La promesa incumplida que convirtió a mi madre en mi mayor enemiga en medio del invierno en Galicia
Part 1
The first time my mother slapped me, snow was falling sideways across the cliffs of Galicia like the sky itself had lost its temper.
Not soft snow. Not the pretty kind from Christmas postcards Americans hang over fireplaces. This was wet, furious Atlantic snow, mixed with rain and wind sharp enough to peel skin off your face. The kind that made old fishermen spit into the sea and say, “Tonight someone’s marriage will break.”
Mine wasn’t a marriage.
It was my life.
“You are not leaving this house for Madrid,” my mother said, standing in the kitchen with her apron still dusted in flour. “And you are certainly not going to America.”
The letter trembled in my hand.
New York University.
Partial scholarship.
Dream accepted.
Future possible.
Behind us, the old radiator coughed like a dying smoker. The soup on the stove boiled too hard, spraying broth across the burner. Somewhere upstairs, my grandfather was yelling at the television because Celta de Vigo had missed another goal.
Everything in that house sounded angry.
“I earned this,” I whispered.
My mother laughed once.
Not because something was funny.
Because something was over.
“You earned?” she snapped. “You earned? You think dreams pay electricity bills? You think your father broke his back at sea so his daughter could run away and become one of those girls who forgets where she came from?”
I should’ve stayed quiet.
Everybody in Galicia knows silence is sometimes the only survival strategy inside a family.
But I was twenty-two, stupid with hope, and carrying a secret I had protected for years.
“Papa wanted me to go.”
The kitchen froze.
Even the soup seemed to stop boiling.
My mother’s face changed instantly, like a curtain falling over a window.
“You don’t speak for your father.”
“He told me before he died.”
That was the mistake.
Not the scholarship.
Not New York.
Not even dreaming bigger than our town.
The mistake was bringing my dead father into the room.
The slap hit so hard my lip cracked against my tooth.
For one second, I tasted blood and salt and old resentment.
Then my mother pointed toward the door with a trembling finger.
“You will bury that fantasy tonight,” she said. “Or you will bury this family with it.”
Outside, the church bells rang through the storm.
In Galicia, bells always sound like warnings.
I remember thinking something absurd at that moment.
Not about the slap.
Not about New York.
Not even about my father.
I remember thinking:
Damn. The soup is going to burn.
That’s the thing nobody tells you about family disasters. Your brain keeps noticing stupid details while your entire life collapses.
The onions smelled sweet.
The window leaked cold air near the sink.
My mother’s left slipper had a hole in it.
And somehow all of that hurt more than the slap itself.
Because ordinary things kept existing while my future died in front of me.
“You promised him,” I said quietly.
My mother stared at me.
Then she did something worse than yelling.
She lowered her voice.
“I promised your father I would protect this family.”
“You promised he wouldn’t trap me here.”
“I promised what needed to be promised.”
That sentence would haunt me for years.
In our town, promises were never sacred. Only appearances were.
And appearances were everything.
Especially for my mother.
Especially after my father drowned.
Our town sat on the Galician coast like an old widow wrapped in gray stone and bad memories. Everybody knew everybody. Everybody talked. Every balcony contained at least one old woman prepared to monitor human activity like a prison guard with knitting needles.
You couldn’t sneeze without six neighbors diagnosing your illness by dinner.
By midnight they’d added pregnancy rumors.
That was Galicia.
Beautiful cliffs.
Beautiful rain.
Beautiful misery.
And my mother ruled our family like a military dictator disguised as a baker.
To outsiders, she was admirable.
Hardworking widow.
Strong Catholic woman.
Runs the bakery alone.
Sacrificed everything for her children.
Inside the house?
Different story.
Inside the house she controlled air itself.
What time we woke up.
What we wore.
Who we spoke to.
What people might think.
Especially me.
My younger brother Mateo escaped most of it because he was born with two magical protections:
He was male.
And he was charming.
Mateo could crash a motorcycle into a church and somehow the priest would apologize to him.
Me?
I once dyed my hair copper-red at seventeen and my mother cried in public like I had joined a satanic cult.
“People will talk,” she kept saying.
People always talked.
One time our neighbor Pilar whispered to my mother for twenty minutes because she saw me laughing with a tourist from Germany near the harbor.
Apparently smiling at foreigners was the first step toward prostitution.
So when the university letter arrived, I already knew the battle waiting for me.
I just didn’t expect war.
“You’re serious?” Mateo asked later that night after my mother locked herself in her bedroom dramatically enough to deserve an Oscar. “You actually applied to New York without telling her?”
We sat in the bakery downstairs after closing. The room smelled like sugar and yeast and burnt coffee. Outside, sleet battered the windows.
I pressed ice against my swollen lip.
“I didn’t tell you either.”
“Yeah, but I’m delightful.”
“You’re an idiot.”
“Also true.”
