Inside, though, something colder is happening.
You keep replaying that dinner in Polanco. Doña Lucía’s red wine lifted like a queen’s scepter. Her voice slicing across the table, calling you too small for her son. Diego laughing. Diego nodding. Diego, who knew even then that your name was propping up debts he had no right to touch. The humiliation no longer feels random. It feels strategic. If they could reduce you to something little enough, maybe you would never realize how much they were standing on your back.