"How is my little sunshine?"
Sure Daddy loved María, but his relationship with his youngest daughter was special. He tried to deny it, but the way he acted around her betrayed him.
After all, María was older, had a more introverted character, was a very serious girl, and Andrea was all the contrary: clingy, affectionate, playful, talkative. Being used to María's peaceful character, Andrea's coming was like an earthquake that shook her parents' life. Even though sometimes little Andy was a headache, she filled the house with life. Every time Daddy came back from work and Andy ran to him, calling him, to give him a big hug and show him a drawing, every back pain, every worry or frustration he could have vanished immediately.
She lit up her father's world and so did he. Like in many other occasions, it was him the one she ran to in tears.
"What's wrong, pretty flower?" Daddy asked, lifting her in his strong arms.
"What did she do?" Mommy showed up, her hands on her hips and a frown on her face. "I caught her playing with your lighter, trying to burn the curtains!"
Daddy's thick eyebrows raised.
"Is that true?" He asked the child, but she kept on bawling, burying her face in his chest.
"Don't you act innocent now, young lady. Do that again and I will give you another one." Mommy reprimanded Andy, and that was how Daddy knew the child had received a good slap in the butt.
"Well, well, that's enough, Socorro. I'm sure she learned her lesson and won't do it again, will you?" Daddy asked to the child, and she just hiccuped and sobbed.
"You are too soft, Armando." Mommy rolled her eyes and left to keep making dinner.
Mommy leaving them alone helped little Andy calm down.
"There, there, my love, it's alright. Mom is only doing this for your own good, understand?" Daddy told her in that sweet voice of his, even though he usually spoke in a very, very deep tone, which reminded Andy of a tuba.
Since she didn't stop crying, Daddy used his infalible weapon. With a wide grin, he sat her on his lap and started singing.
Twinkle, twinkle, little star, How I wonder what you are!
He knew Andy couldn't resist. At first, she looked at him still crying but interested. Then, her whimpers muted, her eyes opened wide and her lips parted to follow the lyrics. Like always, it ended up with her singing the loudest, the most enthusiastic, giggling and shaking her arms. And Daddy laughed and kissed her cheeks.
"That's much better, little star. You are so pretty when you smile."
Andy also thought that Daddy's smile was the sweetest, most beautiful in the world, and did everything she could to make him smile.
It didn't take much. She just had to cry a little, or sing a song, or show him a drawing, and he was already smiling tenderly. Sometimes she managed to put him in such good mood just by doing her own thing, not even minding about him. But she loved showing him how much she loved him—to the Moon and back!
Mommy had stopped him, but Andy waited until she was asleep to show Daddy.
She didn't understand why she kept the magic sticks away from her, out of her reach, but it didn't matter: like all children she was mischievous and very resourceful when it came to satisfying her desires. She waited until everyone was asleep to get out of bed, walk on tip toes to the kitchen, grab a chair careful not to make a sound, climb it and get the box Mommy had hidden inside the cupboard.
Now alone, Andy was free to play with the sticks. She knew of their mechanism. She just had to press their head into the rough brown strip of the box quickly, and something wonderful happened: the room filled with a rainbow gleam.
Andy held the lit match with eyes open with wonder. She smiled showing a hole where a baby front tooth was missing. It was the most beautiful sight a childish mind like her could conceive, and she wanted to show her Daddy.
She walked to her parents' room. Before turning the doorknob she could hear Daddy snoring. She had to contain herself before she chuckled.
There he was, sleeping with his mouth open, wide enough for a fist to fit in. Again, she had to cover her mouth before she betrayed herself.
The magic was extinguishing, she had to be quick. She had tried this with papers before and knew that magic expanded when transferred to a solid object (some worked better than others, she didn't know why).
She wanted those beautiful colors to be the first thing Daddy saw when he opened his eyes, and so she approached the match to the foot of her parents' bed.
And voilà! The rainbow not only didn't disappear, but grew larger! Sparkles jumped to the carpet and her feet.
Feeling like Santa Claus after leaving presents under the Christmas tree, she closed the door and walked away to enjoy the delicious sensation of making people happy.
She heard Daddy's surprised and delighted laughter soon. If she heard right, Mommy had also discovered her surprise and was screaming in joy. Their happiness made the colors spread to the rest of the house; surely María ended up watching it, even though she didn't hear or see her. The house was little and made of wood: in no time its dull white walls were filled with bright color and a rainbow hanged over it.
Attracted by the magic, the neighbors came. The firemen Daddy showed her and María one day appeared with their big truck, with that siren all children loved. She was highly disappointed when they made the rainbow disappear.
Other people came, dressed in uniforms. They found her sitting on the grass, watching the house from the yard. They barely spoke to her—they watched the match box on her lap for long. They walked away to talk to each other where she couldn't hear them. They talked about her, she knew, because they didn't bother to dissimulate. One of them, a tall, burly man, offered her his hand to take and asked her sweetly to follow him. Andy meekly obeyed.
They took her to a room with many clown pictures hanging from the walls, toys of all classes. A woman with glasses made her a lot of questions she didn't understand. She grew tired of this quite quickly and expected Daddy to show up and take her back home. She wanted to see him, what he thought about the surprise she had given him. But she waited and waited and he never came. These people told her Daddy was gone, just like Mommy and María. That was all they said.
But if he was gone, he had to be back one day, and so she waited. She waited when she was brought to that solitary, dark room, in a place full of children she was not allowed to talk to. She didn't have much of a notion of time, but she waited patiently for days, weeks, months, even years. She expected to hear his deep voice or see that bright smile of his, and since she was waiting and those didn't come and sometimes managed to make the magic happen with what she had to distract herself, and this distraction became everything that mattered to her, she ended up forgetting all about him.
