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Your knees are shaking, but sitting feels impossible. Your eyes keep returning to the bread on the floor. Four hours of work. Your rent. Your bus money. Your hope for the week. All of it crushed beneath a woman’s expensive shoes.
“I should go,” you whisper.
Alejandro’s face tightens.
“No,” he says. “She should.”
Regina gasps as if he has slapped her.
The house manager arrives, a thin man in a dark suit named Mr. Ellis. He stands near the doorway, eyes moving from Regina to the broken basket, then to Alejandro.
“Sir?”
Alejandro does not look away from his sister.
“Regina is leaving.”
Mr. Ellis freezes for half a second. “Tonight?”
“Now.”
Regina’s mouth opens. “Alejandro.”
He raises a hand.
“For five years,” he says quietly, “you have walked through my home as if my accident made you queen of it. You dismissed my staff, controlled my visitors, approved my meals, reviewed my calls, and told everyone you were protecting me.”
Regina’s eyes flash. “I kept this family together.”
“No,” Alejandro says. “You kept me isolated.”
The words hit harder than shouting.
You see the staff exchange quick glances. Not surprise. Recognition. They have known. They have always known.
Regina points at you. “All this because of a poor girl with bread?”
Alejandro looks down at the crushed pan de elote.
“No,” he says. “Because she brought kindness into this house, and you treated it like dirt.”
Your tears finally fall.
Quietly.
Not the dramatic sobs Regina would mock.