“Did you live in Puebla,” you ask, forcing the words out, “more than thirty years ago?”
Rosa’s face changes.
It is small at first, just a flicker in her cloudy eyes, but then it widens into something fragile and frightened. Her hand trembles in her lap. She studies you as if your face were a door she has spent decades trying to find in the dark.
“How do you know that?” she whispers.
Camila looks from her to you, and you can feel the questions pouring off her like heat from asphalt. She is thirteen, old enough to understand that secrets exist, young enough to still believe they can be solved if you ask the right question. Around you, the city continues its restless sprint, but within that circle of staring strangers, everything has narrowed to this woman’s breathing and your own.
