno, showed their mamá a vision the other night and now her mamá was saying that it would be ‘better for the family’ if Mirabel left and lived with someone else in town (or even as far as where Agustin’s familia lived).
All in all, it hasn’t been great. After Julieta’s argument with her mamá, she went to bed with Agustin, feeling quite frustrated. She loved her mamá, but she could be a pain at times. She was tempted to check on her youngest one more time, but her daughter was probably asleep and she didn’t want to disturb her slumber. It took her a while to get to sleep, but she managed. It was going to be okay. Mirabel was going to be okay. Everything was okay.
The next morning was like every other. Julieta got up at 6:30 in the morning, got dressed, and started breakfast. Usually, she would check up on her youngest before starting breakfast, but Mirabel deserved to sleep in after the night she had. Though, Julieta did have an unsettling feeling. One of foreboding and dread. Something felt off this morning, but she couldn’t quite put her finger on it. Agustin was the first to come downstairs (as per usual), wrapping his hands around her waist and giving her a good morning kiss before going to wake up Luisa (Isabela was usually pretty good at waking up for breakfast every morning). The next person to come downstairs was Julieta’s madre . Suddenly remembering their argument from the other night, Julieta tried to avoid her madre’s gaze as much as possible (even if she could feel her eyes burning into the back of her skull). She could tell her madre wanted to speak to her about the other night, but she really wasn’t in the mood to talk.
Suddenly, she heard a loud ‘THUNK’ from upstairs, causing her to jump a little. She quickly assumed it was Agustin being a clumsy, lovable fool again. She began to prepare one of her extra
arepas
for him, however, she was surprised when she saw him running towards the kitchen with such a frantic look in his eyes. Her
madre
had already left to the patio where breakfast was being laid out, assuming this was just one of Agustin’s clumsy accidents. Julieta knew better. She had only seen her
esposo
with this look in his eyes once; when his mother was badly injured and he was looking for help. Julieta dropped the
arepa
she was holding and ran towards her husband “
Agustín, ¿qué pasó? ¿Por qué estás en pánico?,”
Agustin took a moment to catch his breath and then spoke the words that made Julieta’s world shatter,
“I can’t find Mirabel,”