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It can’t be that difficult. It just can’t. Lucía frowns in frustration and looks up. She’s seen her siblings climb the trellis a million times; Mum’s really good at it. Baba and Dad too, of course, but Mum? She’s the best of them all. She likes hearing her laugh; she likes seeing her smile. And she knows how much Mum smiles when she does things well, so she wants to make her proud.
But she’s scared. Very, very scared. The leaves feel strange to the touch, and Lucía doesn’t want to do it, because although she knows there’s nothing wrong, she doesn’t like the sensation. At times like this, she feels sad. Neither Eri nor Alejandro are like her: they talk and touch everything, they can eat anything and the noise doesn’t bother them. But that’s not the case for her. Loud sounds scare her so much that she has to cover her ears, and there are other noises which, even if they’re quiet, she’d rather not hear – like the way Uncle Viago taps his fingers on the table when he’s angry – he gets angry very often, though not with her – or even hearing her grandmother breathing. She’s actually Baba’s grandmother, but her siblings don’t call her great-grandmother, which is what you’re supposed to say. That irritates her quite a lot too.
Lucía gives Mocha a big hug, just as she does whenever she needs to calm down. Mocha has been with her for as long as she can remember – Mum says since she was born, but she doesn’t remember that – and she likes the way it feels, even though it’s getting a bit worn in places. She doesn’t want to be apart from it, even though she’s terrified of the idea of losing it, but if that happens, Spite will help her. He’s done it before, although when she thanked him, everyone around her stared at her with their eyes wide, wide open. She thought she’d done something wrong, but Mum quickly reassured her and told her, very quietly, that she was a very special girl. She also heard Eri ask Dad why she was talking to someone invisible, and afterwards Baba and Dad asked her siblings to stay after dinner whilst Mum put her to bed. Spite likes it when she calls him ‘Papa Spite’ and often crawls inside Mocha, as if it were a game. Not today, though, because Baba is working, and Spite has to be with him.
Lucía looks around. It’s about to get dark and she hasn’t even tried yet. She tucks Mocha inside her jacket and clings to the railing, trying to cope with the sensation. She moves very carefully, one, two rungs up. She’s going to make it! She climbs another two, and then a few more, feeling more confident. But just as she’s about to grab hold of the next one, she feels a sharp prick in her finger – a very sharp one – which makes her lose her concentration so much that she slips and falls to the ground. She hasn’t hurt herself in the fall – what does ‘hurting oneself’ even mean? She’s never understood it – but she looks at her hand and sees a few drops of blood on her palm, enough to frighten her terribly, and she runs back home.
Mum is on the sofa, reading, but she stops when Lucía comes rushing in, her eyes full of tears. She offers her arms, worried, but doesn’t make a move to pick her up, because she knows Lucía doesn’t always like being touched.
“Do you want to sit with me, ratoncito?” she says, softly. “What’s happened?”
Lucia hugs her very tightly, and Mum lifts her up and sits her on her lap. She shows Mum her bloodied hand. 「I wanted to learn how to climb. To surprise you,」 she explains, pouting, 「but I wasn’t very good at it.」
Mum asks her with her eyes if she can touch her hand, and she nods. Mum’s fingers are gentle and stay away from where it hurts. They tickle her, and when she looks again, the blood has gone and the cut is better.
“You didn’t do it wrong, cariño. That’s just how roses are,” Mum smiles, just the way Lucía likes it. “You’re a very brave little girl, you know? I’m proud of you.”
「Even though I can’t climb? Even though I don’t like talking?」 Lucía had seen the way Grandma and Uncle were looking at her at first, but Dad told them to go off somewhere and left her in peace. She wonders what that ‘somewhere’ might be, but Baba says it’s a very nasty word and children mustn’t say it.
Mum smiles even more broadly and kisses her on the forehead, which makes Lucía laugh in turn and hug her even tighter. “Of course I do, sweetheart,” she hears her murmur. “Always.”