After I confronted your father, Antonio’s mother says, he ran to his parents and acted like he was the victim, and his parents, who were like my second parents, sided against me, claiming that I was slandering him, and that how could I possibly believe what a child was saying, but your aunt Sofía called me and said Leonora I have to tell you something, because I wasn’t well, Antonio, and here Antonio pauses the recording, unable to continue, trying to compose himself because in less than an hour he has to playact at being a database analyst instead of a novelist who insists on spending his mornings listening to recordings of his mother as he awaits news of his sister, composing himself as he recalls his mother, drained of life, seeing her own body on the sofa from above and feeling a pull toward the light, a consoling light, Antonio’s mother had said to him when he was still a child, a peaceful light, a light that over the years he has interpreted as god, as the light at the end of the tunnel from the New Age death literature, peace at last, etc. — out-of-body experiences can be induced by delivering mild electric currents to the temporal parietal junction in the brain, Bessel van der Kolk says — as the outcome of the electric currents Antonio’s grandparents were inflicting on his mother by pretending his sister was lying, and as I was ready to leave this world, Antonio’s mother says, because I wasn’t well, Antonio, I’d become a skeleton by then, my face was covered in boils, I remembered the school bus would be dropping off you and your sister soon, and so I panicked because who would open the door for you, who would take care of you if I was gone (for years Antonio has been seeing the ghost of his mother battling to return to her drained body so she could open the door for them, for years Antonio has not thought about the ghost of his mother until today (and because he’s a parent now, has been one for eight years, he’s on the one hand relieved that he can see himself emulating his mother in that moment, and on the other hand he suspects that if he were to discover someone had been harming his daughters in his own home, he wouldn’t feel a pull toward any goddamn light, he would simply abdicate reason and knife the culprit)), when did you confront that individual, Antonio hears himself say in the recording, when we were still living in that house in Mirandela, Antonio’s mother says, that’s strange because my sister told me years later, Antonio says, when we were already living at that other apartment, yes she told you because a sexual education class at school reminded her, Antonio’s mother says, oh so she told you beforehand, Antonio says, yes what happened is that she blocked it out, Antonio’s mother says, and how could she not since your father accused your sister of being a liar, you’re demented and so is your daughter, he would say, and your sister would hear it and she would say I’m not crazy, Mom, no, Estelita, I believe you, I am going to defend you, I know what could have been happening, and it pains me that I wasn’t more alert, and from then on, as soon as she told me, I began to sleep in your room, I was there with both of you, all the time, and he would tell me you have to come back to our bedroom, no, I am not moving from here, you’re never touching our daughter again — why did you keep us in that house with that individual, Antonio didn’t ask his mother while he recorded her — please don’t ask me that question haven’t I had enough punishments already? — yes, no — and so when his parents sided against me, claiming I was slandering him, Antonio’s mother says, your aunt Sofía called me and said I never told you because my parents forbade me to do so, Leonora, but my brother touched us improperly, all three sisters, and instead of finding help for him my father thrashed him and sent him away to military school, that’s why my youngest sister Lucía can’t stand him, you’ve seen how Lucía treats him, whenever he tries to hug her she screams, so I do believe you, Leonora, and you haven’t reminded your parents about this, I said to your aunt Sofía, yes but you know my mother has always been blinded by her love for my brother and my father does whatever my Mom says, but I want you to stay calm because I know you’re telling the truth, and if you have to take drastic measures, take them, so I confronted your father again and told him what Sofía had said and this became another scandal with his parents because why did Sofía have to interfere, his parents who were like my parents, Antonio, who disheartened me because I respected them, loved them, when I was pregnant with your sister they asked me to live with them so they could take care of me because my parents were already in Chapel Hill, and so after this new confrontation your grandmother Martina paid for us to see a psychiatrist, who did tests and asked for drawings and said well, perhaps the child imagined it, I don’t see anything concrete in these drawings, perhaps the child invented it, I think the best thing to do is for me to help you, because this is too traumatic for you, he said, plus your husband doesn’t want to come anymore since he says he’s not the one who has a problem, and then this psychiatrist tried to take advantage of me, on top of everything I was going through this psychiatrist abused his role, what was his name, Antonio says, Winston Villamar, Antonio’s mother says — dear Winston Villamar, Antonio writes, if you aren’t already dead, you son of a bitch, I wish one day you and everyone you know will read my mother’s words — I had to run away from his office, Antonio’s mother says, and later he called me and said that I couldn’t prove anything, that no one was going to believe me, and of course I never returned to his office but for a while he would lurk near the house in his car, he was the most famous evangelical pastor in Bogotá, that’s why your grandmother Martina picked him, your grandmother Martina who never accepted what your father did, Antonio, who would come over to visit you and your sister at our new apartment, bringing sweets and acting as affectionate as possible, but whenever I would leave to the other room she would start saying things to your sister, and one day I heard her from the other room saying what you’re accusing your dad of isn’t true, this accusation stems from your mother not being right in the head and we are thinking of pressing charges so they can intern her in a psychiatric facility for crazy people, and if you continue to accuse your father you’re also going to that facility, and so when I heard this, Antonio, I ran over and threw her out, you don’t step in this house ever again, I said, I am here to defend my children, I believe what has been happening, and if you ever want to see them again it’ll be under my supervision, I am never leaving you alone with my children, leave this house this instant, and so your grandmother stopped coming, whereas your grandfather would secretly stop by and bring you sweets, and later your grandmother would tell me bring the children to me, please, and I would say I’m sorry but I am not taking them to you, you’ve caused my daughter too much harm, because they should have supported her, Antonio, nobody in that family supported her, and when years later your grandmother Martina was gravely ill, when you and your sister were already here in the United States, I was meditating alone in my yoga studio and your grandmother appeared to me and said forgive me, Leonora, and I said to her I have already forgiven you — dear Grandma, Antonio writes, I haven’t forgotten you, I still remember my summers in Cartagena with you, the tiny mallet you would carry in your purse because you loved to eat crab legs by the beach, I still remember you and Grandpa stationed on the beach under your parasol while my cousin Leonidas and I boogie boarded all day, and even though I don’t remember you threatening my sister, don’t remember much about those years, no, Grandma, I don’t forgive you — but your grandmother insisted, Antonio’s mother says, please forgive me, Leonora, she said, everything has been forgiven, I said, wondering if perhaps your grandmother’s health had deteriorated further, and about fifteen minutes later your father called and said my mother just died and she never had a chance to talk to you because you never came to see her, yes, your grandmother was gravely ill but I did not visit her — I left Colombia when I was eighteen, Antonio writes, and I never saw those horrible people again — so I said to your father I already said goodbye and she asked me to forgive her, how is that possible, he said, she appeared to me, I said, bah, he said, and he hung up the phone, I do remember when my aunt Elena came to exorcise my sister, Antonio says, yes and your sister couldn’t sleep for months — Aunt Elena, Antonio writes, you knew what my father had done to you and your sisters and you had the nerve to come exorcise my sister so she would stop accusing him? — your sister would sleep in my room because your aunt Elena had terrorized her, your aunt Elena, who I had to forbid from visiting the two of you as well, and just imagine, Antonio, when your sister started feeling unwell in Baltimore, when she was still working at Fidelity Insurance as a Senior Actuarial Associate and couldn’t sleep — more than thirty years later, Antonio writes — she didn’t want to seek help because she was worried that they were going to intern her in a psychiatric facility, that they were going to tell her she was crazy.