Part 4 — Thirteen Years Later, My Former Husband Humiliated Me Publicly, but the Two Boys Who Went Up on Stage Suddenly Erased His Smile

When I heard about the doctor’s disappearance, it was as if the air had vanished from the hall.

My fingers again tightened around the wooden bracelet.

“What does it mean, disappeared?” I asked.

Marisol brought the phone to her ear.

“His car was found behind the hospital. The phone was left inside. He himself is nowhere to be seen.”

Santiago immediately made a call.

“Lawyer, come to the cultural center right now.”

A few seconds later a stern voice sounded in the receiver.

“Mr. Montero, I am no longer handling your case.”

“What do you mean, you are no longer handling it?”

“Your company’s accounts are frozen. I cannot defend a person who concealed the bribery of witnesses and the falsification of documents.”

“That was not my order!”

“But your signature is on the documents.”

The call ended.

Santiago threw the phone so hard that its screen shattered on the floor.

Valeria approached him.

“Santiago, we have to leave.”

“You be quiet.”

“I did everything for you.”

“No. You decided instead of me which child I should know.”

For the first time there was no confidence in his voice. Only fear.

The police officers stepped in front of both of them.

“Mr. Montero, Mrs. Solorzano, please come with us. For now, as witnesses.”

Valeria stepped back.

“I will say nothing without a lawyer.”

“That is your right,” one of the police officers replied. “But everything has already been recorded on camera.”

Santiago’s face changed.

“Which camera?”

Marisol paused the old recording on the screen.

“There was not only one recording in the hospital archive. The sound at the entrance was stored there too.”

She turned on the sound.

Santiago’s own voice sounded, cold and tired.

“If the children survived, Elena can take care of them herself. I chose a new life.”

Everyone in the hall fell silent.

Santiago stared at the screen.

“I did not say it like that…”

“You did,” I said calmly.

“No.”

“That is your voice.”

“I was angry then.”

“And I was alone in the hospital.”

For the first time he heard his own words the way I had heard them that night. He covered his face with his hand. Valeria stood beside him, but now neither of them could touch the other.

Patricio was standing by the stairs of the stage.

“Dad, did you never look for these boys?”

Santiago looked toward him.

“I did not know they existed.”

“But you knew their mother.”

Patricio’s voice was broken.

“You abandoned her too.”

Santiago could not find an answer.

That evening the police took them away. The trial lasted several months. They found the doctor three days later in a small sanatorium, where he was hiding under someone else’s name. He confessed that Valeria had paid him, while Santiago had signed the documents.

Santiago’s company lost its contracts. His name no longer appeared in the newspapers as an example of success. But I did not read these stories with joy.

I only wanted my children never to need to be hidden by anyone again.

In court Santiago gave his share of the property for the children’s education. The judge gave him a suspended sentence, while Valeria received an actual sentence for falsifying documents. Patricio stayed with my boys on the day his mother was led out of the hall.

His eyes were red.

“Can I come home with them?” he asked me.

I thought for a moment.

“If my boys agree.”

Mateo nodded. Daniel smiled slowly.

“There will no longer be three of us,” he said. “There will be four of us.”

That night all four boys sat at the kitchen table at home. There was hot cocoa on the table, while rain knocked on the window.

Santiago sent me a letter later.

“I want us to start over.”

I did not get angry. Nor did I hide.

I replied: “Starting over is impossible. But you can begin taking responsibility. The children will have contact with you only when they themselves want it.”

He wrote to me two more times. In the end he did not write again.

Three months later we moved from the small apartment into a brighter home. I began working at a school as a laboratory assistant. The boys still made pastries for me on Sundays, only now Patricio also poured flour with them and made a mess of the kitchen.

On the first snow, Daniel drew four little figures on the window. Mateo added our house below. Patricio drew a fifth figure beside it, but then erased it and left four again.

“Why did you erase it?” I asked.

“Because now I already know where I am,” he told me.

I could not answer. I only hugged him.

In the evening I placed the wooden-beaded bracelet beside the bed. The one I had worn on my hand for thirteen years. The small crack was still visible, but it no longer seemed like a split to me.

It reminded me that some things break and still continue to exist.

Outside the window, snow was falling quietly.

The laughter of four boys could be heard in the house.

I put the bracelet back on my hand.

This time it was no longer a sign of the past.

It was the sound of life that had returned home.