Dolores wakes up to find a weight on her stomach.
It was Antonio, who'd fallen asleep after all his crying.
Dolores carefully lays him on her bed and gets up to go shower, before waking up Antonio and allowing him to brush his teeth & help him shower.
The two leave Dolores's room and get confronted by their Madre, who was wondering where Antonio had gone.
The two look at each other and Dolores answers quickly.
"Antonio wanted to sleep in my room because he was scared I'd disappear too." Dolores lies, and Pepa believes it since she wasn't one to lie.
Once she leaves, Antonio looks at his Hermana, confused.
"But that's not what-" he begins.
"Shhh" Dolores puts a finger to her mouth.
"Oh...Kay..."
The two head down the stairs to eat breakfast, and Casita helps them down whenever they stumble.
Breakfast is awkward and quiet, with everyone staring at Camilo like if they looked away he'd disappear again.
Dolores finishes her breakfast and quietly puts it in the sink, before leaving to find something to do. She couldn't go outside since the ground was still wet, and she can't really investigate Camilo, since he was still eating (though not much, he probably hadn't eaten a thing in a while.)
So, of course, she just walks around, bored.
Eventually, everyone's done eating and Mirabel does her chores around the home, so Dolores tries to focus her hearing on Camilo most of the day, only ever stopping when she has a chore from Abuela.
Eventually, she hears Camilo's voice, and Mirabel's too.
!! TW GASLIGHTING!!
NOTE: Nobody should behave in the manner displayed my Camilo, and if you see that, try to intervene. Okay???
"Let's play the game from yesterday!" Camilo exclaims excitedly.
"I...I don't know Camilo, it wasn't that...fun." Mirabel sighs, but Camilo ignores her.
"I'll go first." Dolores contemplates listening and eventually decides that she should so if it gets out of hand she can intervene.
Or so she thinks. She wasn't going to intervene. She wasn't going to do a single thing.
After all, she never did before.
Dolores listens as they play their "game" and as Camilo leaves, heading down the stairs. Dolores looks away to look as if she was doing something else, and Camilo thinks nothing of it.
Dolores goes upstairs, acting as if she just came out her room and didn't hear a thing, to check on Mirabel.
She knocks on the door to the nursery and Mirabel quickly opens it for her, a fake smile plastered on her face.
"Dolores? Hey!" She waves.
The two girls sit down on the bed and talk, and Dolores tries to talk about what was going on between her and Camilo, but Mirabel always changes the topic.
"I've noticed you and Camilo have been talking a lot. Wanna talk about it?" Dolores asks quietly.
"Oh it's nothing- just some cousin-catching up- ah haha!" Mirabel's voice shakes nervously.
"Okay..." She accepts her prima's answer.
She should've done more.
Much, much more.
— f a l s e —
Camilo stares into the darkness, too scared to move. He can see familiar shadows move around but when he goes to see them they vanish.
He can hear various whispers and so he covers his ears, but that just makes them louder.
He hears footsteps but he doesn't move an inch.
"Oh Camilo! We should finally talk properly." A voice that sounds just like his gets his attention, and he looks up to find Carlos, standing a foot taller than usual with black scleras and Maroon irises. Their pupils were the and their hair was curly yet it didn't bounce up the way it used to. His hair was also black, almost invisible due to the black void surrounding them.
Camilo can see black inky tattoo-like markings all over, and he realizes where he's seen that before.
This thing standing before him.
Was him.
"Missed me?"
For the first time, no witty remarks escape Camilo's mouth. Just silence and a hateful yet terrified glare.
— f a l s e —
It'd been a week since Camilo had come back, and a week until Antonio's gift ceremony.
Despite this, Antonio felt nothing but sinking despair- something NO 4-year-old should feel.
Everyone seemed to notice but brushed it off as a fear of not getting a gift- and while that was sort of true, it wasn't what bothered him most. Their ignorance was driving him mad and he would've told the truth had Dolores not asked him to keep it a secret.
Antonio sighs as he watches Mirabel lay in bed miserably. Every day for the past week, her self-esteem had been dropping (though, from what Antonio could tell, she wasn't that happy about herself in the first place.)
He had tried to cheer her up, yet she only dismissed him.
"Go talk with Camilo or Dolores. You don't need my bad luck..." She curls up in bed.
He agreed only because his Prima hated pity.
He did too.
Walking up to Dolores, he finds her listening to something with shock.
"I KNEW IT! SHE WAS HIS AUNT!" Dolores whispers in surprise (though it must've been loud for her.)
"Who?" Antonio asks in confusion.
"No one!" Dolores turns around quickly.
"Oh...kay..." Dolores notices how sad Antonio is.
"What's wrong?" She asks concerned for her hermano.
"Mirabel is sadder now. She won't talk to me!" He would shout, but Dolores's flinching reminds him to lower his voice.
Dolores doesn't know what to do, so she tries the only thing she knows to do.
Try to separate the two.
"ክዐፕ ል ርዘነክርቿ..."
YOU ARE READING
F a l s i f i e d
FanfictionIt's been forever since anyone last saw Camilo. He's stayed in his room as much as possible, staring blankly into one of the various mirrors in his room. If he left, it was brief and he did whatever he had to get back to his room as quickly as possi...
