La Llorona was more blood than bones, bloated and red. The children called her bruja and sang cruel chants when they saw her on the river-banks, drowned and sobbing, called her puta and made fun of her swollen belly and puffy eyes. She was a vagabunda – that’s what they liked to call the ghosts that haunted the river-banks, and the abuleos called to them <> Told La Llorona that what she needed was a child to fill her bloated stomach and a home to dry her stinging eyes, told her that reiendo would suit her lovely face better than her tears, and she always listened but not in the way they wanted her to. So she stole away los nietos y los hijos and filled up her bloated bloody stomach with them, and still she cried.
“¡Mis hijos!” she’d cry, and it was like the end of the world. “¡Mis pobrecitos hijos!” So the story of the caballero who came around and stole her heart and the dumped it by the side of the river-bank with her children came about, and the La Llorona threw everything of his away, including a little girl and a little boy. And when she realized what she’d done, she screamed and ran and ran along the banks until her soles bled and her ankles broke, and then she crawled until her elbows gave out, and then she dragged herself along until her stomach ruptured and her ribcage caved. And her spirit wandered the river-bank and cried and cried until she was bloated with it, and she stole away children because she missed her own, and when they were the wrong ones she swallowed them whole.
“Don’t go near La Llorona, niños,” the abuelos warned. “Her stomach is swollen with brothers and sisters and she wants you, too.”