Mateo leaned against the counter and opened the acceptance letter again.
“Jesus Christ,” he muttered. “New York University. Elena, this is huge.”
Hearing someone say it aloud almost broke me.
Huge.
Yes.
That’s what it was supposed to be.
Not shameful.
Not betrayal.
Not selfish.
Huge.
“I can’t lose this,” I whispered.
Mateo looked toward the ceiling where our mother paced above us.
“You know she’ll never allow it.”
“I’m twenty-two.”
“In this house, you’re twelve.”
That made me laugh despite myself.
A short ugly laugh.
Mateo pointed at me immediately. “See? Mental collapse already starting.”
“Shut up.”
“No seriously, Elena, think about this logically. Mamá still thinks Wi-Fi causes infertility. You’re talking about moving her daughter across the ocean.”
“She promised Papa.”
“Ah,” Mateo sighed. “There it is.”
We both went quiet.
Our father had been dead four years, but mentioning him still rearranged the oxygen in the room.
He drowned during a winter fishing storm.
One moment alive.
One wave.
Gone.
In Galicia, the sea feeds families and destroys them with equal enthusiasm.
My father had been different from my mother in every possible way. Softer. Messier. Funny. The kind of man who danced badly while cleaning sardines just to make his children laugh.
He wanted more for me.
Not because he hated our town.
But because he knew I did.
“You have a brain too big for this place,” he used to tell me.
My mother hated when he said that.
“You make her arrogant,” she’d complain.
“No,” he’d reply. “I make her brave.”
After he died, bravery became illegal in our house.
Mateo folded the letter carefully.
“So what now?”
I stared at the ovens.
The metal surfaces reflected warped versions of us both.
“I go anyway.”
Mateo blinked.
“Oh, fantastic. Excellent plan. Very cinematic. Do you also plan to rob a bank on the way to the airport?”
“I’m serious.”
“So am I. Mamá will hunt you down like Liam Neeson.”
“She can’t stop me.”
Mateo gave me a look so loaded with pity it annoyed me instantly.
“Elena,” he said gently, “she absolutely can.”
And the terrible thing?
He was right.
Because my mother didn’t use force.
She used guilt.
Which was much more effective.
The next morning, the entire town somehow knew.
Of course they did.
I walked into the bakery at six a.m. and old Señor Ventura immediately crossed himself dramatically.
“America!” he shouted. “Madre de Dios. Elena wants to abandon us for hamburgers.”
Three women near the pastry display stared at me like I’d announced plans to join organized crime.
One whispered, loudly enough for me to hear:
“Poor Carmen.”
Carmen.
My mother.
Already the victim.
Amazing efficiency.
I tied my apron on harder than necessary.
“It’s called studying,” I muttered.
Ventura grinned. “Nobody leaves Galicia to study. They leave for love or money.”
“Or because they want to.”
The bakery went silent.
One woman actually gasped.
You would’ve thought I spit on the Virgin Mary.
In small towns, wanting your own life sounds offensive.
My mother emerged from the kitchen carrying fresh bread.
Perfect posture.
Perfect expression.
Perfect martyr.
She didn’t look at me.
That was intentional.
“Oh Elena,” she said sweetly, “could you help Señora Pilar with her order? My daughter is distracted lately.”
There it was.
The performance.
Everyone immediately became uncomfortable in that deliciously nosy way villagers enjoy.
Pilar patted my arm.
“Your mother sacrifices so much for this family,” she said softly.
I nearly laughed in her face.
Not because Pilar was cruel.
Because she genuinely believed she was helping.
That’s how guilt survives for generations. It disguises itself as love.
By noon, I wanted to scream.
Every customer had an opinion.
America is dangerous.
Young women disappear there.
Family matters more than ambition.
Your mother will die from heartbreak.
New York smells like urine.
Why would you leave Galicia when Galicia is paradise?
That last one especially irritated me because it was raining sideways again and our roof literally leaked into the flour storage.
Paradise.
Sure.
At one point my mother placed a tray down beside me and whispered without smiling:
“Look around carefully.”
“What?”
“This town remembers daughters who betray their families.”
I turned toward her slowly.
“You think this is betrayal?”
“I think selfishness always has consequences.”
Before I could answer, the bakery bell rang.
And in walked Diego Álvarez.
Which would’ve been fine.
Except Diego Álvarez had once almost ruined my life.
And judging by the look on his face, he had just heard everything.
Part 2
Diego Álvarez entered the bakery carrying cold air and trouble.
Some people age into respectability.
Diego aged into rumors.
At twenty-seven, he already had the face of a man mothers warned their daughters about while secretly hoping their daughters married someone exactly like him. Broad shoulders. Dark curls always slightly wet from rain. A crooked nose from an old football fight. The permanent expression of somebody one bad decision away from either prison or poetry.
Unfortunately for me, he specialized in both.
