The rain fell like a divine sentence over the dark, lonely highway on the outskirts of Medellín. It wasn’t a gentle drizzle, but a furious storm pounding the asphalt with violence, mirroring the chaos reigning in Valentina’s heart. There she was—a white, ghostlike figure outlined against the immensity of the night—kneeling beside the trunk of a centuries-old ceiba tree. Her wedding dress, which hours earlier had symbolized purity and hope, was now torn, soaked in mud, and weighed on her body like lead. But what kept her anchored to the ground was not the weight of the wet fabric—it was the two small bundles she clutched to her chest with primal desperation.
Two babies. Two helpless little girls crying in competition with the thunder.
