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Mirabel was back.
She'd been gone for a long time. Antonio had missed her. He'd secretly begun to worry that he would forget her. Even the sound of her voice was beginning to fade.
But now she was back, and now things could return to just like they used to be.
But they didn't.
He sensed that from the first, when he hugged Mirabel. It had been a very long time, but he thought she felt different from when she'd used to hug him. Now she was too skinny, except for her stomach which was too big. And she was crying, everyone was crying, which Antonio didn't understand, because now that Mirabel was back they should all be happy! Like everyone had been happy when Tio Bruno had come back! It was a happy time now, right?
Right?
"What's that?" Antonio asked Dolores.
She froze. "What's what?"
He pointed. "On your arm."
"Oh, it's nothing-"
But Antonio had already dragged back her sleeve to reveal a long, nasty-looking gash down his sister's arm. He stared. He'd never seen a wound so big. It wasn't bleeding, but it looked like it had been recently; it looked red and painful. There wasn't any blood on Dolores' arm or sleeve, but come to think of it, she was wearing a different shirt than she had this morning, wasn't she?
"Doesn't that hurt?" he asked.
"Not really," Dolores said.
Antonio wondered if she was lying.
"But what happened?" he asked. "How did you hurt yourself like that?"
"It's fine," Dolores assured him. "It doesn't hurt very much. It's not even bleeding anymore. You don't need to tell Mama."
Anymore?
And also-
"You didn't tell Mama?" he asked.
She winced. "We just found Mirabel. It's not important."
"So you got hurt when you were finding Mirabel?" he asked.
Dolores winced again. "Antonio...sometimes you're too smart, you know that?"
"Thank you!" he beamed. "But what happened? Oh-" His eyes widened. "Did the same man who hurt Mirabel hurt you also?"
"Yes," Dolores admitted.
"Oh," Antonio said. He was bursting with questions. No one was explaining anything to him. "When? Is that how you knew he had Mirabel? Because he hurt you also?"
"No-" Dolores pulled her sleeve back down, wincing. "It was when me and Camilo rescued her. He tried to stop us, and I had to fight him, and..."
She gestured to her arm. "I'm fine, really. It's not nearly as bad as it could have been, only a graze. It could have been much worse, I could be-and, anyway, he's locked up now, and we have Mirabel back, that's the important thing. She needs worrying about way more than I do. I could have asked Tia to make me something, now that we have our gifts back, but she doesn't have very many healing foods yet, we only just got them back, and whatever she just made Mirabel needs way more than I do. I'll be fine. It'll heal by itself."
She was talking more than usual, and faster, too.
She looked disheveled, sort of. Her hair somewhat messed up. Her eyes wild, and - scared? She seemed more unsettled than she claimed.
It was true, though, that Mirabel needed whatever healing foods their aunt had more than Dolores did. She had all these marks on her face and arms. The only time Antonio had ever seen marks like that was one time when he and Juancho and Cecilia and Alejandra had been playing on some boulders that they weren't supposed to and he'd fallen off and landed on his leg, which had gotten all scraped and bumped, with some marks on it like the ones Mirabel had.
"Just some bruises and scrapes," Tia Julieta had told him as she'd cleaned his leg and he made loud painful moans to attract sympathy. "Don't groan like that, Antonio, it doesn't hurt that much. Just don't bang it and it'll get all better in a few days. I just wish I could still..."
She sighed, but Antonio was already running off to play. Well. Walking off to play. His leg had hurt for a while. But, as his aunt had assured him, within a few days the marks had faded and the scrapes had healed and his leg was as good as new.
Now Mirabel has marks like that all over her face and arms. Like she'd fallen on her face and arms a lot. Hard.
Or, not fallen, but something had hit her...
And they hurt, too. Mirabel needed all of Tia's magic healing food she could get.
She also probably just needed a lot of regular food, because she was way too skinny. She should eat more.
"Look," Dolores said. "I-I don't want to make Mama and Papa worried when Mirabel just came back, so just-could you not tell them about it? It'll be a secret. I trust you, Antonio."
She trusted him? His big sister who was already a grown-up trusted him to keep her secret?
So Mami and Papi wouldn't be worried, too, right now when everyone was worried about Mirabel.
"I won't," he promised. "I won't tell anyone, not if you don't want me to."
She hugged him. "Gracias, Tonito. But also," she added. "Remember, if you do tell them, I'll know now..." She tugged at her ear.
Everyone cried a lot, nowadays. Mama. Tia. Tio Agustin, once or twice. Isabela. Luisa. Even Abuela. Antonio never saw Camilo cry, but then again, Camilo was also spending a lot of time by himself in his room.
And Mirabel. Mirabel most of all.
When Mirabel had first disappeared, Antonio had cried sometimes, because he missed her. He thought some others of the familia cried to, but they tried not to let him see because they didn't want to make him even sadder. Now it was like everyone was crying except Antonio.
