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"Ready?" asked Mirabel, standing with her uncle at the entrance to Encanto.
"I'm not sure it's a good idea, Mirabel," said Bruno, glancing in the town's direction with unease. The mere sight of the streets brought back many painful memories. "What if I mess something up?"
"Then you come back here and we try again tomorrow."
This sounded reasonable. He wished the emotional stakes were indeed so low.
"Can't you come with me, just one more time?"
With Mirabel around, the townspeople didn't dare to taunt him or call him names. They were nice and polite, completely different than when they talked to him alone.
His niece gave him a look. "You said that yesterday."
"Oh. Right."
Having noticed her uncle's sudden mood drop, Mirabel took his hand and squeezed it lightly.
"You can do this," she said with finality.
Bruno looked from her to their joint fingers. The warmth gave him comfort.
"I can do this," he repeated, much less certain. Mirabel's touch disappeared and he was off.
The man already reached the main street when he heard from behind,
"Go get them!"
He gave out a nervous laugh.
Just a few more steps and Bruno was on his own. Alone among the crowd. There were a lot of unfamiliar faces, but it's the familiar he feared the most. He might have moved on, but their relationships with him were stuck in the past, unmoved and unchanged. In the times he hoped to never revisit.
The man took a deep breath and slowly let it out.
Here goes nothing.
He readjusted his glasses and puffed out his chest. With his chin held high and a new spring in his step, he pushed forward onto his usual route.
He was no longer Bruno. His name was Valentino.
The brave one.
And he was there to do something that seemed impossible even for the fearless Hernando. Put himself out there and face other people.
At first, everyone was passing him by, paying the man no attention whatsoever. This wasn't difficult at all; he was good with pretending he's not there. Even occasional greetings were easy to deal with.
The beginner's luck ran out quickly, though. He could hear people mumbling.
"Look, there's that creep again."
"What is he doing here?"
"What did he come back for?"
"Oh my, isn't that Bruno!" said Señora Pezmuerto way too loud for his liking. "I thought you were dead."
Don't let her get to you, he thought, fighting off the habit to lower his head and get away.
"Still kicking and living, as you see," replied Bruno in Valentino's voice, deeper and more cheerful than his own. "Unlike any and all of your pets, may I add."
The woman gave an exasperated gasp. Before she could answer, Bruno was long gone.
He walked into priest Flores by mistake. Strange, he could have sworn that the church used to be in a completely different part of town.
"You!" the priest exclaimed, pointing his finger at Bruno. "Didn't expect you to be back. You here to gloat that your predictions came true, aren't you?"
Valentino swallowed back the apology that someone else almost put in his mouth. He put his hand to his ear and raised his voice as if the speaker was far, far away.
"Sorry, father, but I can't hear you from under my thick, long, curly hair. Did I mention that they're thick and long?"
Several kids giggled.
After this initial show of his newly-discovered power, people seemed less likely to jump on him out of nowhere. At one time, Bruno was under the impression that everyone purposefully kept their distance.
But even this couldn't remain unnoticed.
"Hey, man, take your big nose outta here! You're scaring the customers."
It was señor Osvaldo, but he was huge. Bruno remembered him as a little thinner than himself, although noticeably more muscular. Some people did not age well.
Before instinctively fleeing from outside of the shop, Bruno gave the shop owner a mischievous grin.
"You know what they say − big nose, big… other parts of your body. They don't say that about bellies. Tough luck."
The man adjusted his sunglasses. He was on a roll.
On his way back, Bruno a.k.a. Valentino knocked three times on the wood before trying his luck in a local bar. He barely came through the front door when he heard,
"How dare you show yourself here after last time!"
Apparently, not all battles could be won.
"Don't mind him. Old Mateo is cranky as ever."
Bruno turned around and saw two women sitting in the bar's garden. He did not remember them from his predictions.
"Hey, you're Bruno, right?" said the other one, squinting at the man before her. "The fortune teller? Can you tell us our future?"
She looked at him expectantly. He was not ready for this. He couldn't do it.
What would his favorite telenovela character do in such a situation?
"All I can tell you is this." Valentino made a dramatic pause for a better effect. "Tomorrow a handsome guy with killer shades is going to ask you out for a drink and you won't be able to say no."
The women smiled at him in amusement.
"You're different than I was told."
"What can I say? People change." His shrug came off a little awkward. "Ladies."
Bruno nodded a quick goodbye before retreating. He felt emotionally exhausted, having forgotten how draining it was to pretend that you're someone you are not. Even though, his first walk around town was not a total disaster. Actually, all past things considered, it went relatively well. Valentino turned out to be surprisingly good at clever remarks.
When her uncle came back, Mirabel stood up and gave him a questioning look. From her face, he could tell that she was nervously awaiting his relations. Before the girl could ask him anything, however, Bruno ran to her and gave her a heartfelt hug.
"You were right! I can't believe that this actually worked." His embrace was tight but fortunately not rib-crushing like Luisa's. "So simple yet so ingenious. Thank you, thank you, thank you!"
Bruno span around with Mirabel still in his arms. Their laughs mixed together until he finally released her.
"I knew you could do it," she said with a triumphant grin. "Your acting skills are amazing!"
Encouraged by the praise and his earlier success, Bruno decided to incorporate other meanings of Valentino's name into this new persona.
"My sweet Mirabel, would you do me the honor of escorting you back to your chambers?" he said in a deep voice, offering her his arm in an overdramatic gesture.
Mirabel raised her eyebrow. She reached for her uncle's face.
"Tio, lose the glasses."