It wasn’t that my father was cruel. On the contrary, he spoiled me with gifts all my life. But that was all I received: things. The problem was that I wasn’t her, his firstborn; born in Europe to a Spanish mother. I wasn’t passionate about the land, about those damned cacao beans and chocolate like she was—even from afar. No, I was born in the New Continent; I was the daughter of a mestiza, his second not-so-legal wife and certainly not a full-blooded hidalga. It didn’t matter that I wore the latest fashion or how light my hair was (I washed it with manzanilla tea every other day to keep my blond streaks). It didn’t matter that I married a Frenchman, just to please my father, or that I’d memorized the name of every important wife in París Chiquito. It made no difference how meticulously I ran the kitchen, including my father’s favorite recipes every week: chateaubriand, quiche Florentine, cordon bleu, soufflé, and of course, fish on Fridays, like a good Catholic family. We never skipped the rice, either—a day without rice in this country was like not fixing a complete meal at all.

But none of this mattered.

My father had no time for me. Some days, when he was speaking to Martin, I would wonder if I’d turned invisible. I would start coughing, just to get his attention, but it was often Martin who patted my back without missing a beat in the conversation.

I couldn’t help but glance at Martin as Aquilino continued to read my father’s last wishes with that monotonous drone of his. We were all gathered in the dining room, surrounding my father’s lawyer, elbows resting on the surface of the table, mouths tightly shut. Martin pressed his hands together, his knuckles turning white. The will seemed to be having a similar effect on him as it did on me.

My father never tried to hide the fact that Martin was like the son he always wished Alberto had been. Martin was decisive, stern with the workers, and above all, he shared my father’s passion for the business. Alberto, on the other hand, had been barely audible before joining the seminary. He’d spoken in monosyllables and his days and nights were spent locked in his room with his architecture, theology, and philosophy books. On the rare occasions that we did see him (during meals) he seemed to be transported to another world, and if he spoke, it would be to question things we’d never thought about or had nothing to do with our current conversation. (“Do you think goodness is innate or learned?”)