But inside, all she felt was relief.
She had rid herself of the shame of that ugly dark daughter who would have ruined her reputation.
But time is no fool.
Seven years passed, and nothing. No other child came. No belly grew. No morning sickness. Nothing.
With each visit to the healer, she returned with a new amulet. With every prayer in the hilltop church, she came back more tense. Until one day, Mario himself said, “I’m tired. You lied to me. That girl, are you sure she was born weak?”
“What?” she replied, offended. “Do you think I would kill my own daughter?”
“I didn’t say that.”
“But you thought it. I was the one who suffered, who gave birth, who cried through countless nights. You fell silent.”
This time she truly cried, not for her daughter, but from fear, because the truth was a shadow that occasionally whispered in her ear.
Her mother-in-law, more cruel than ever, did not forgive.
“That woman has a dry womb. I said it. She threw away the blessing and now wants to reap miracles. Never.”
In the village, other women began to distance themselves. Mothers avoided talking about children around her. Children stopped playing when she passed. One day, while drawing water from the well, a girl said loudly, “Look, the woman who lost her baby. They say the river took her. Or maybe the other way around.”
Laughter. Whispers. Humiliation.
Bimbo came home every day with slumped shoulders. At night, she lay beside Mario, who no longer touched her, and whispered to herself. And yes, she would have gone back, but the thought was immediately swallowed by pride, fear, guilt.
Only destiny does not forget.
One day, a little girl appeared in the village carrying leaves, laughing, and helping the elders with a basket of mangoes. Her eyes had a strange brightness, as if they knew too much. Her skin was dark as night, and her smile shone like the sun. No one knew where she had come from, but soon everyone wanted to know who she was.
And Bimbo felt a chill the moment she saw her.
“Who is that girl?” she asked breathlessly.
“We don’t know,” replied Donatau, scratching her chin. “But doesn’t she look like someone?”
Bimbo swallowed hard.
The girl had the same mark on her left cheek, the same little wrinkle on her chin. And when she smiled, the world spun.
“This cannot be,” Bimbo murmured.
But it was.
What came after that would be another chapter in the story, because when you throw a flower into the river thinking it will sink, the river may carry it to a garden that sends it back stronger. And Bimbo was about to reap the seed she had sown, not of love, but of cruelty.
And harvests do not wait for seasons.
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