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The village knows what happened. Knowing is set in every stone, carved into every table, the most common ingredient in the food they cook. It is in every corner of every life if one knows where to look.
Children hear the stories. They know that Alma Madrigal was gifted magic for her family in order to protect everyone. In games they reenact the mountains rising around them. They pretend that they have their own magical powers. They play and wave their hands as if to shock each other, they imagine they can control water and fire and move the earth.
But they do not understand. Its common enough to hear the whispers. They know that sometimes their abuelos are sad, but still don’t understand why.
Isn’t Encanto magical? Isn’t it paradise? A fantastical dream?
In growing up one begins to see, though. They see the haunted looks in their elders’ eyes. How sometimes a look will glaze over, and it seems like their minds are so far away from their bodies, further away than the farthest reaches of Dolores's hearing.
It’s the start of understanding.
Understanding that there was a time barely 50 years ago when there was no magic and that people simply lived life in much more ordinary ways. In which buildings took longer to construct, broken bones needed to be set to heal, and cuts were washed and wrapped to stave off infection.
The beautiful, perfect flowers that grow in excess at Isabela’s whim is not something that happened 20 years ago. Prior to 10 years ago the only reason to see more than one person with the same face would be because they were twins, not because Camilo was entertaining the masses.
Understanding leads to being let in on the secret. Knowing why one’s abuelo has burn marks on his arms and chest or why the old widow has a large scar down the side of her face despite Julieta and her magical, healing cooking.
The elders know. They lived it.
The youngest is 54. She remembers being woken from a deep sleep by her mamá and papá. Choking on gray smoke wafting in the air like a nightmare masquerading in a heated, starless night she even remembers naively hoping her parents would catch up to the rest of the group soon, with her baby brother in their arms. The oldest is 91. He’s tiny and decrepit and spends most of his time in his rocking chair, answering with as much humor and gusto as he can muster when children ask, “Señor, where did your right hand go?”
Usually, "I wasn't paying attention and it just... disappeared!" or, "I didn't eat my vegetables when I was your age."
Most of them remember sneaking out of their destroyed homes, the solemn march into the trees. They can easily recall the shrill cries of Alma as they all watched Pedro be struck down by a tall man on a horse, blade in hand.
Seeing one death after so many was a blank realization, a quiet shock of cognizant acceptance that those men would soon strike them down no matter how fast they ran.
The glow erupting from the ground was another entirely unbelievable thing.
The mountains rose and with it the Casita followed, but the earthquake instead brought them to their knees in relief and disbelief.
Even as people left the refuge of Casita over time to build their own happy homes and the village grew, the loss is tangible. It’s a part of everyone, gouged into their hearts the way Encanto is gouged into the valley at the center of the mountains.
The people know.