PART 3
Two days later, my younger brother, Andrés, called me. He almost never got involved in family fights, so when I saw his name on the screen, I knew something serious had happened.
“Mariana,” he said quietly, “I found a folder in Mom’s closet.”
He told me he was looking for some of Santiago’s papers when he saw an old box behind some blankets. Inside there were supermarket receipts, pharmacy receipts, tuition payments, internet bills, and even tickets for school shoes. Almost all of them had been paid with my card.
But that was not the worst part.
There was also a notebook where my mother wrote down the household expenses. In one column were Claudia, Andrés, and herself. In another, my name. But next to my name, it did not say “Mariana.” It said: permanent support.
Permanent support.
As if I were not a person. As if I were a source of money, time, and energy that never ran out.
That night, Claudia came to my apartment without warning. She knocked on the door for several minutes. When I opened it, I found her crying, without makeup, holding a paper bag in her hands.
“I found the receipts,” she said. “And I found the notebook.”
I did not invite her to sit down. She came in anyway, but this time not with arrogance, only with shame.
She placed the bag on my table. Inside there was money, not much, but enough to understand that something in her had broken.
“It’s not everything we owe you,” she murmured. “But it’s the first thing I can give you.”
I did not answer.
