I stand at the doorway, giving myself a moment before I ring the doorbell. What will I find when the door is open? I’ve searched for months, and now is the end. Secretly, I hope that the girl who opens the door is like her. My Sarita. My wise owl. My baby girl. I swallow my fear and ring the doorbell.
I hear footsteps coming to open the door. My heart is beating faster than it ever has before, in sixty years of life. The door opens.
When I see who it is, all I feel is everything crumble. Everything, I worked for, for months. Every hope I have had in the last ten years. Because this is not the granddaughter I dreamt of. This is a demon. I collapse onto the sidewalk.
“Oh, my Sarita,” I whisper.
The girl who opens the door has blond hair. Sarita’s was black. But the hair is not what scares me about this girl. It is the eyes. A pale, calculating blue color, that would discern any secret you tried to hide, a blue that kills dreams. An evil color. Those where the color of his eyes. He took my Sarita away from me without blinking.
My Sarita had skin the color of rich chocolate, shiny black hair, big caramel eyes, and would flash a smile that made you think of twinkling stars. She was so strong when that horrible boy, with the icy blue eyes left her, pregnant. When she got sick, she died, instead of giving up her baby. And now that child stands before me, and she is like him. With those horrible eyes.
I sit on the sidewalk, sobbing. Then I hear a voice, that warms my heart and melts it. It is my Sarita’s voice.
“Hey, umm, what’s wrong?” says the voice. It is filled with compassion. I look up and see the child. She doesn’t seem so bad anymore.
“Sit.” I tell her. The girl sits down and looks at me questioningly. I dry my tears and begin. “I’m going to tell you a story. This is the story of a wonderful girl named Sarita. She was a wise, and brave at heart. She was so special, she made her very own mother feel young again. But of course, when this girl was fifteen, she fell in love.”
The girl smiles at me. “Was it true love?” she asks.
“No.The boy who she fell in love with was a monster. He had awful, calculating blue eyes. When Sarita got pregnant, he left her. Then Sarita got sick. She had to chose if to keep the baby and die, or kill it and live. She chose to die herself.”
The girl looks sad and a little shocked. “Sarita dies?” I feel momentarily bad for ruining her perfect fairy tale, but then I look at those cold blue eyes. She has to know what her father did to Sarita.
“She died, but left behind a child who she loved more than anything else. Before she died she told her mother to find that child, who had been adopted by a very nice couple. Every night, the mother would watch her dream of finding her grandchild shift and billow at an unreachable distance. How would she ever get to it? But one day she did. What she found surprised her. Her granddaughter looked like him, that horrible boy who stole away Sarita.” I look at the child to see her reaction. I’m surprised to find a thoughtful look on her face. I wait for her to respond, but she says nothing. She stares at a crack in the sidewalk and watches ants crawl in and out of it. Eventually she speaks.
“You’re the mother aren’t you?” she asks. “And if you're the mother, then I’m your granddaughter.” She watches me waiting for a response.
One thought whirls around my head over and over again. How does she know? How could she figure it out? I stare at her. Slowly and deliberately I nod my head.
“I don’t think you should hate my father or me. My father was just a scared teenager, he was never as strong as Sarita. As for me, you don’t even know me. How can you hate me?” She says all this so sadly, it scares me.
Then it dawns on me. She is a wise owl. She is like my Sarita. I feel like a kindergartener explaining to my mother why I hate somebody. “You’re right. You’re absolutely right.” I say. I take my granddaughters hand, ready to meet the future with an open embrace.



THE END