Chapter Text
The day of Mirabel's fifth birthday had come and gone, but the effects of not receiving a gift like everyone else didn’t seem to be fading. She was beginning to worry that no one would ever move past it, her Abuela certainly didn’t seem keen to. Even her sisters acted differently around her, and her parents always got a strange look in their eyes when she walked into a room. Really she was sick of it, and the only one who understood her was Camilo, but tia Pepa and Abuela were giving him more tasks to do every passing week.
It was something that was never asked of her, the tasks were meant for those who were gifted. It made her feel lonely most days, and though her papa and Felix tried to keep her company, her tio Felix seemed to be the only one who could calm down tia pepa, so he followed her around a lot, and her papa was busy with a lot of things her mama asked of him. It was okay though, Mirabel was figuring out how to be helpful in her own ways.
Everything was fine.
Then a year later, just a few days after her sixth birthday, it happened. The adults had been cleaning up after dinner, all of the kids going upstairs to sleep in their rooms, and Mirabel to the nursery. She noticed when she got to her door that Camilo had undoubtedly stolen some snacks from dinner and dropped a few on the way to his room.
Wanting to be helpful, Mirabel got to work picking the food up and began taking it back downstairs to the nearest trash can in order to throw it away. Upon reaching the bottom steps, Casita decided to help her along to the kitchen by pushing her with a tidal wave of tiles. A tile wave, if you would. Just before getting to the kitchen though, it stopped. Through the open door on the other side, she could see tia pepa in the next room, helping her mom clean up.
“You know, I do miss him. Even though I still don’t forgive him for my wedding. It’s just, quieter, without him.” Her tia said, picking up a plate and looking at Mirabel's mama with a sadness she couldn’t place. Her mama just looked back with a matching look and nodded in agreement.
“There’s a lot more arepas con queso though,” her mother sighed, and they stared at each other for a moment before laughing, quietly and genuinely. It was the first time since her fifth birthday that she had seen her mother with such a sad look in her eye.
There weren’t that many ‘he’s’ in the family, and though she had only a vague image of her uncle, one year was not long enough to fully forget tio Bruno. Had more time passed, and she was older, perhaps she wouldn’t remember him outside of the repeated ‘don’t talk about Bruno’s’ she got. The small time she shared with him would have already faded from her mind.
As it was, she was not too old, and still remembered him, albeit vaguely. Therefore, it came as no surprise that when she heard muffled laughter from somewhere down the hall near the dining room, she knew it wasn’t her imagination. It was her tio Bruno, and she felt it deep in her bones. When she looked though, there was no one there. Had it been anyone else, she would have been convinced that they were in the same room as her mama and tia, but she knew her papa and uncle had gone to help her Abuela with more firewood. The other kids were all upstairs too, and whoever had laughed seemed to be near the hall closest to the dining room doors. That’s why it had to be Bruno! But if he was in the dining room wouldn’t they be able to see him?
It didn’t make any sense, and before she could think on it any longer she heard a loud ‘ahem’ and looked up to see her tia with the dishes still in her hands. Mirabel looked past her at her mother and before anyone could be too disappointed, she held her hands out with the food.
“Someone dropped these upstairs, I came back down to throw them away.” She followed up her statement by walking past Pepa to the trash can and then leaving back out the door toward her room. That was not without hugging her mama and noticing the way a storm cloud formed above her tia’s head. Clearly her explanation of ‘someone’ was not convincing enough to save her cousin from his mama’s wrath. As it was, her own mama looked proudly at her and Mirabel couldn’t find it in herself to be too worried for her cousin. She was on her way back to her room when she noticed a small rodent running along the wall, and disappearing into a small hole mostly hidden by a plant. It disappeared once the rodent was inside.
“Are there rodents in the walls, casita?” She thought to ask once she returned to her room. The response she got seemed to be in affirmative, but if it was truly a problem then casita wouldn’t be helping them. That’s why Mirabel didn’t think it important to mention it to Abuela the next day, at least, that’s what she had convinced herself. If there were mice and rats in casita then maybe Mirabel could befriend them with the food Camilo dropped everywhere. They could help her do more chores, and maybe then Abuela would be proud of her.
That’s what her plan would be then. Befriend the rats, gain some company, and prove to her abuela that she didn’t need a gift to be important.