Promise of a Wedding

Aurora.

Five in the morning. I wake up the same way I do every day. Making a nutritious breakfast for my family has always been my greatest satisfaction — I take care of every last detail when preparing their meals. I have three children. My eldest, Alfredo, graduated from high school and decided to strike out on his own. He's twenty-four now, living in the capital. The two still in my care are Juliana, twenty-two, and Nancy, sixteen. Each one is special in her own way. My little Nancy is allergic to peanuts, so I always have to be extra careful with her food. Juliana is picky about certain things, so I select every dish with her in mind. And then there's my dear husband, Jose Luna — I say husband, though we were never legally married. We've lived together for twenty-five years in a common-law union. He loves his coffee, and as always, I have it waiting for him at the table every morning.

He owns a mechanic's workshop. It's not exactly big, but he works hard every day to support us and make sure we want for nothing. My name is Aurora Manrique. I'm forty-four, and my husband is forty-five. We started from nothing when we were young, saving every last cent so he could have his own shop. I've been a full-time housewife, watching over his savings and making sure there was always a hot meal on the table for my family.

"Mom, I need to leave for the university. How is my breakfast not ready yet?" Juliana said.

"Mom, this is disgusting. How do you expect me to eat this?" Nancy glanced at her father. "Dad, can you give me extra money so I can eat something at school?"

"Of course, sweetheart," Jose said.

"Jose, make her eat it all. It's just scrambled eggs with toast," Aurora replied.

"Mom, I had that yesterday. Can't you come up with something different?" Nancy rolled her eyes. "Oh, and Dad — could you come to my school meeting instead? Mom always smells like onions and dresses awful. I'm embarrassed to tell people she's my mother."

Juliana laughed. "Now you get why I never wanted her showing up at school. She always dresses so outdated. Not like your friend's mom — she always looks great. I wish I had a mother like her."

"That's too bad for you two, but I'm your mother. And I do not smell like onions," Aurora said.

"We urgently need a new mother, Dad." Nancy grabbed her things and left.

Aurora looked at her husband, waiting for him to defend her against their daughters' attacks. But he just smiled, finished his coffee, and walked out without a word to his wife. This kind of behavior had become normal in their house. Sometimes she couldn't tell if she was actually the mother of her children and the woman of this house, or just an unpaid housekeeper in her own home. They had no luxuries — her daughters even attended public schools — but every dismissive word they spoke cut into her sensitive heart.

After cleaning the kitchen, she started tidying the house. She went into her eldest daughter's room and cleaned up the entire disaster, because Juliana would leave everything everywhere, even her sanitary pads — anywhere but the trash can. In her younger daughter's room, she picked up all the notebooks and textbooks. Nancy's diary was there too, the one where she wrote about the perfect mother she wished she had. There was even a photo of her friend's mother tucked inside — and in the picture, alongside this woman and her daughter, stood Jose and Juliana. That struck Aurora as strange. Jose never got involved with his daughters' friends, much less with their mothers.

She tried to make sense of what she was seeing. The photo looked like a family of five. Her husband was smiling. Lucia Sanchez was pressed close to him. Juliana beamed with happiness, and Nancy, who'd taken the selfie, was smiling too. It looked like they'd gone on an outing — an outing Aurora hadn't been invited to. On the back of the photo, in her youngest daughter's handwriting, were the words: "I wish she were my mom. Not this ugly mom I have."

Those words were devastating. A pain pierced her chest — not because of what she saw in the photo, but because of what her youngest daughter had written. The pain deepened because she had carried these girls in her womb for nine months, had raised and cared for them to the age they were now, and this was the reward she received — cruelty of the worst kind. Jose had forgotten something at home and came back. He called for his wife, asking her to bring it. Aurora came out with the photo in her hand and demanded an explanation. Her eyes were red with tears, and for the first time, that look made Jose feel enough to actually give her one.

"We took that photo when I went to pick up our daughter from a restaurant where she was with Jamilec's mother. Juliana was with me, so we took advantage of the moment and snapped a picture," Jose said.

"You're talking about Lucia? The mother of Nancy's best friend?"

"Yes. She works at Banco Pacifico. You know she's a single mother. That day she invited our daughter out, and we just went to pick her up. That's all. Dry those tears. We've been together twenty-five years — don't start doubting me."

"You promised me a wedding," Aurora said quietly. "And that promise still hasn't been kept. It's stayed nothing more than a promise. And sometimes... I feel you so far away from me."

"Woman, what do we need a wedding for? What matters is that we're together, we have our kids — isn't that enough for you? The shop isn't doing well, and spending money on a wedding right now doesn't make sense."

Jose kissed the crown of her head and left her standing there, lost in her thoughts. She still remembered the day she gave up every comfort of her family home to follow Jose's love — when he'd promised her a beautiful wedding that, to this day, he had never delivered. The years had passed and she was still waiting for that promise to come true. She went back to her chores, and while sorting his laundry, she found a motel receipt in the pocket of his pants.

"What is this?"

Meanwhile, at the workshop, Jose was already in his blue overalls and ready to work when his phone rang. He answered with a smile on his lips, joy lighting up his face. On the other end of the line was Lucia Sanchez, inviting him and his daughters to lunch. He accepted happily. But first, in that flirtatious voice of hers, she invited him over for a little appetizer before the meal. Jose grinned, ended the call, ordered his assistants to keep working, changed out of his overalls, and left the shop — heading straight for Lucia Sanchez's apartment, where she was waiting eagerly.

On the drive over, he called his daughters to let them know about the invitation. They accepted without a second thought for the effort their mother was putting into preparing the lunch they liked. Aurora never minded if she had to cook several different dishes — all that mattered to her was that her daughters had full bellies and were happy with the food.

Jose felt a pang of guilt about his wife, but the truth was she had stopped mattering to him as a woman a long time ago. She'd become nothing more than his housemate. He'd even saved her in his phone as "mother of my children."

Little did any of them know that two hours away, alone in his house, there sat a man who would one day steal the love of Aurora — the same Aurora that Jose, blinded by his mistress, had stopped caring about. Javier Mendoza, still disillusioned with life, sipped his glass of red wine and smiled bitterly, remembering the day he'd been abandoned at the altar more than twenty years ago.

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