“There are treatments, Ricardo. I don’t promise miracles, but there are options. Intensive therapies, neurological stimulation, medication in some cases…”
And Ricardo, who had lost María and now saw his daughters trapped behind an invisible wall, did the only thing he knew how to do in the face of pain: bet everything.
For six months, the mansion transformed into a private hospital. Doctors came and went daily. They installed extremely expensive machines in several rooms.
Sensors, cameras, stimulation devices. Dr. Victoria supervised every step with authority.
Every week she requested a new adjustment, a different protocol, a higher dose. The budgets grew like a long shadow.
Ricardo accepted. Sometimes he spent entire nights sitting in an armchair next to the twins’ bed, watching them breathe, trying to remember the last time he heard them laugh.
The employees walked on tiptoes. Even the dog seemed to understand that one had to move slowly.
The house, big and luxurious, had become a mausoleum.
And in the midst of that stillness, Ricardo began to notice something unsettling: Dr. Victoria spoke of the girls as if they were a “case,” as if their pain had a price and a schedule.
It wasn’t a clear suspicion, just a discomfort, a prick hiding behind desperation.
One morning, when the sun barely touched the windows, there was a knock at the service door.
Ricardo was in the office, with dark circles under his eyes and papers, when the head of staff poked her head in.
“Sir, there is a woman looking for work. She says she can help with cleaning and domestic support. Her name is Elena Robles.”
Ricardo barely looked up.
“Let her start. Do whatever you have to do.”
He didn’t imagine that name, so simple, was about to push a crack into the wall of silence.
Elena entered with a worn backpack, discreet clothes, and a humble but firm gaze.
She was thirty years old and had the face of someone who has learned not to ask for too much so as not to be disappointed.
She greeted with respect, listened to instructions, and got to work without drawing attention.
But the house was so quiet that any new presence was noticeable.
While cleaning the living room, Elena saw Lucía and Daniela sitting on the sofa, side by side, with dolls in their hands and eyes fixed on an invisible point.
They weren’t playing. They weren’t talking. They looked like two small statues.
Elena stopped for a second, as if her heart gave a tug. That empty gaze was painfully familiar to her.
She tried to imagine those girls before, laughing, arguing, singing… and felt a lump in her throat.
Without thinking too much, she started to hum.
It was an old melody, one of those passed down like grandmothers’ secrets. A soft song, almost a lullaby, that didn’t pretend to cure anything. Just to fill the air with something warm.
The melody floated through the living room like a hand caressing without touching.
Lucía raised her head. Daniela let her doll fall onto the cushion.
In the hallway, Ricardo, passing by chance, stood rooted to the spot. He couldn’t believe what he was seeing: his daughters… were reacting.
Elena kept humming while she dusted. Then she spoke, as if telling a story to herself.
“When I was a girl,” she said aloud, expecting no answer, “my grandmother used to say that fear locks itself in the chest like a frightened bird.
And that, if you want it to fly again, you can’t scream at it… you have to open the window.”
The twins looked at her. They didn’t speak, but they truly looked at her, with attention.
That day, Ricardo said nothing. He only watched from afar, with a hope he was afraid to name.
In the following weeks, something happened that no expensive equipment had achieved: the house began to breathe again.
Elena sang while she worked, invented stories, spoke of small things—of the rain, of stray cats, of flowers that grow even in cracks—and she did it with a naturalness that seemed impossible in that place.
Lucía and Daniela began to follow her like curious shadows. They sat near where she folded clothes, peeked in when she cooked, watched her when she watered plants.
Sometimes, without realizing it, they smiled. They weren’t bursts of laughter, they were shy glimmerings, as if joy were relearning the way back.
Ricardo started arriving home early just to watch that scene without being seen.
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