Mercedes navigates over to the images tab and that’s when we see it. A photo. A photo of a man wearing a khaki vest full of pockets standing on a steep mountainside.

“It’s him,” she says.

Mercedes clicks on the picture. It fills up the whole screen. Below the image, the caption reads Francisco Gómez Flores, June 7.

“That was taken this summer,” I murmur. I try to remember what I might have been doing the day that photo was taken. The day my father stood on that mountain. I think back. School had been out for a week, maybe. I was probably riding my bike with Mai, probably going to buy ice cream cones. It was after I knew my mom was getting married and we were moving to California, but before I really understood that I would have a new life and a new family.

Now I swat away the thought. I push away the memory of that June day getting ice cream cones with Mai and how much I miss my best friend. I push the delete key on the memories and hold it down until they disappear. I concentrate only on the screen. This man. My father.

Mercedes scrolls through one page after another; all the results are images and articles about Francisco Gómez Flores. She clicks the links, some in indecipherable Spanish and some in equally foreign-sounding English.

Indigenous populations and shamanism. Ecodevelopment in Guaviare. Indigenizing methodologies of South American field research. Conceptual reflections of origin mythologies. El ecodesarrollo en regiones indígenas. Investigación de antropológica. La mitología de las culturas indígenas de las montañas.

“Do you understand Spanish?” I ask Mercedes, secretly hoping she doesn’t. My mom thinks it’s funny that I’m half Colombian but can hardly ask where the baño is. I say it’s her fault for not teaching me. When people see my last name, they always ask if I speak Spanish. Or worse: they start talking to me in Spanish and then I just stand there looking dumb.

“Do you?” Mercedes stops scrolling and looks at me, her eyes—my eyes—boring into me. I shake my head. She breaks our stare. “Me neither.”

And still we click and scroll. Spanish, English. Every article mentions Colombia. Santa Marta. Bogotá. Tayrona. Boyacá. Once my mom showed me a magazine featuring photos of Colombia. There were steep green mountains and white beaches. Aqua-blue water and palm trees. Slinking rivers through dense rain forest. “This is where your dad lives,” she had said. “Beautiful, isn’t it?” It was one of the only times she talked about Colombia.

Scroll and click. Our foreheads are nearly touching; her flyaways tickle my cheek. I have no idea what we’re looking for.

Comparative mythology in pre-Columbian societies. Sociopolitical structures of Aracataca peoples. Dichotomy of Indigenous philosophies.

None of the articles are very interesting looking.