"You're going to kill him?" Papa asked. From where Antonio stood behind the doorway-he'd only wanted to ask if he could go play outside, ever since Mirabel had disappeared and even now that she'd come back, his parents always wanted him to tell them where he was going and to make sure they knew where he was-he couldn't see his father's face.
"Yes." Antonio had never heard his Tio Agustin sound like that. Only one word, but it was sharp, cold, filled with a deep, endless fury. "That-that-"
Antonio didn't know what the next words Tio Agustin said were. He'd only ever heard one of them before. Camilo had said it once, and Mama had given him a talking-to in front of the whole familia-except Mirabel, because this had been a few months ago-and made him wash his mouth out with soap. That part had been pretty funny, actually. Everyone had refused to tell Antonio what the word meant, though. Tio Agustin was saying that word now, and more that sounded even worse, but neither Papa nor Tio Bruno said anything.
Antonio had never had any reason to fear his uncle before, but the way Tio Agustin sounded had scared him. He suddenly didn't want him, or his father, to see him. Tio Agustin had spoken just a few words, but he'd sounded so angry...
Tio Agustin stalked out of the house, saying nothing more, the sharp stomps his boots made somehow speaking his fury to the world.
From what Antonio heard later, it had taken the magistrate, the priest, and Senor Ortiz combined to keep Tio Agustin from strangling Rafael Gonzalez in the holding cell with his bare hands.
Antonio probably hadn't been supposed to know that. But the rats knew everything.
Mirabel liked to just sit and do things. Everyone wanted her to just sit and rest, so Mirabel always had a stack of books or sewing next to her. She would read a lot, or embroider designs. She had to take lots of breaks, though, because she said her eyes and mind weren't used to focusing and concentrating for so long.
Mirabel was knitting. She'd known how to knit before, but she hadn't done it often; she liked sewing better. But now she was knitting something. It looked like it was going to be a big wide scarf or something.
"What is that?" Antonio asked her. "What are you making?"
"A baby blanket," she said quietly.
Antonio liked to snuggle up to Mirabel when they were sitting on the couch together, or wrap his arms around her knees in a hug, like he used to back when he was just a little four-year-old before Casita had fallen and Mirabel had gone. Or he would pull her arms when he was showing her something, or accidentally bump into her. He'd always acted like this. Everyone acted like this. No one else minded if he pulled their arm, as long as he didn't pull too hard.
But whenever he touched Mirabel she sort of flinched, but instead of moving away she went very still, unmoving, almost holding her breath.
"Antonio," Mirabel asked him one day, bending over to meet his eyes, "can I ask you something?"
"Yeah," he said, standing up as tall as he could because he knew it was hard for Mirabel to bend down now. "What?"
Mirabel hesitated, looking nervous. "When you-whenever you hug me, or touch my shoulder, or anything-could you just tell me first?"
"You don't want me to hug you?" Antonio asked. He wanted to hug Mirabel. He'd spent a whole year and a half without her. He wanted to be next to her forever.
"No, no, I do, I'm sorry, never mind," Mirabel said all in a rush.
"But what?" he wanted to know.
"It's fine," Mirabel assured him.
She didn't sound fine. She was sort of breathing funny, and she looked almost scared. Which didn't make sense, because she was home safe now and the bad guy was in jail! He moved to lean against her, then remembered what she'd just asked him and stopped, confused. "So I can hug you?"
"You can," Mirabel told him. "I-I do want you to hug me. But could you-could you tell me before you do so I know you're going to?"
"Like, before I do, I should just say 'Mirabel, I'm going to hug you now,' and then I can?"
"Yes," Mirabel told him, sounding relieved. "And-if it's not too much to ask, could you-could you do that before you touch my arm or anything also?"
"Like if I wanna show you something I should tell you before I tap you to show you?"
"Yes, like that. Or you could just tell me that you want to show me something, without tapping me?"
"I can do that," Antonio said thoughtfully. He would have done anything Mirabel asked of him. She'd been gone for so long. She was his favorite prima. "But how come?"
"Because-well-I just want to know before you touch me."
"Oh!" Antonio said. "So you're not surprised or scared?" His mother had cautioned him not to make any loud sudden noises, so Mirabel didn't get scared. Apparently that applied to even just touching her on the arm, too.
"Yes," Mirabel said. "That's it."
Atonio and Mirabel were in the kitchen. Mirabel had wanted to help Tia Julieta cook, so she could spend time with her mother but also not be around too many people at once, because she was still getting used to it. But she was also supposed to be resting, which is why she was sitting instead of standing at the counter. She was supposed to be resting all the time. So Antonio had volunteered himself to be Mirabel's helper and to bring her whatever she needed that she couldn't reach from her chair.
Tia Julieta reached up her arm to take something down from a high cabinet.
She wasn't even facing Mirabel. But Mirabel jumped up and scrambled backward, stopping at the edge of the kitchen, breathing hard like she'd been running, her arms half raised as though to shield herself from a blow.