The bell above the bakery door jingled once.
Every woman in the shop looked up.
Even my mother straightened slightly.
Diego removed his soaked jacket and grinned.
“Well,” he said. “Looks like I walked into a funeral.”
“Buy bread or leave,” my mother answered immediately.
He pressed a hand dramatically against his chest. “Carmen, your warmth heals me every winter.”
“You still owe me twelve euros.”
“Your memory remains extraordinary.”
The old women nearby snorted into their coffee cups.
That was the dangerous thing about Diego. He made people laugh before they remembered they were supposed to distrust him.
Then his eyes landed on me.
And there it was.
History.
Ugly, complicated history.
“Elena,” he said quietly.
I kept arranging pastries.
“Diego.”
One of the customers practically vibrated with excitement. In small towns, unresolved tension was considered public entertainment.
Diego stepped closer to the counter.
“You look terrible.”
“How romantic.”
“You’ve been crying.”
“You’ve been aging.”
He smiled.
Damn him for smiling.
My mother interrupted instantly.
“She’s emotional because she has forgotten what matters.”
Translation:
Please leave before my daughter remembers she once loved you.
Diego leaned one elbow on the counter.
“Ah,” he said. “So the New York story is true.”
There it was again.
The whole town knew already.
Fantastic.
“People here gossip faster than the internet,” I muttered.
“No,” Diego said. “Faster than disease.”
One old woman gasped at the language.
Another nodded in agreement.
My mother folded her arms tightly.
“My daughter is not going anywhere.”
Diego glanced between us once.
Then he made the fatal mistake of speaking honestly.
“That sounds less like motherhood and more like kidnapping.”
The bakery froze.
I actually stopped breathing.
My mother’s eyes narrowed slowly enough to terrify everyone present.
“Careful,” she said softly.
But Diego had never been careful in his entire life.
“I’m serious, Carmen. Elena earned that scholarship.”
“She earned responsibility here.”
“She earned a future.”
“She has a future.”
“At the bakery?”
“At home.”
Diego looked at me.
Not mocking.
Not pitying.
Just furious on my behalf.
“You want that?” he asked quietly.
Before I could answer, my mother slammed a tray onto the counter so hard the pastries jumped.
“Enough.”
Her voice cracked through the bakery like breaking ice.
“Diego, your opinions are not welcome in this family.”
That should’ve ended it.
A smart man would’ve apologized, grabbed bread, and escaped.
Diego, unfortunately, had the survival instincts of fireworks.
“You mean the same family that blamed Elena for her father’s death?”
Silence.
Complete silence.
I felt the blood drain from my face instantly.
My mother looked like she’d been stabbed.
“Get out,” she whispered.
Nobody moved.
Even the rain outside seemed quieter.
Diego realized too late what he had done.
“Elena—”
“Get out.”
This time my mother screamed it.
The old women nearly levitated from shock.
Diego stared at me one second longer, regret filling his face.
Then he left.
The bell jingled again.
And suddenly every customer in the bakery remembered urgent reasons to disappear elsewhere.
Within thirty seconds, only my mother and I remained.
The ovens hummed.
Rain battered the windows.
My mother stood perfectly still behind the counter.
Then she whispered:
“You told him?”
I swallowed hard.
“No.”
“Then how does he know?”
Because everyone knew.
Because in towns like ours grief becomes public property.
Because four years ago, after my father’s boat disappeared, I said terrible things during the worst night of my life.
Things nobody let me forget.
“I didn’t tell him,” I repeated.
My mother’s face hardened again.
“Of course not,” she said bitterly. “You only told the entire harbor while your father’s body was still missing.”
My chest tightened instantly.
“You know I didn’t mean—”
“You screamed it in front of everyone.”
“I was nineteen!”
“You blamed me.”
“I was grieving!”
“And so was I!”
That exploded out of her unexpectedly.
For one second, real pain appeared beneath all her armor.
Then it vanished again.
My mother turned away quickly and began wiping an already clean counter.
“I should never have allowed you to spend time with Diego again,” she muttered.
I laughed once in disbelief.
“That’s your concern right now?”
“He fills your head with rebellion.”
“No,” I snapped. “You filled my head with rebellion.”
She spun around immediately.
“Everything I have done was for this family.”
“That’s what dictators always say.”
The slap this time never came.
Which somehow felt worse.
My mother stared at me with exhausted disappointment.
“You sound exactly like your father.”
I almost answered:
Good.
Instead I grabbed my coat and left before I said something unforgivable.
Outside, the cold hit like punishment.
The harbor road glistened black beneath sleet and seawater. Fishing boats rocked violently against the docks while gulls screamed overhead like tiny drunk demons.
Galicia in winter never looked welcoming.
It looked haunted.
I walked fast, hands shoved into my pockets, fury boiling hot enough to survive the weather.
Half the town stared openly as I passed.
