I GAVE BIRTH AT FORTY-ONE, AND MY HUSBAND LEFT ME FOR AN EIGHTEEN-YEAR-OLD… FIFTEEN YEARS LATER, OUR SON SHATTERED HIS PRIDE IN THREE SECONDS

And cried only after Mateo was asleep.

But somehow we made it.

Every birthday, I baked his cake myself.

Every school play, I sat in the front row.

Every scraped knee, every report card, every nightmare, every victory.

I was there.

Andrés wasn’t.

Occasionally he would send a gift.

An expensive watch.

A gaming console.