The familia was sitting at the table eating dinner. It felt sort of weird to have Mirabel with them. Antonio had missed her, but he'd sort of gotten used to her not being there. He'd wanted her back! He was just not used to her being back. Plus also things weren't the same as they used to be.
It had taken Tia Julieta a full two months to stop setting out a place for Mirabel.
So they were all sitting and eating, when suddenly Mirabel jumped up from where she was sitting in Tia Julieta's usual place and ran to the bathroom. Tia Julieta got up immediately, calling Mirabel's name, and followed her. Everyone else exchanged concerned looks.
Worried, Antonio climbed down from his chair and followed his aunt and cousin. The bathroom door was mostly closed, but not all the way.
"-nausea is normal," Tia Julieta was saying. "Not just in the first few months. Sometimes even just the smell, not even of all foods - before Luisa was born I could barely look at pollo asado without gagging, but afterwards I cooked and ate it like normal."
"I don't think it's that," Mirabel said quietly, shakily. "I don't-"
Mama called him back to the table. "Leave them be, Tonito."
Tia Julieta returned to the table a few minutes later. "She's fine," she assured everyone. "She just-she's not used to eating so much."
Mirabel's plate hadn't had so much on it, Antonio thought. Just a normal amount of food. The same amount of food that was on his plate, he thought, and he was a lot smaller than Mirabel, who was supposed to be eating more now anyways.
"They should have let me kill him," Tio Agustin muttered.
Mirabel cried a lot. Antonio often heard her weeping-sobbing-in her room. His mother told him to leave her alone unless she asked for his company; otherwise he would have gone in to see if he could make her feel better.
Apparently the man who had taken her hadn't let her cry, so it was like all of Mirabel's tears were coming out now instead.
Antonio thought that was really mean. Bad enough that this man had taken Mirabel away from them and hadn't let her go home and had hit her a lot and hurt her, but he hadn't even let her cry about it? Antonio would have cried, even though he was big now, six and a half.
It made him feel angry, deep down. He'd never really felt angry before. Not like this. The feeling scared him.
Luisa and Isabela were setting the table when Luisa fumbled when picking up a plate and dropped it. She tried to catch it but missed; it hit the floor and shattered, the splintering noise sharply breaking the routine hum of the house. Mirabel went white.
Mirabel was sitting on a chair doing nothing, just closing her eyes and gently swinging her legs, when Antonio came running in. "I found some new puppies!" he said excitedly. "Come see the new puppies! Their mama said I can-hey, what's that?"
"What?" Mirabel asked, looking around quickly.
"What?" Camilo, who had just entered the room looking half asleep asked.
Antonio pointed to Mirabel's leg.
On the back of her right leg, just above the ankle, were several jagged pinkish-white lines, stark against pale dusky (too pale) skin.
"Oh, um," Mirabel said nervously, "it's, uh, a scar."
Camilo had gone very still. His face looked hard.
"But where's it from?" Antonio wanted to know. He'd never seen a scar like that before. Then again, he hadn't seen very many scars before either. Dolores's-well, it wasn't a scar yet, it was only half healed, still covered with a scab-was a long straight line.
"It's from-when-" Mirabel's eyes were half closed again, and she was breathing funny. She clutched the sides of the chair tightly.
Antonio frowned. "What's wrong?"
Camilo stepped in front of him. "Look," he told Mirabel. "You don't have to say."
"But I should-he asked-"
"Breathe," Camilo reminded her.
Mirabel took a deep breath. Antonio copied her, holding his breath until he let it all out in a gasp. Neither of them noticed.
"Look," Camilo said again. "If you want to talk about it, it's totally fine. If you don't want to talk about it, that's also totally fine. We're good either way. Right, Antonio?"
Antonio actually really wanted to know what had happened to Mirabel's leg, but Camilo was giving him a Look, so he just nodded and said "Right!"
Mirabel took another deep breath. "Thank you," she said finally, and then very politely excused herself and left the room.
"Tonito," Camilo sighed as soon as Mirabel was gone, sitting down in the chair she'd vacated. "You can't-don't ask her these things."
"But I wanted to know!" Antonio protested. "She was going to tell me!"
"Couldn't you see it was making her upset?"
"No!" Antonio hadn't seen. He'd never wanted to make Mirabel upset. "It was?"
Camilo looked at him. "A bit. Just-don't ask her to talk about things if it makes her sad, all right?"
Antonio didn't want to make Mirabel sad. But-
"I thought we're supposed to talk about our feelings if we're sad," he pointed out. "That's why Mama has it rain sometimes."
"Right, right." Camilo scratched his head. "But that's-different."
"How?"
Camilo hesitated. "It just is. It's-well, it's more complicated. And besides, Mirabel already cries. So she's letting out her feelings. She just might not want to talk about them."