Of course they did.
By tonight the bakery argument would evolve into twelve different versions.
In one story I’d probably already joined an American cult.
Near the harbor, old men smoked beneath an awning and pretended not to watch me.
“Poor girl,” one murmured.
“Poor mother,” another corrected.
I kept walking.
That was the problem with our town:
nobody minded their own business because they genuinely believed everyone’s life belonged to everyone else.
As I turned near the fish market, a familiar voice called behind me.
“Elena!”
I ignored it.
“Elena, stop walking like you’re fleeing a murder scene.”
I turned slowly.
Diego jogged toward me through freezing rain carrying absolutely no umbrella because apparently pneumonia was part of his personality.
“What?” I snapped.
He stopped a few feet away, breathing hard.
“Your mother wants to kill me.”
“She’ll need to stand in line.”
“I deserved that.”
“Yes.”
Rain dripped from his curls onto his jacket.
For a moment neither of us spoke.
The tension between Diego and me had existed for years because we had once committed the cardinal sin of growing up together.
As teenagers, we were inseparable.
Then at nineteen, I made the catastrophic mistake of sleeping with him during the town festival after too much cheap wine and exactly zero common sense.
Three weeks later, his ex-girlfriend Lucía announced publicly that she was pregnant.
The timing destroyed me.
The gossip nearly killed my mother.
And Diego handled the situation with the emotional intelligence of a collapsing building.
“I never cheated on you,” he insisted afterward.
“We were together for six months!”
“I thought we weren’t serious!”
I threw a glass of sangria at him.
Honestly, fair reaction.
Turned out Lucía wasn’t pregnant after all. She lied because Diego had broken up with her.
Classic small-town disaster.
But by then the damage was done.
My mother banned his name inside the house like he was Voldemort with chest hair.
And yet somehow he kept appearing in my life.
Like mold.
Or taxes.
“You shouldn’t have said that in the bakery,” I muttered.
“I know.”
“She’ll never forgive you.”
“I wasn’t trying to hurt her.”
“You literally accused her of emotionally imprisoning me.”
He considered that.
“Okay, yes, when you say it out loud it sounds aggressive.”
I glared at him.
He rubbed his face with cold hands.
“Elena… are you really going to give up New York?”
The question physically hurt.
“I don’t know.”
“Yes you do.”
“No, I don’t.”
“You’ve wanted this since you were fourteen.”
I stared toward the harbor.
Fishing boats disappeared beneath fog and freezing rain.
“My mother’s alone,” I whispered.
“She has Mateo.”
“Mateo can barely operate a microwave.”
“True.”
“And the bakery—”
“Will survive.”
“You don’t know that.”
“Elena,” Diego said carefully, “your mother survived widowhood. She survived debt. She survived losing your father. She’ll survive you having your own life.”
I looked at him sharply.
“You make it sound simple.”
“It isn’t.”
“Then stop talking like it is.”
Diego sighed.
A truck rattled past us spraying dirty slush onto the curb.
“Do you know why I never left?” he asked suddenly.
I blinked.
“What?”
“I had chances too.”
I almost laughed.
“You? Studying?”
“Please. Even criminals deserve education.”
Despite everything, a smile escaped me.
Diego pointed accusingly. “There. I saw that. Emotional progress.”
“Don’t ruin it.”
He leaned against the harbor railing.
“I got an offer once,” he said quietly. “A construction company in Barcelona.”
“You never told me.”
“Your mother already hated me enough.”
“Why didn’t you go?”
His expression shifted slightly.
Then he shrugged.
“My father got sick.”
Ah.
There it was.
Family.
Always family.
In Galicia, dreams weren’t destroyed dramatically.
They were slowly suffocated by obligation until one day you woke up forty years old defending the same prison that trapped you.
“My mother thinks leaving means betrayal,” I said.
“She’s afraid.”
“She’s controlling.”
“Both can exist.”
I hated when he sounded wise.
It ruined my commitment to being angry at him.
The wind howled harder around us.
Diego shoved his hands into his pockets.
“So what’s the plan?”
“There is no plan.”
“There should probably be a plan.”
“I hate you.”
“Not currently. Your eyebrows say confused sadness.”
I burst out laughing unexpectedly.
A real laugh this time.
Loud enough that two fishermen turned to stare.
Diego grinned triumphantly.
“There she is.”
The warmth lasted maybe three seconds.
Then my phone rang.
Mamá.
Of course.
I stared at the screen.
“She implanted a tracking device in you at birth,” Diego muttered.
I answered reluctantly.
“What?”
“Come home.”
Straight to the point.
“No.”
“Now, Elena.”
“I’m walking.”
“With Diego?”
I shot him a glare.
He mouthed:
Tell her I’m handsome.
“I’m alone,” I lied.
A long silence followed.
Then my mother said something that instantly chilled me harder than the weather.
