Hector and I were married for five years. From the first day I became his wife, I grew accustomed to his cold words and indifferent glances. Hector wasn’t violent or loud, but his apathy made my heart wither a little more each day.
After the wedding, we lived at his parents’ house in a neighborhood in Mexico City. Every morning I woke up early to cook, do the laundry, and clean. Every afternoon I sat waiting for him, only to hear him say,
“I’ve already eaten.”
I often wondered if this marriage was any different from being a tenant. I tried to build something together, I tried to love, but all I received in return was an invisible emptiness I couldn’t fill.
Until one day, Hector came home with a cold, expressionless face. He sat down across from me, handed me some divorce papers, and said in a dry voice,
“Sign it. I don’t want to waste any more time, neither mine nor yours.”
I froze, but I wasn’t surprised. With tears in my eyes, I took the pen with a trembling hand. All the memories of waiting for him at the dinner table, of the times I suffered stomach aches in the early hours without him even noticing, came crashing down on me like knives.
After signing the papers, I started packing my things. There was nothing in that house that was truly mine, except for some clothes and the old pillow I always slept with. As I was about to leave with my suitcase, Hector threw the pillow at me with a sarcastic tone:
“Take it and wash it. It’s probably falling apart by now.”
I picked up the pillow, feeling a pang of sadness in my heart. It really was old; the pillowcase was faded, with yellow stains and tears.
It was the pillow I’d brought from my mother’s house in a small town in Oaxaca when I went to university in the city. And I took it with me when I got married because I had trouble sleeping without it. He used to complain about it, but I kept it anyway. I left that house in silence.
Back in my rented room, I stared at my pillow, dazed. Thinking about her sarcastic words, I decided to take off the pillowcase to wash it, at least so I could sleep well that night, without dreaming of painful memories.
As I opened the case, I felt something strange. There was a bulge inside the cotton filling. I reached in and stopped dead in my tracks. A small bundle of paper, carefully wrapped in a nylon bag. I opened it with trembling hands.
Inside was a wad of bills, all 500-peso notes, and a piece of paper folded in quarters.
I unfolded it. It was my mother’s shaky, familiar handwriting:
“My daughter, this is the money I saved for you in case you went through hard times. I hid it under your pillow because I was afraid you’d be too proud to accept it. Whatever happens, don’t suffer over a man, my child. I love you very much.”
My tears fell heavily onto the yellowed paper. I remembered my wedding day, when my mother gave me the pillow, saying it was very soft, so I would sleep well.
I laughed and said, “You’re getting old, Mom. What things you say. Hector and I are going to be happy.”
My mother just smiled, her gaze distant and sad.
I hugged the pillow to my chest, feeling as if my mother were beside me, stroking my hair and comforting me.
It turned out she always knew how much a daughter could suffer if she chose the wrong man. It turned out she had prepared a backup plan for me; not one filled with riches, but one that would spare me despair.
That night, I lay on the hard bed in my small rented room, hugging my pillow, tears soaking the pillowcase. But this time, I wasn’t crying for Hector.
I was crying for my mother’s love.
I was crying because I felt lucky, because at least I still had somewhere to go back to, a mother who loved me, and a big world out there waiting to welcome me.
The next morning, I woke up early, carefully folded my pillow, and packed it in my suitcase. I told myself I would find a smaller room, closer to my job. I would send more money to my mother, and I would live a life where I no longer had to tremble or wait for a cold message from anyone.
I smiled at my reflection in the mirror.
That woman with the puffy eyes, from this day forward, would live for herself, for her aging mother at home, and for all the youthful dreams yet to be fulfilled.
That marriage, that old pillow, that sneer of disdain… all of that was just the end of a sad chapter.
As for my life, there were still many pages left to write with my own hands and my resilient heart.