Antonio had been playing beneath the table with a couple of capybaras he'd brought into the house. He thought he'd fallen asleep, because he blinked and the capybaras were gone and his head felt a bit fuzzy. He was still half asleep, lying quietly under the table without moving much, which was why Dolores didn't notice him behind the long tablecloth when she and Camilo came into the kitchen.
"I know we have to be gentle," Camilo was saying. "But I mean, like-I was standing right in front of her, I wasn't making any sudden movements, she saw I was right there, and then I accidentally brush her shoulder and she freaks out. Like, I didn't mean to, but-"
"Camilo." Dolores sighed. "Think. For the past year and a half-that's, like, a quarter of Antonio's life-the only times she's ever been touched has been to hit her, or-or-"
There was a short, sickly silence.
"So, yeah," Dolores said quickly. "She's just-she's not used to not being hit. We need to give her time, to be careful-"
"I know, I know." The scrape of a chair being pulled over the floor, followed by the rustle of fabric as Camilo sat. "I just-I mean, I guess I thought that once we found Mirabel and brought her back things would go back to normal, you know? The familia would be complete and we'd get our powers back and Mira would be here and everything would be like it used to be..." He trailed off. "Estúpido, I know."
"It's not, really." Dolores sighed again. Everybody was doing that a lot, nowadays. "If it had been like Tio Bruno, then it would have been easier for things to be like they used to be. Like if she'd left because she was having a hard time, and she stayed away for a while, but then she came back and we all talked and she was fine the whole time....Like with Tio Bruno. He went away, and we didn't know where he was, and we worried about him, but eventually we got used to him being gone, and now that's he's back-well, remember him and Mama and Tia and Abuela had a whole long conversation for a few hours? But now-you probably don't remember, but him talking with our parents or playing with Antonio...it's just like it used to be. I think we were all hoping that that's how it would be with Mirabel. She would come back soon, and she'd be fine, and we would all go back to normal....We never thought..." She took a deep breath. Dolores didn't usually talk this much.
"Si," Camilo whispered. "Like that. But she wasn't fine. All this time..." He trailed off.
"You saved her, you know," Dolores told him. "If you hadn't been suspicious of Mr. - of Rafael Gonzalez," she corrected herself, "if you hadn't convinced me that we should go look around in his house, we would never have realized..."
"You know what the terrifying thing is?" Camilo asked, almost in a whisper. "I was barely even expecting to find her there. I thought, maybe a couple of clues at the most. It was only a few little things that made me suspicious of him, you know? Such small things....On their own they wouldn't even have been suspicious. It was only that it was all together that I thought something was up. He lied so well....He was always so nice and friendly to everyone. He even helped us rebuild Casita, remember? And he just kept going around like normal. I don't know if I really, really thought he had her. I was - I was desperate, I guess. I had no idea what had happened to her, so I was just looking for anything, any little thing, to find her..."
"But you were right," Dolores said. "You did find her."
"You know what I keep thinking?" Camilo went on, as though Dolores hadn't spoken. "This is what the terrifying part is-if I'd just written it off, if I hadn't paid attention to him-it was just the little things, you know? Really little things-if I hadn't noticed any of that, if I'd ignored it....she would still be there." His voice was shaking.
"But she's not," Dolores told him. "You saved her."
Camilo made a sharp sound that didn't sound like a laugh. "I first started getting suspicious of him months ago! And I told Mami and Papi, and I told you, but none of us noticed anything! But if I'd done something back then-I could have saved Mira months-" He made that sharp not-a-laugh sound again, and then a hitching noise; with a feeling of almost wonderment, Antonio realized that Camilo was trying not to cry.
Camilo never cried. He was Camilo, Antonio's big brother. He didn't cry. He always just laughed and came up with a fun prank instead. Even now that Mirabel was back and everyone was crying a lot, Camilo didn't. Okay, so he was spending a lot more time in his room. Maybe he was crying a little up there. But surely not in front of people, not even Dolores.
He didn't now, either, and Antonio was relived. He heard Camilo take some deep breaths, and Dolores whisper, "Cami, Cami. You found her. She's all right now."
Camilo snorted. "No, she's not."
"She's not," Dolores agreed. "But she will be, and that's the important thing."
Camilo said quietly, "We should've killed him."
Dolores made a "hmm" sound that wasn't quite agreement or disagreement.
"He deserves it!" Camilo spat. "He had Mirabel this whole time-torturing her-you remember what he said to Mirabel when he came in and found us?"
"Yes," Dolores said.
Camilo said it anyway. "'I've been telling you this whole time that I'll kill your family if I have to. Well, looks like I'm going to have to.'" He spoke each word slowly, deliberately, edged with venom, as though it was etched into his memory. "And then he came after you with a knife."
A knife?
Antonio remembered the long gash on his sister's arm, and shivered.
"He could have killed you," Camilo said. "He would have killed you. Me too, anything to keep Mirabel-but you managed to hold him off long enough for Senor and Senora Martinez to come by to see what the noise was. If he hadn't left the door open..."
