To me, my mother’s passivity was even more unforgivable than my father’s outbursts. Really, I forgave him for everything and loved him all the more. Because my father was also that other person, the one you could play dominoes and blackjack with. The one who took me to swim class on Saturday mornings and watched me the whole hour from the little window that looked over the heated pool at the YMCA. My father was the one who went with me to the swings at the playground, and on long bike rides from one neighborhood to another. He was the one who read me strange stories from the religion he practiced. The one who challenged me to figure out the combination to his briefcase in exchange for something of his that I wanted to use for a while, like a tool or a funny tie printed with a Bugs Bunny pattern. With orange-chirimoya ice cream in hand, we could take walks through the streets while he talked to me about subjects that I considered deep and interesting, like how “learning to breathe is learning to live . . .” My father was the one who, unlike my mother, took me seriously, treated me with respect, and placed the demands on me that one places on an equal.

But I’m sure I had a distraught expression on my face, because as we walked, Caro’s mom asked me if my parents were very strict. I nodded, my head down. “Don’t you worry,” she said. “I’ll take care of everything. You want to keep coming over to our house, right?”

Her name was Raquel and she told me she worked downtown but didn’t like it, and she was taking a class in hair removal so she could set up her own salon.

“I practice on my friends and on myself. Carolina doesn’t let me touch her, but if you want, we can try one day . . . Let’s see, how are those eyebrows?” she said, smiling, and she came close to peer at my face.

She also told me that she’d lived with Caro for only a short time. She explained it all to me in detail. She had two children, Felipito and Carolita, but she hadn’t gotten married, she’d only lived with the kids’ dad—that’s how she referred to him—for a couple of months, and then she left with them. She’d had money problems and had to leave them at her mother’s house for a while, and when their father found out, he had brought them to live with him. Not long ago they’d come to an agreement: he would keep Felipito, and she would keep Carolita.

She was relaxed and cheerful as she spoke, and her lips and laughing eyes gave me the impression that everything she said was half in jest. I liked her, but I also was uncomfortable with her telling me things that I considered private—I wasn’t used to an adult talking to me in such a friendly and intimate manner.