“Stop fighting!” I shout. “Please, just—stop!”

The shouting and accusations continue despite our pleas. But then Seu Romário stands up and everyone quiets. He walks toward the platter with samples of our cake and reaches for one of the slices. We watch him as he studies the cake and brings it to his mouth.

When Seu Romário takes the first bite, he bursts into tears.

“Father!” Dona Eulalia cries out. She starts fussing over him, but he waves a hand for her to let him speak.

“This is a great homage to an old recipe. I’m proud of you, filho,” he declares, and Pedro’s eyes glisten. I know he’s been waiting so long to hear this. “When I was your age, I once baked a recipe with Julieta. It was the Salt and Sugar cake, the recipe our mothers created together.”

“What?!” Mom exclaims.

“Father! I never knew...” Dona Eulalia says, shocked.

“You think you and Gabriel were the only ones trying to end the feud?” he says to Mom. “Julieta and I tried, too... Our mothers found out. We wanted to run away together, but I couldn’t leave my mother behind. She needed me. She’d done everything she could to raise me, and I couldn’t find the courage to fight for Julieta. And Julieta went back too, and she did her best to regain her mother’s trust. Maybe, after our mothers passed, we could have come together again. We could have said it was all water under the bridge. But it’s hard to swim against so much water. And then Gabriel came along and became involved with you, Alice. When you tried to bake the Salt and Sugar cake with him, I thought it would be heartache all over again.”

Mom’s eyes are bright with angry tears. “If this is true, if you loved my mother and tried to end the feud with her, why did you call Gabriel a traitor? He loved you as if you were his own father! How am I supposed to trust you will respect my daughter and your grandson’s relationship now? That you won’t hurt them, like you hurt Gabriel and me?!” she yells.

“I didn’t want Gabriel to get hurt. I should have listened to him,” Seu Romário says, his voice garbled. “Ever since Julieta passed away, my mind has been in the past, and I keep thinking about Gabriel, how everything would have been different, and he would still be alive, had I accepted you two. Had I not sent him away that night, he would be here now. I regret the way I reacted then. I deeply regret it, Alice. I was the traitor. Not Gabriel. I betrayed his trust when I turned my back on him and you, after I had promised him to be his godfather. I failed to be his family.”