"But he did," Dolores said. "He did, and he's in the cell now, and you rescued Mirabel, and-" She inhaled. "I want him dead too, believe me. We all do. But we can't just murder him."
"Try me," Camilo muttered. "Or Mama, or Tio Agustin, or-"
"I know, Camilo! But think. We're the Madrigals. Nothing like this has ever happened before here-"
"Because it's supposed to be a safe place."
"-We have no concept of what to do. There's no precedence. We can't just kill him in his cell. Yet, at least. We need to make sure justice is done. Study the laws, or something. I don't know." She clapped her hands once. "Then we can kill him."
"We will," Camilo agreed, banging his fist on the table.
Dolores yelped at the sudden noise.
"Sorry!" he apologized. "I forgot."
They didn't talk any more after that. Dolores got something from the refrigerator and left. Camilo didn't move for a while. Antonio lay still beneath the table, thinking.
Finally Antonio heard the chair scrape slightly against the floor as Camilo got up and went to open a cabinet. There was the clink of tableware as he moved things around on the shelf.
"You have to ask," Antonio said.
Camilo yelped and dropped whatever he was holding. A plate, Antonio saw as he crawled out from under the table. It hadn't broken, though.
If it had broken, and Mirabel had been there, Mirabel would have dropped to her knees and scrambled to pick up each piece with her bare hands, apologizing over and over. That had happened last week, and Mirabel hadn't even been the one who dropped it.
"Antonio-" Camilo had his hand on his chest. "Don't do that to me! I almost had a heart attack!"
"Lo siento," Antonio apologized, picking up the plate. He hadn't meant to startle Camilo. He didn't want anyone to be scared. He just wanted everyone to be happy.
"You have to ask Mirabel," he told Camilo. "If you touch her shoulder. She asked me to. Mama told me."
"It's fine," Camilo told him, taking the plate from his hand. "Right. Right. Thanks. I'll remember that. Um..." He eyed the table. "How long have you been there?"
"I think I fell asleep," Antonio said. "I brought some capybaras inside to play but when I woke up they were gone. Did you see them?"
"You brought more capybaras into the house?"
"They wanted to explore!" Antonio defended himself.
"All right, all right." Camilo waved his hand. "But, um, when did you wake up? Did...did you hear me and Dolores talking?"
Antonio nodded. He suddenly felt very small.
Camilo looked nervous. "How much of it did you hear?"
"All of it," Antonio whispered.
Camilo rubbed his forehead with his palm. "Oh man," he muttered, and then sat right down on the floor next to Antonio. "So, um...so you know he's in the holding cell now, right? He's locked up. He can't hurt any of us ever again."
"But he did," Antonio whispered, and there was something in his throat and his eyes were wet. He was a big six-and-a-half year old now. He was not going to cry. He was not. "He hurt Mirabel for so long, and he was going to hurt you and Dolores, and..."
"Ay, Tonito..." Camilo wrapped his arms around Antonio and rubbed his back, like Mama did whenever he had a nightmare, and Antonio took a few deep gulping breaths, sniffling.
"But why?" he asked. "Why did he take Mirabel? Why did he want to hurt her?"
Camilo closed his eyes and muttered something that sounded like, "I'm not qualified for this." But he kept rubbing Antonio's back as he told him, "It's...complicated. Should I try to explain it anyway?"
Antonio nodded.
"Okay. Um." Camilo's brow furrowed as he thought. "You know those kids who like to pull the wings off of flies?"
Antonio nodded vigorously. He did know a few boys like that. "I do! It's so mean to the flies! It hurts them so much and then they die! I told them," he told Camilo earnestly, "that if they keep doing that then I'll tell all the other flies where they are and then there'll be a whole big storm of flies to scare them." He stretched his arms wide to show how big the cloud of flies would be.
Camilo smiled faintly, distantly. "Yeah. That's...a good thing to tell them, it's not a nice thing to do to the flies. But...see, when kids get older, they don't do that anymore, right? None of my friends pull the wings off flies. We get older and we realize that it's a bad thing to do to them, so we stop."
Antonio nodded.
"But some people..." Camilo took a deep breath. "Some kids don't stop. They pull the wings off flies because they like to hurt them. They keep doing it when they get older. They like to cause pain. But they get older, and hurting the flies isn't enough for them. They want more. So they hurt people instead."
"Like Mr. Gonzalez?" Antonio asked.
"Like Mr. Gonzalez," Camilo nodded.
"Can I tell Parce to eat him?" Antonio asked.
Camilo laughed, but he didn't sound happy. "I wish."
Mirabel's glasses lay folded on a side table. Each lens was covered in a delicate spiderweb of fractures. Leaning forward, Antonio gently poked one cracked lens with the tip of his finger. It wobbled, but didn't break.
"Mama, what's a miscarry?" Antonio asked.
