The days had begun to feel the same.
Slow. Blank. Suspended.
Snow still fell on the hills, and the wind, rushing through the trees,
seemed to whisper the same secret: stay.
Catarina lived to the rhythm of simple gestures.
In the morning, she would prepare the fire before Valéria woke up.
In the afternoon, she would tidy up, sort things out, sometimes write a few lines in a notebook that she only opened in daylight.
And in the evening, she would sit on the old wooden bench near the frozen garden, where footprints disappeared as soon as she looked away.
The world around her had shrunk, reduced to the breathing of the stove,
the sound of boiling water,
the creaking of the floorboards beneath her feet.
And somewhere, in that silence, she slowly began to exist again.
The nausea had subsided, replaced by a gentle,
almost soothing tiredness.
Sometimes she would lie down on the sofa and let her hand slide over her still flat stomach.
She couldn't feel anything yet, but she knew.
She felt the promise.
A discreet, timid presence that was growing without asking her permission.
One morning, Valéria entered the room,
a scarf tied around her hair, her cheeks red from stoking the fire.
"You're not going to melt into that window, my girl.
You need to get out for a bit."
Catarina smiled faintly.
"It's cold."
"It's not the cold that's hurting you. It's being afraid to feel again."
The sentence hung between them.
Then Valéria grabbed a coat and put it on her shoulders.
"Come on. Let's go for a walk."
The path behind the house wound its way between bare trees.
The branches, thin as veins, seemed to scratch at the sky.
Their footsteps crunched in the snow.
They didn't speak, not right away.
Catarina let the wind bite her cheeks, breathing in the icy air like medicine.
At the end of the path stood a small abandoned chapel, covered in frost.
The broken stained-glass windows let in streaks of pale light.
Valéria stopped.
"This is where your mother came when she was pregnant with you," she said simply.
Catarina froze.
"I... I didn't know."
"She said it was the only place she could be without fear."
Catarina ran her hand over the cold stone wall.
A shiver ran through her.
"And you, were you afraid?"
Valéria smiled slightly.
"I was afraid for her. And now I'm afraid for you.
That's the role of mothers."
Silence enveloped them.
Catarina entered the chapel.
The air was icy, but soothing.
She sat down on a stone bench and closed her eyes.
For a moment, everything faded away.
The voices. The memories. Even her name.
All that remained was the beating of her heart, and another, more discreet, somewhere below.
Two rhythms.
Two lives.
She whispered, without realizing it:
"I don't know how to love you without being afraid."
Valéria placed a hand on her shoulder.
"Then love with fear. That's already a start."
They stayed there for a moment, in the fragile morning light.
Then, on the way home, Catarina felt something stir gently inside her.
Not pain.
An echo.
A sign.
She placed her hand on her belly, breathless.
"Mom," she whispered, not knowing if she was talking to herself or to the child.
Valéria turned to her, her eyes full of that tenderness that never judges.
"Yes, my daughter. That's where it all begins again."
Back home, the fire crackled loudly.
The heat enveloped her, almost too quickly, almost too strongly.
Catarina sat down by the fireplace.
Her gaze lost itself in the flames.
She thought of Sylus.
What he would have said, what he would have thought.
And for the first time in weeks, she no longer felt anger.
Only this strange melancholy that resembled peace.
She whispered, as if through time:
"You'll never know, Sylus.
And maybe that's for the best."
The wind outside picked up, rattling the windows.
Valéria came up behind her and placed a blanket over her shoulders.
"Spring will come back eventually, you know."
Catarina nodded.
Her eyes followed the flames as they danced, uncertain, alive.
"Yes," she whispered.
"But this time, it won't come back alone."