Work Text:
Everyone's got a prophecy to share.
Mama? Even if I wasn't born yet, it's not like it's the first time I've heard about Tio Bruno ruining her and papa's wedding. She was too young to get a prophecy on how her gift was going to ruin her life. Not like the rest of us. Dolores? Imagine living your whole life in love with someone who never notices you?
(okay, so maybe the exception Isabella)
Mirabel wants to know about Tio Bruno? Sure.
I remember Tio Bruno. A total killjoy. Nothing like getting your door and you gift and a huge party celebrating you, a party that I spent hour after hour shapeshifting into each guest. A party where everyone had fun. Everyone delighted in me! In my gift, that I shared with everyone! And then... after the guests were gone, the house was dark, I was looking forward to spending my first night in my own room.
Mirabel's question brings me right back to that night.
"A seven foot frame, rats along his back."
There was nothing quite like having that giant, hulking creep towering over you with his glowing green eyes and his little scampering rat pals, listening to him telling you how awful the rest of your life was going to go.
"Camilo."
I remember wanting to slam the bedroom door in his face. I didn't want to hear. I knew why he was there. He was going to tell me what my gift was going to give me.
"When he calls your name, it all fades to black."
I closed the door to my bedroom, standing in the hallway. The night sky felt so dark is could have swallowed me whole.
"You're going to know everyone, but no one will ever know you the same way."
And he couldn't just say that, could he? He couldn't let that sit with me on the happiest day of my life?
No, he had to go on. And on. And explain how it was going to eat me alive.
Stepping into someone else's shoes, without anyone ever knowing me the same way I'd know them? Stepping in when they couldn't handle being them anymore? Knowing everyone in town, knowing how hard it could be for them, knowing everything they'd ever need... and then knowing that'd never happen for me? That I was going to know a loneliness no one else would ever, ever know.
Mirabel asks what we know about Tio Bruno?
Could I ever really tell it how it was? How it felt to be five years old, terrified and screaming and your own uncle just wanting nothing more than pressing how awful your gift was going to be? Like he ... was feasting.
"He sees your dreams and feasts on your screams."
There was a reason we don't say a word about Bruno anymore.