“Your grandfather collapsed.”
Everything inside me dropped.
“What?”
“He’s conscious now. Just come home.”
The line disconnected.
Diego’s expression changed immediately.
“What happened?”
“My grandfather.”
We were already moving before I finished speaking.
The walk home felt endless.
Rain soaked through my boots. My stomach twisted violently the entire way.
Whatever anger existed between my mother and me vanished instantly beneath older instincts.
Family emergency.
Run first.
Fight later.
That was Galicia too.
When we reached the bakery, Mateo burst through the door looking pale.
“He’s okay,” he said quickly. “Well… okay-ish.”
I pushed past him upstairs.
My grandfather sat in bed wrapped in blankets, looking deeply offended by mortality itself.
“The doctor says stress,” Mateo whispered.
“Stress?” my grandfather barked. “The doctor is an idiot.”
“You fainted.”
“I sat down aggressively.”
Typical.
The old man noticed Diego behind me and pointed immediately.
“You still alive?”
“Against medical expectations,” Diego answered.
“Good.”
My mother appeared in the hallway carrying tea.
The second she saw Diego, her expression soured.
“What is he doing here?”
“I brought Elena back,” Diego said calmly.
“We managed transportation before your existence.”
Mateo stepped between them instantly.
“Fantastic energy everyone. Very healthy atmosphere for Grandpa’s heart.”
My grandfather snorted.
“Your mother’s face is worse for my heart than cholesterol.”
“Miguel,” my mother warned.
“No, let me die honestly.”
I almost laughed despite the tension.
That was my grandfather’s gift: weaponized sarcasm.
Unlike my mother, he never hid what he felt.
Unfortunately, what he felt most often was irritation.
He motioned me closer.
“You crying again?”
“No.”
“Good. Crying gives your grandmother headaches.”
“She’s been dead ten years.”
“Still dramatic.”
Diego covered his mouth to hide a laugh.
My mother noticed.
“Enough comedy,” she snapped. “Everyone out. Papá needs rest.”
But my grandfather suddenly grabbed my wrist.
“No,” he said. “Elena stays.”
My mother stiffened.
“Papá—”
“You too, Carmen.”
Uh oh.
Even Mateo recognized the danger instantly.
“I should go check… literally anything downstairs,” he announced before disappearing.
Coward.
Diego started backing away too.
But my grandfather pointed at him suddenly.
“You stay.”
Now everyone looked alarmed.
“What?” my mother protested.
“You heard me.”
The old man adjusted himself slowly against the pillows, breathing harder than usual.
Age had weakened his body but sharpened his bluntness.
He looked directly at my mother.
“You are repeating your mistakes.”
The room went cold.
My mother’s jaw tightened immediately.
“This is not the time.”
“It is exactly the time.”
“Papá—”
“You trapped yourself here after my wife died,” he continued. “Now you want Elena trapped too.”
“That’s unfair.”
“No,” he snapped. “What’s unfair is demanding sacrifice from your daughter because you regret your own life.”
The silence afterward felt enormous.
I stared at my grandfather in shock.
My mother looked like she might either scream or collapse.
“You know nothing about my life,” she whispered.
“I know everything about it. I watched you bury yourself alive after Javier died.”
Mentioning my father nearly shattered her composure completely.
“I did what I had to do.”
“No,” my grandfather said softly. “You did what was easier than grieving.”
My mother’s eyes filled instantly.
I had never seen anyone speak to her like that.
Ever.
Even Diego looked uncomfortable now.
“Papá…”
“You loved that man so much,” my grandfather continued quietly. “And when he died, you turned fear into control.”
A tear slid down my mother’s face before she angrily wiped it away.
“I will not discuss this in front of them.”
“Why? They already live inside it.”
Nobody moved.
Rain hammered the windows harder.
The radiator hissed.
My grandfather looked at me next.
“Your father wanted you gone from this town by twenty-five.”
My throat closed instantly.
My mother shut her eyes.
“He told me,” my grandfather said. “Many times.”
“Miguel, stop.”
“He knew this place was too small for her.”
“He also loved this family!”
“Yes,” my grandfather barked. “Enough to want better for her.”
My mother suddenly stood.
“I can’t do this.”
Then she walked out.
Not dramatic.
Not angry.
Broken.
Which somehow felt far worse.
The bedroom remained silent for several seconds after she left.
Then my grandfather sighed deeply.
“Well,” he muttered, “that went poorly.”
Diego burst into helpless laughter first.
I covered my face.
And for the first time in years, I realized something terrifying:
Maybe my mother wasn’t just controlling.
Maybe she was drowning.
And maybe she’d been drowning since the day my father died.
Part 3
Diego Álvarez entered the bakery carrying cold air and trouble.
Some people age into respectability.
Diego aged into rumors.
