Chapter Text
Dressed in all black, young Luz Noceda looked as pathetic as she felt, her sorrowful dress poofing around her as her tears fell past her knees, onto the cold wooden floor. A careful knock on her door echoed in her room. She wiped her cheeks and stood up, a small, weak “come in” escaping her lips.
She turned around to see her sweet, heartbroken mother, somehow holding it together better than Luz was. Camila leans on the doorframe with a wistful, sad smile. “How are you doing, mija?”
Even from a young age, Luz couldn’t handle the idea of anyone worrying about her. Her “I’m fine, mama,” wasn’t convincing by a long shot, with her tear-stained cheeks and sniffles.
“Luz...” Camila said as a means to get through to her.
Luz looked down, unwilling to break. Not when her mom was going through it as well. She had to be there for her.
Camila’s eyes wandered to the photo of Luz with her father on her desk. Luz couldn’t have been older than five or six at the time the picture was taken. Manny was messing up her Mickey ears, a sign they were at Disneyland, a day Luz barely remembered anymore. Now, all she wanted was to remember, to cling onto every last memory of her father.
“Did you see what he left you?” Camila asked softly in hopes to cheer her daughter up, even a little.
“An electric guitar.” Luz glanced at the guitar case in the corner of her room resentfully.
“Just like you always wanted. Aren’t you going to—”
“No,” Luz interrupted. “I’m never going to touch it.”
And that was true. For a while, it sat collecting dust in the lonely corner between Luz’s poster-crowded walls. Until.