Mama made a sudden jerky movement with her arms (good thing Mirabel wasn't there), like she was surprised. "¿Qué?"
"A miscarry," he repeated.
"A miscarriage?" Mama asked as a grey cloud formed. "When a woman miscarries it is called a miscarriage. Ay, Tonito, where did you-"
"But what is it?" he persisted.
"A miscarriage," Mama explained, "is when a baby dies before it is born."
"Oh." Antonio frowned. "That's sad. Poor baby."
"I thought we were all making sure he couldn't hear us," Papa hissed.
Tia Julieta kept the best treats up in a high cabinet that he couldn't reach. Naturally, that meant that Antonio found a way to reach them, by dint of dragging a chair to the counter, climbing on the chair, climbing on the counter, standing on his tiptoes and reaching the cabinet from there.
"Antonio?" a voice behind him asked.
Antonio turned around to see a tired-looking Mirabel there.
"Hi, Mira!" he said excitedly, always happy to see his favorite cousin even if she had caught him in the midst of sneaking some treats.
Now, having been caught red-handed, he had three options. He could quickly try to hide the evidence and pretend he was on the counter next to an open cabinet for no reason. He could ask Mirabel very nicely not to tell his mother-or hers. Or he could share some of the bounty with her.
"You want one?" he asked, holding out a polvorosa to her.
She blinked. "I-oh-yes, thank you." She took the sugar cookie from his hand and took a bite. Antonio sat down on the counter and happily munched on his.
Mirabel finished hers before he did and licked her fingers.
"You want another one?" Antonio asked. He wanted another one, too.
Mirabel looked surprised. "I-yes, I think so. Yes."
Antonio clambered back up and stood up to reach the cabinet. "You could take by yourself if you want," he commented.
"Hmm?" she asked, watching him nervously.
"The cookies!" He took out the whole bag this time. They might as well share it. "You're taller than me! You could reach it all by yourself. You could take some by yourself if you wanted."
Mirabel looked surprised again. "I-maybe. I guess I could."
The trail of rats led Antonio through the living room, up the stairs, down the hall, into Mirabel's bedroom, and under her bed, where it turned out the rats had found three sugar cookies, an arepa, some crackers, and two oranges, all neatly huddled together in the back corner.
After Casita had been rebuilt, Antonio had had a hard time sleeping.
He kept having nightmares that the new Casita would fall, too, when everybody was sleeping and crush them in their beds. And he kept dreaming that he was looking and looking for Mirabel and couldn't find her.
He'd missed Mirabel. He'd always shared a room with her. If he'd had nightmares she'd comforted him. Then he'd had his own room for one night, and then Casita had fallen, and Mirabel had disappeared.
For a while, he refused to sleep in his room, insisting on sleeping with his parents. Eventually, he'd started sleeping in his room again, but only if one of his parents or Dolores or Camilo stayed with him until he fell asleep, and if the door was left open. Finally, he was ready to sleep in his room all by himself.
And then Mirabel came back.
He wished they could share a room again, but no, he was a big boy now, he had his gift and his own room. And Mirabel liked to sleep either by herself or in her parents' room.
One night Antonio got out of bed to get a drink of water. As he padded by Mirabel's room he heard a soft, muffled sound.
Mirabel's door was slightly ajar. Turning, he saw that Tia Julieta's was as well.
He heard the noise again.
He opened Mirabel's door a little more and peeked in.
Mirabel was covered in blankets, so the only part of her he could see was her head, facing the wall.
He tiptoed in.
Mirabel was lying perfectly still, not moving around like he did when he had a nightmare. But she looked like she was having a nightmare. She was breathing fast, even though she was asleep. She looked afraid, and-was she crying? In her sleep? So that was the noise he'd heard. But it was very quiet, as though even in her sleep she was trying not to be heard.
He shuffled his feet on the carpet. "Mirabel?" he whispered.
Instantly, her eyes snapped open; she curled up under her blanket and looked around wildly, almost expectantly, as though waiting to see-
"Tonito?" she whispered, and instead of looking happy to see him like she always did, her face fell. "You're here too?"
Too? He and Mirabel didn't share a room anymore.
"I heard you crying," he whispered. "Are you okay?"
Mirabel looked around, her eyes widening as she stared at her room. She covered her face with her hands for a moment and whispered something. "Yes," she said finally. "I just...had a bad dream."
When Antonio had nightmares, his Mama or Papa would come in and sit with him, singing a song or telling him a story or just staying with him until he fell back asleep.
Maybe he could do the same for Mirabel! He could make her feel better!
When he was little, only three or four years old, and he shared a room with Mirabel, if he ever had a nightmare she would climb into his bed and fall asleep next to him, and her being there would make him feel better and he would fall back asleep right away.
"Should I sing you a song?" he whispered. "Or sit next to you?"
"What?" Mirabel whispered back.
"When I have a bad dream Mama and Papa sing me songs or sit with me til I go back to sleep," he explained. "Should I do that with you?"