At twenty-seven, he already had the face of a man mothers warned their daughters about while secretly hoping their daughters married someone exactly like him. Broad shoulders. Dark curls always slightly wet from rain. A crooked nose from an old football fight. The permanent expression of somebody one bad decision away from either prison or poetry.
Unfortunately for me, he specialized in both.
The bell above the bakery door jingled once.
Every woman in the shop looked up.
Even my mother straightened slightly.
Diego removed his soaked jacket and grinned.
“Well,” he said. “Looks like I walked into a funeral.”
“Buy bread or leave,” my mother answered immediately.
He pressed a hand dramatically against his chest. “Carmen, your warmth heals me every winter.”
“You still owe me twelve euros.”
“Your memory remains extraordinary.”
The old women nearby snorted into their coffee cups.
That was the dangerous thing about Diego. He made people laugh before they remembered they were supposed to distrust him.
Then his eyes landed on me.
And there it was.
History.
Ugly, complicated history.
“Elena,” he said quietly.
I kept arranging pastries.
“Diego.”
One of the customers practically vibrated with excitement. In small towns, unresolved tension was considered public entertainment.
Diego stepped closer to the counter.
“You look terrible.”
“How romantic.”
“You’ve been crying.”
“You’ve been aging.”
He smiled.
Damn him for smiling.
My mother interrupted instantly.
“She’s emotional because she has forgotten what matters.”
Translation:
Please leave before my daughter remembers she once loved you.
Diego leaned one elbow on the counter.
“Ah,” he said. “So the New York story is true.”
There it was again.
The whole town knew already.
Fantastic.
“People here gossip faster than the internet,” I muttered.
“No,” Diego said. “Faster than disease.”
One old woman gasped at the language.
Another nodded in agreement.
My mother folded her arms tightly.
“My daughter is not going anywhere.”
Diego glanced between us once.
Then he made the fatal mistake of speaking honestly.
“That sounds less like motherhood and more like kidnapping.”
The bakery froze.
I actually stopped breathing.
My mother’s eyes narrowed slowly enough to terrify everyone present.
“Careful,” she said softly.
But Diego had never been careful in his entire life.
“I’m serious, Carmen. Elena earned that scholarship.”
“She earned responsibility here.”
“She earned a future.”
“She has a future.”
“At the bakery?”
“At home.”
Diego looked at me.
Not mocking.
Not pitying.
Just furious on my behalf.
“You want that?” he asked quietly.
Before I could answer, my mother slammed a tray onto the counter so hard the pastries jumped.
“Enough.”
Her voice cracked through the bakery like breaking ice.
“Diego, your opinions are not welcome in this family.”
That should’ve ended it.
A smart man would’ve apologized, grabbed bread, and escaped.
Diego, unfortunately, had the survival instincts of fireworks.
“You mean the same family that blamed Elena for her father’s death?”
Silence.
Complete silence.
I felt the blood drain from my face instantly.
My mother looked like she’d been stabbed.
“Get out,” she whispered.
Nobody moved.
Even the rain outside seemed quieter.
Diego realized too late what he had done.
“Elena—”
“Get out.”
This time my mother screamed it.
The old women nearly levitated from shock.
Diego stared at me one second longer, regret filling his face.
Then he left.
The bell jingled again.
And suddenly every customer in the bakery remembered urgent reasons to disappear elsewhere.
Within thirty seconds, only my mother and I remained.
The ovens hummed.
Rain battered the windows.
My mother stood perfectly still behind the counter.
Then she whispered:
“You told him?”
I swallowed hard.
“No.”
“Then how does he know?”
Because everyone knew.
Because in towns like ours grief becomes public property.
Because four years ago, after my father’s boat disappeared, I said terrible things during the worst night of my life.
Things nobody let me forget.
“I didn’t tell him,” I repeated.
My mother’s face hardened again.
“Of course not,” she said bitterly. “You only told the entire harbor while your father’s body was still missing.”
My chest tightened instantly.
“You know I didn’t mean—”
“You screamed it in front of everyone.”
“I was nineteen!”
“You blamed me.”
“I was grieving!”
“And so was I!”
That exploded out of her unexpectedly.
For one second, real pain appeared beneath all her armor.
Then it vanished again.
My mother turned away quickly and began wiping an already clean counter.
“I should never have allowed you to spend time with Diego again,” she muttered.
I laughed once in disbelief.
“That’s your concern right now?”
“He fills your head with rebellion.”
“No,” I snapped. “You filled my head with rebellion.”
She spun around immediately.
“Everything I have done was for this family.”
“That’s what dictators always say.”
The slap this time never came.
Which somehow felt worse.
My mother stared at me with exhausted disappointment.
“You sound exactly like your father.”
I almost answered:
Good.
Instead I grabbed my coat and left before I said something unforgivable.
Outside, the cold hit like punishment.
The harbor road glistened black beneath sleet and seawater. Fishing boats rocked violently against the docks while gulls screamed overhead like tiny drunk demons.
