The day I really understood what it means to be “the daughter-in-law.”
I never thought I would tell this story. For a long time I preferred to keep it inside me, as if by keeping quiet I could erase what happened. But there are memories that do not disappear. They just sit there, spinning in your head, reminding you who you were… and at what point you changed forever.
It all started with a call from my mother-in-law, Doña Carmen.
“Maria, come early tomorrow. There is a lot to do.
His tone was not one of request. It was an order.
My husband, Diego, was sitting on the couch when I hung up. He looked at his phone as if nothing had happened.
“What does your mother want?” I asked.
“Grandpa’s anniversary,” he replied without looking up. You know how she’s with that stuff.
Of course he knew.
Doña Carmen had always been a proud woman. He liked people to speak well of his house. That they said that their family was respectable, generous, hardworking.
He liked people to come and go from his house.
He liked to hear praise.
“Doña Carmen’s house is always full of food.
“Doña Carmen is a woman who knows how to serve her guests.
That was what she wanted to hear.
And to achieve this, he did not hesitate to invite half the neighborhood.
The next morning we arrived early. The courtyard was already full of movement. Diego and two neighbors were setting up an improvised tent with metal pipes. They had taken out the long wooden tables and covered them with white tablecloths.
“About twenty people are going to come,” Diego said as he adjusted a rope.
Twenty.
I felt something inside my chest tighten.
“Twenty?”
—Family, friends from the neighborhood, the compadres… you know.
Of course.
I already knew.
But what I didn’t know was what came next.
I went into the kitchen. Doña Carmen was checking some dishes while talking to a neighbor.
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