Mirabel finally smiled. "Te amo, Toñito. Thank you. I don't think I need a song, I just need to rest."
"Oh," Antonio said sadly. "Okay."
He'd wanted Mirabel to feel better. He'd wanted to be the one to make Mirabel feel better. What if she had nightmares again and she was all alone?
But she didn't have to be alone, did she?
He gasped as an idea popped into his head. "I know!" he said excitedly. "I'm coming right back!"
He ran quickly back to his room, dragged his pillow and blanket off his bed, and tucked Parcito under his arm. He returned to Mirabel's room, which took longer this time, as he had to bring the pillow and blanket with him - turns out blankets were heavy! - but soon enough he was there.
"We can have a sleepover!" he told Mirabel.
She smiled, so Antonio carefully spread his blanket out on the floor, put the pillow on it, lay down on top of it, and wrapped himself up on it, clutching Parcito to his chest.
"I'm a tamale," he said through the blanket.
Mirabel laughed.
Neither of them had bad dreams that night.
Mirabel was sitting on the couch reading a book to Antonio, who was laying on her lap even though he was almost too big for such things. He had asked Mirabel very nicely if he could, and she'd said yes.
"And then," Mirabel said, "Caperucita Roja went down the path, when all of a sudden she met a big, hairy lobo-"
She stopped, and gasped.
At that moment Antonio felt something, sort of like a flutter, a soft tap. He sat up quickly. "Was that-"
She nodded.
Impulsively, Antonio put his hand on Mirabel's stomach.
She flinched.
"Sorry!" Antonio said, quickly withdrawing his hand, remembering what she had asked him. "Can I feel?"
She hesitated. "Um-could you just listen with your ear, instead?"
"Okay," Antonio said. He leaned down and gently placed his ear against Mirabel's stomach. He held his breath.
He didn't feel anything at first, and he exhaled in disappointment. But then-
A tiny pat against his cheek.
He shot up, grinning. "I felt it! I felt it!"
Antonio had always wanted to have a little sister or brother or cousin. Then he wouldn't be the youngest anymore. Then he would be a big brother or primo, and he could play games with the little one and teach him or her everything he knew, like the best way to sneak some of Tia Julieta's arepas, and give rides on Parce.
Now he was going to have a little cousin - a primo una vez eliminado - but nobody was as happy as he'd thought they would be. Well, they were happy, but they were also worried. And of course, all the hugging each other and crying when they thought he wasn't noticing.
And where exactly do you think you are going, young cub? Parce asked in a growl that would have terrified anyone but Antonio, who knew that Parce liked to pretend to be scary but really was a softhearted jaguar who liked it when he rubbed his belly.
"This way," he said as an answer, walking through the town, waving hello to all the people he passed. Some of them asked how Mirabel was. He told them what Abuela had told everyone to say, which was that she was doing "as well as could be expected."
Passing by Tia Julieta's market stand - she still gave out food to assist the townspeople, but only for illness and major injuries, and she'd significantly cut back on her hours - he waved to her. She waved back.
After Mirabel had disappeared, and even after she'd come back, all the adults had been very nervous about another one of them going missing. Antonio wasn't supposed to play outside after dark, and he wasn't supposed to play alone. He was always supposed to tell someone where he was going, and often, one of his siblings or cousins would watch him when he was playing.
But he had Parce with him now, so he wasn't alone. And if any bad man tried to take him away, Parce would eat him all up.
Above them, Pico circled above them and squawked twice, which meant that he was about to land on Parce's back. Normally, a jaguar could eat a toucan, but Parce and Pico were Antonio's friends. They wouldn't hurt each other.
With a small rush of air, Pico swooped down and perched on Parce's back.
Show-off, Parce grumbled.
Antonio giggled.
They passed the small holding cell, where the man who had hurt Mira, Mr. Gonzalez, was.
Two men stood in front of the small building, idly chatting. Every so often, one of them would poke his head inside. To make sure the prisoner wasn't escaping.
Antonio hoped he would stay inside the jail forever and ever.
Your mother's mother, Pico remarked, gave him quite a piece of her mind.
"A piece of her mind?" Antonio echoed, confused.
Parce huffed, the whoosh of warm air ruffling Antonio's hair. She yelled at him.
"Oh," Antonio said. "Good."
I was on the roof. Pico waved a wing at the top of the little jailhouse. Watching your uncle's rats scurry in to nibble on his toes and food. Saw her walk right in, all stately and dignified, like one of your queens. Antonio knew stories about queens. I heard everything. She let him have it....He wasn't expecting that. A chirrup; that was how Pico laughed. Never expected her, the leader of your flock, to speak to him like that, to lose her temper so...
Well, Parce pointed out, humans are protective of their young as well.
"Antonio?" One of the men stood up upon seeing him. "What are you doing here? You shouldn't be here - go to your mother."
Antonio folded his arms and stomped off, Parce easily keeping pace with him.