Galicia in winter never looked welcoming.
It looked haunted.
I walked fast, hands shoved into my pockets, fury boiling hot enough to survive the weather.
Half the town stared openly as I passed.
Of course they did.
By tonight the bakery argument would evolve into twelve different versions.
In one story I’d probably already joined an American cult.
Near the harbor, old men smoked beneath an awning and pretended not to watch me.
“Poor girl,” one murmured.
“Poor mother,” another corrected.
I kept walking.
That was the problem with our town:
nobody minded their own business because they genuinely believed everyone’s life belonged to everyone else.
As I turned near the fish market, a familiar voice called behind me.
“Elena!”
I ignored it.
“Elena, stop walking like you’re fleeing a murder scene.”
I turned slowly.
Diego jogged toward me through freezing rain carrying absolutely no umbrella because apparently pneumonia was part of his personality.
“What?” I snapped.
He stopped a few feet away, breathing hard.
“Your mother wants to kill me.”
“She’ll need to stand in line.”
“I deserved that.”
“Yes.”
Rain dripped from his curls onto his jacket.
For a moment neither of us spoke.
The tension between Diego and me had existed for years because we had once committed the cardinal sin of growing up together.
As teenagers, we were inseparable.
Then at nineteen, I made the catastrophic mistake of sleeping with him during the town festival after too much cheap wine and exactly zero common sense.
Three weeks later, his ex-girlfriend Lucía announced publicly that she was pregnant.
The timing destroyed me.
The gossip nearly killed my mother.
And Diego handled the situation with the emotional intelligence of a collapsing building.
“I never cheated on you,” he insisted afterward.
“We were together for six months!”
“I thought we weren’t serious!”
I threw a glass of sangria at him.
Honestly, fair reaction.
Turned out Lucía wasn’t pregnant after all. She lied because Diego had broken up with her.
Classic small-town disaster.
But by then the damage was done.
My mother banned his name inside the house like he was Voldemort with chest hair.
And yet somehow he kept appearing in my life.
Like mold.
Or taxes.
“You shouldn’t have said that in the bakery,” I muttered.
“I know.”
“She’ll never forgive you.”
“I wasn’t trying to hurt her.”
“You literally accused her of emotionally imprisoning me.”
He considered that.
“Okay, yes, when you say it out loud it sounds aggressive.”
I glared at him.
He rubbed his face with cold hands.
“Elena… are you really going to give up New York?”
The question physically hurt.
“I don’t know.”
“Yes you do.”
“No, I don’t.”
“You’ve wanted this since you were fourteen.”
I stared toward the harbor.
Fishing boats disappeared beneath fog and freezing rain.
“My mother’s alone,” I whispered.
“She has Mateo.”
“Mateo can barely operate a microwave.”
“True.”
“And the bakery—”
“Will survive.”
“You don’t know that.”
“Elena,” Diego said carefully, “your mother survived widowhood. She survived debt. She survived losing your father. She’ll survive you having your own life.”
I looked at him sharply.
“You make it sound simple.”
“It isn’t.”
“Then stop talking like it is.”
Diego sighed.
A truck rattled past us spraying dirty slush onto the curb.
“Do you know why I never left?” he asked suddenly.
I blinked.
“What?”
“I had chances too.”
I almost laughed.
“You? Studying?”
“Please. Even criminals deserve education.”
Despite everything, a smile escaped me.
Diego pointed accusingly. “There. I saw that. Emotional progress.”
“Don’t ruin it.”
He leaned against the harbor railing.
“I got an offer once,” he said quietly. “A construction company in Barcelona.”
“You never told me.”
“Your mother already hated me enough.”
“Why didn’t you go?”
His expression shifted slightly.
Then he shrugged.
“My father got sick.”
Ah.
There it was.
Family.
Always family.
In Galicia, dreams weren’t destroyed dramatically.
They were slowly suffocated by obligation until one day you woke up forty years old defending the same prison that trapped you.
“My mother thinks leaving means betrayal,” I said.
“She’s afraid.”
“She’s controlling.”
“Both can exist.”
I hated when he sounded wise.
It ruined my commitment to being angry at him.
The wind howled harder around us.
Diego shoved his hands into his pockets.
“So what’s the plan?”
“There is no plan.”
“There should probably be a plan.”
“I hate you.”
“Not currently. Your eyebrows say confused sadness.”
I burst out laughing unexpectedly.
A real laugh this time.
Loud enough that two fishermen turned to stare.
Diego grinned triumphantly.
“There she is.”
The warmth lasted maybe three seconds.
Then my phone rang.
Mamá.
Of course.
I stared at the screen.
“She implanted a tracking device in you at birth,” Diego muttered.
I answered reluctantly.
“What?”
“Come home.”
Straight to the point.
“No.”
“Now, Elena.”
“I’m walking.”
