“With photos of my brother’s wife taken without her consent?”
Esteban doesn’t blink. “I don’t know what’s on there.”
Tomás steps forward. “Don’t.”
The word is
quiet, but it lands.
Esteban turns toward him, adopting practiced injury. “You think I’d do something to Lucía?”
“I think you already have.”
At that moment, your mother appears behind him in the hallway, her robe loosely wrapped, her face tight with confusion. “Why is everyone shouting?”
No one answers immediately.
The room feels like a stage where every actor suddenly becomes aware of the audience. Shame, denial, loyalty, horror—all of it crowds the air. Your mother looks from Tomás’s face to Lucía’s tears to Esteban’s rigid posture and begins
to sense that something has broken, though not yet what.
“What happened?” she asks again.
You say it plainly.
“Esteban has been harassing Lucía.”
The silence that follows is unlike anything your house has ever held.
Your mother’s mouth opens. Closes. Opens again. “No.”
Of course that is her first response.