This isn't the way to your nest, Pico said.
"We're not going there," Antonio said. "We'll go soon."
Where are we going, then?
"Just come," Antonio said.
Parce huffed again, in amusement, at Pico's squawk.
Soon enough, they reached their destination: the Gonzalez house.
Oh, Pico said.
You should not be here, Parce growled, but Antonio walked right up and opened the door. It wasn't even locked.
He hesitated on the threshold, then entered.
Inside, the house was small, dark, and gloomy. There was a living room with a couch and there was a kitchen and a bathroom and a hallway.
The entire house seemed to be full of darkness and misery and fear. Antonio kept looking around wildly, almost expecting a monster - or Mr. Gonzalez, it was the same thing - to jump out from behind the door or something.
Parce rubbed himself gently against Antonio's side. Antonio hugged Parce and rubbed his face on his fur.
Parce moved on and began walking slowly around the living room, jaws open, inhaling deeply.
"What do you smell?" Antonio whispered. The very atmosphere seemed to discourage speaking loudly. Mirabel had been trapped in here all by herself for a year and a half.
Pain and fear, Parce growled, circling. Power and pleasure.
"You can really smell that?" Antonio asked, hugging himself.
He didn't know why he'd thought it would be a good idea to come see where Mirabel had been trapped. This house was evil. He could feel it. The exact opposite of Casita.
Parce shook his head suddenly, as though remembering Antonio was there. He turned around and headed to the door. Come out, cub. Go home. This is no place for you.
"I'm not a cub," Antonio objected as he followed Parce out of the house and into the sunshine, relived to have something mundane to complain about. "I'm big. I'm six and a half. That's almost seven, you know."
Jaguars didn't snort, but Parce did a pretty good impression of it.
Pico squawked.
It had been Antonio's idea to do something for Mirabel's birthday.
It wasn't Mirabel's birthday, of course. Her birthday had been months and months ago. But they'd missed it, so he thought he would do something now, as a late birthday present. Something that would cheer Mirabel up, because she was still sad a lot.
Luisa had given him the idea of what to do, though. Mirabel liked to spend a lot of time resting on the balcony, reading or sewing or sleeping. She said she liked to be in the fresh air and the sunlight. That had been part of what had inspired Luisa's idea.
"I have a birthday surprise for you," Antonio informed Mirabel, who was sitting on the balcony in a chair with her eyes closed, looking at peace for once.
She opened her eyes and squinted at him. "It's not my birthday, Tonito."
"Yeah," he said. "But I couldn't give you a present on your birthday so I have one for you now. Come on, get up!" He took Mirabel's hand and tried to pull her out of her chair. Laughing, Mirabel got up and followed him to the railing.
"See?" Antonio asked. "Do you like it?"
Mirabel's mouth opened slightly, but she was momentarily speechless.
Antonio had spent the past week convincing every animal he could talk to to be here now, telling them all where to stand and when. Capybaras, toucans, monkeys, anteaters, dogs, cats, snakes, lizards- Every single animal that could be found in and around the Encanto he'd persuaded to come here, whether by dint of asking nicely, promising favors (he'd be cleaning out a lot of nests next week) or food, or simply out of wonder that a human boy could speak their tongue.
They all stood in formation, each animal to its spot. What they spelled out could only be seen from above, and that was: Feliz cumpleaños.
"You asked them all to do this...for me?" Mirabel asked.
"Yeah!" he said. "It's your late birthday present! Do you like it?"
Mirabel hugged him. "Of course I do, Tonito," she whispered.
They stood there for a while, hand in hand, watching the animal scatter and return to their homes.
The sun set over the mountains, bathing the Encanto in glowing light. It was beautiful.
A jaguar was light on his feet, could pass almost unnoticed even through a human town, as long as he kept to the shadows. It helped that he was the trusted friend of Antonio, the human boy who spoke his tongue. He was paid barely a second glance.
To call a human being an animal was one of the worst insults one man could call another. Such an epithet meant that the receiver was the lowest of the low, acting in a manner not even befitting beasts, and didn't deserve to be part of humanity.
But to call a man like this an animal would be an insult to animals, Parce thought.
Animals hunted and fought and killed, yes. But for food, or in defense of their home or young. They did not harm others simply for pleasure. Not like this man. If this man had been a jaguar he'd have been cast out as a disgrace to the species.
All of the Encanto despised him, for years now. But he could never finish paying for what he had done. Some things were unforgivable.
Parce approached the jailhouse from the back and wrapped his jaws around the bars in the single small window. With strenuous effort, he pulled them out. He squirmed his way through and landed with a thud on the floor.
A cell took up half of the room, and the man he sought lay inside it. Sleeping, but his eyes opened when Parce fell in. He paled, eyes widening, and back away as Parce approached, closer and closer, intent on his prey.
It had been a long time, but Parce had waited out the years and decades patiently. No one harmed anything or anyone Antonio loved and got away with it.