“With Diego?”
I shot him a glare.
He mouthed:
Tell her I’m handsome.
“I’m alone,” I lied.
A long silence followed.
Then my mother said something that instantly chilled me harder than the weather.
“Your grandfather collapsed.”
Everything inside me dropped.
“What?”
“He’s conscious now. Just come home.”
The line disconnected.
Diego’s expression changed immediately.
“What happened?”
“My grandfather.”
We were already moving before I finished speaking.
The walk home felt endless.
Rain soaked through my boots. My stomach twisted violently the entire way.
Whatever anger existed between my mother and me vanished instantly beneath older instincts.
Family emergency.
Run first.
Fight later.
That was Galicia too.
When we reached the bakery, Mateo burst through the door looking pale.
“He’s okay,” he said quickly. “Well… okay-ish.”
I pushed past him upstairs.
My grandfather sat in bed wrapped in blankets, looking deeply offended by mortality itself.
“The doctor says stress,” Mateo whispered.
“Stress?” my grandfather barked. “The doctor is an idiot.”
“You fainted.”
“I sat down aggressively.”
Typical.
The old man noticed Diego behind me and pointed immediately.
“You still alive?”
“Against medical expectations,” Diego answered.
“Good.”
My mother appeared in the hallway carrying tea.
The second she saw Diego, her expression soured.
“What is he doing here?”
“I brought Elena back,” Diego said calmly.
“We managed transportation before your existence.”
Mateo stepped between them instantly.
“Fantastic energy everyone. Very healthy atmosphere for Grandpa’s heart.”
My grandfather snorted.
“Your mother’s face is worse for my heart than cholesterol.”
“Miguel,” my mother warned.
“No, let me die honestly.”
I almost laughed despite the tension.
That was my grandfather’s gift: weaponized sarcasm.
Unlike my mother, he never hid what he felt.
Unfortunately, what he felt most often was irritation.
He motioned me closer.
“You crying again?”
“No.”
“Good. Crying gives your grandmother headaches.”
“She’s been dead ten years.”
“Still dramatic.”
Diego covered his mouth to hide a laugh.
My mother noticed.
“Enough comedy,” she snapped. “Everyone out. Papá needs rest.”
But my grandfather suddenly grabbed my wrist.
“No,” he said. “Elena stays.”
My mother stiffened.
“Papá—”
“You too, Carmen.”
Uh oh.
Even Mateo recognized the danger instantly.
“I should go check… literally anything downstairs,” he announced before disappearing.
Coward.
Diego started backing away too.
But my grandfather pointed at him suddenly.
“You stay.”
Now everyone looked alarmed.
“What?” my mother protested.
“You heard me.”
The old man adjusted himself slowly against the pillows, breathing harder than usual.
Age had weakened his body but sharpened his bluntness.
He looked directly at my mother.
“You are repeating your mistakes.”
The room went cold.
My mother’s jaw tightened immediately.
“This is not the time.”
“It is exactly the time.”
“Papá—”
“You trapped yourself here after my wife died,” he continued. “Now you want Elena trapped too.”
“That’s unfair.”
“No,” he snapped. “What’s unfair is demanding sacrifice from your daughter because you regret your own life.”
The silence afterward felt enormous.
I stared at my grandfather in shock.
My mother looked like she might either scream or collapse.
“You know nothing about my life,” she whispered.
“I know everything about it. I watched you bury yourself alive after Javier died.”
Mentioning my father nearly shattered her composure completely.
“I did what I had to do.”
“No,” my grandfather said softly. “You did what was easier than grieving.”
My mother’s eyes filled instantly.
I had never seen anyone speak to her like that.
Ever.
Even Diego looked uncomfortable now.
“Papá…”
“You loved that man so much,” my grandfather continued quietly. “And when he died, you turned fear into control.”
A tear slid down my mother’s face before she angrily wiped it away.
“I will not discuss this in front of them.”
“Why? They already live inside it.”
Nobody moved.
Rain hammered the windows harder.
The radiator hissed.
My grandfather looked at me next.
“Your father wanted you gone from this town by twenty-five.”
My throat closed instantly.
My mother shut her eyes.
“He told me,” my grandfather said. “Many times.”
“Miguel, stop.”
“He knew this place was too small for her.”
“He also loved this family!”
“Yes,” my grandfather barked. “Enough to want better for her.”
My mother suddenly stood.
“I can’t do this.”
Then she walked out.
Not dramatic.
Not angry.
Broken.
Which somehow felt far worse.
The bedroom remained silent for several seconds after she left.
Then my grandfather sighed deeply.
“Well,” he muttered, “that went poorly.”
Diego burst into helpless laughter first.
I covered my face.
And for the first time in years, I realized something terrifying:
Maybe my mother wasn’t just controlling.
Maybe she was drowning.
And maybe she’d been drowning since the day my father died.
