PART 1
“Miss Valeria, an eleven-year-old boy just said you’re his emergency mom.”
The call came in at 11:38 p.m., right when I was standing in my kitchen in the Portales neighborhood of Mexico City, eating cereal straight from the box because I didn’t even have the energy to heat up some tortillas. I barely answered. At that hour, an unknown number could only be a debt collector, spam, or some coworker from the agency forgetting I had a life too.
But I answered.
“Am I speaking with Miss Valeria Mendoza?” a woman asked in a serious voice.
“Yes, this is she.”
“We’re calling from San Gabriel General Hospital. We have a minor here. He had your name listed as an emergency contact.”
I let out a nervous laugh, one of those laughs that comes out when your body doesn’t know whether to be scared or laugh.
“That’s impossible. I’m thirty-two years old, single, and I don’t have children.”
There was silence on the other end. Then I heard papers rustling.
“The boy’s name is Diego. He says you have to come.”
I felt a strange chill run down my spine.
“Diego who?”
“Diego Salgado. He was admitted after a car accident on Calzada de Tlalpan. He’s conscious, with a broken wrist and a head injury. He doesn’t want to talk to anyone else. He’s only asking for you.”
I leaned against the kitchen counter.
“There must be some mistake. I don’t know any Diego Salgado.”
“The police found a card in his backpack. It has his full name, phone number, and address.”
I stopped breathing for a second.
I could have hung up. I could have told them to call child protection services, the police, anyone. But a part of me was stuck on that sentence: a boy in a hospital bed asking for me.
Twenty-five minutes later, I walked into San Gabriel Hospital with wet hair, wearing sneakers without socks, my heart pounding in my throat. A nurse named Maribel greeted me at admissions.
“Thank you for coming,” she said. “Before we go in, I need to ask you something. Do you recognize the name Clara Salgado?”
My world shifted.
I hadn’t heard that name in twelve years.
Clara had been my best friend in college. My roommate. My chosen sister. And also the person who cut me out of her life after a horrible night, an accusation no one wanted to believe, and a silence that became a wall.
“Yes,” I whispered. “I knew her.”
Maribel lowered her voice.
“Diego says she’s his mother.”
I had to hold onto the counter.
I walked behind the nurse down a cold hallway, smelling of bleach, burnt coffee, and fear. In room twelve, a small boy sat on the bed, his wrist bandaged and his lip split. His black hair plastered to his forehead, his face pale, and his eyes pierced me the moment I walked in.
Eyes that were all too familiar.
For a few seconds, no one spoke.
Then he whispered:
“Valeria?”
I swallowed.
“Yes.”
His chin trembled.
“My mom said that if anything bad happened, I should look for the woman with two eyes.”
I felt my legs buckle.
“The woman with two eyes?”
Diego nodded, clutching the sheet with his good hand.
“She said you were the only one who ever saw her completely.”
And in that instant, I understood that Clara hadn’t forgotten me.
I couldn’t believe what was about to happen…
