The night was warm, almost like summer, even though the calendar already marked the end of September in Mexico City. Our apartment was crowded with friends—the same people who called themselves “almost family,” drank tequila from our glasses, and always felt entitled to dictate how we should live,crsaid.
I sat by the window, clutching a cup of coffee, hoping it might warm me from the inside out.
And Alejandro… my husband Alejandro, stood in the center of the room, rigid, as if preparing to announce a victory.
—“I’m going to file for divorce,” he said calmly, almost smiling. “I’m tired of pretending that everything is okay between us.”
The room froze.
One of his friends—Fernanda, who always looked at me with thinly veiled disdain—let out a small sigh. Not surprise. Satisfaction. As if she had been waiting for this moment for years.
And his mother… Ms. Patricia—a woman who never hid her belief that I was unworthy of her son—started laughing aloud.
A loud, cruel laugh, like she had just heard the most satisfying gossip of the year.
—“Finally!” she exclaimed, clapping. “I thought you’d be stuck in that cage forever!”
I didn’t move.
I didn’t scream.
I didn’t cry.
I just watched.
At Alejandro.
At his mother.
And at those “friends” who now leaned forward, eager to witness my humiliation as if it were a spectacle.
They expected a scene.
They expected me to break.
They expected him to fall to his knees, begging me to stay.
