"Bruno, hermano, are you free now?"

"Julieta… Yes. I just got back from town. You need something?"

"It seems that Mirabel is not feeling very well today, so I've prepared a snack for her to keep her strong until dinner. Would you do me the favor of bringing it to her?"

"Mirabel is sick?!"

Damn it! And I had left her alone when she had offered to come with me. Who knew how bad she would have had it alone and sick.

"No… It's not that. She seems disheartened, but she hasn't told me why. That girl… she tends to keep her feelings to herself, you know? She doesn't like to worry others."

"I know…"

"I have to go to the Rodríguezs' house right now. Can I count on you taking it to her?"

"Of course, you can. Where is she?"

"She's in her room."

"Alri… what?! In her… But…"

"Thank you, hermano."

Julieta squeezed me in her arms without letting me speak, planted a kiss on my cheek, and practically ran out of the house.

"In her room? Really?"

I could do it. It was just a matter of knocking on the door, leaving her food on her desk, and getting out of there again. At that time, surely she wasn't in her nightgown, so I wouldn't see anything indecent, and I would just be her uncle taking care of her as Agustín wanted; nothing more.

I knocked on her door rhythmically and whispered a 'knock on wood' that would give me the courage to enter that room.

"Mirabel?" I asked half whispering and poking my head slowly behind the door when I didn't get an answer.

"What are you doing here, Bruno?"

Seriously, why did she stop calling me 'tío'? Was it her way of telling me that after ten years without seeing me she couldn't consider me family? And that… would it be that bad? I should have felt sad, but… in the end, it didn't sound so bad to me.

"Oh, uh… Julieta has asked me to bring you th…"

She finally entered my angle of vision and killed all the words in my throat with a stroke of the pen. Her eyes and her lips were red, her cheeks bright, her hair disheveled… she had been crying, a lot.

"Mirabel! You okay? What happened to you?!"

I put the plate down on her sewing machine table and ran over to her.

"It's nothing… Thanks for the food," she answered in a nasal voice rubbing her cheeks with the palms of her hands.

"Hey, if… I mean, if you… Nevermind. I leave you with your things and, uhm… well… bye."

I got out of there and closed the door. Of course she wasn't going to tell me: she hadn't even told her mother, how was she going to tell me? But… did I really have to leave her alone? She seemed to be in pain. I took a couple of steps toward the stairs; I had no right to meddle in her life; I couldn't do it.

About five seconds later, I was opening that worn blue door again and sticking my head through it.

"Unless… you want… company, or, talk about it, or… nah, it doesn't matter, it's nonsense; of course you don't want me to stay. Although, well, if you need anything…"

Enough, Bruno. Mirabel was looking at me wide-eyed and I realized how ridiculous this whole thing was turning out to be.

"I'm sorry. I'm leaving. E… enjoy your meal."

I turned to leave again and try to assume again that my place was not at her side when her voice, soft and trembling, hugged me from behind.

"I would like you to stay."

"Ah… really?" I asked puzzled.

Mirabel burst out laughing and my soul breathed for a few seconds.

"Here, sit down," she said making room for me next to her on the edge of the bed.

"Oh, no, no, no. I'll stay here."

"Sit right now or leave me alone."

Seriously? Cornered between the need to get away from her and the imperative need to tuck her in when she needed it. Imperative need overpowered plain need, so I timidly agreed to her imposition. I sat next to her leaving a couple of safety feet of distance between her body and mine and shivered to realize that, even so, I could feel her weight on the mattress and the warmth she radiated toward me.

"Uhm, a… a bad day?"

"Can I not talk about it? I'd rather just have company and… a hug?"

Could I say no to that crystalline gaze? Not in a thousand years. I quietly repositioned the pillow, leaning back against the headboard and opening my arms wide.

"Come here." (*There should be a fanart included here that I have no idea how to place, so if you feel like it, you can check it out on my Tumblr hiptoff or on AO3.)

Mirabel lunged at me and, instead of crying as I expected, she smiled lightly and snuggled into my arms. That was hateful. It was my niece seeking shelter in her uncle and, yet, I could only feel that that was definitely the place I belonged; I felt that happiness was in surrounding that woman with my arms and in feeling how her own arms almost split my waist.

And I got carried away. I was supposed to be the one comforting her, but it was her warmth that enveloped me. By the time I knew it, the morning sun was bathing her lightly and sensually bare shoulder on my chest and I was slowly coming back to consciousness after the most restful and pleasant sleep I could remember having in my entire life.

Then, as called by my awakening, Casita brought us one of those unbearable alarm clocks and the thing began to ring shrilly making me definitively abandon that slumbery state that kept me partially out of reality.

"Mirabel!"

"Oh, my God, Bruno!" she exclaimed, sitting up violently and almost knocking me out with a headbutt to the chin. "You are here!"

"But, what? How…?"

"Have we fallen asleep?!"

"No, no, no, no, no, no, no…! Mirabel, I'm so sorry, I…"

I should have extended more that apology, but I forgot how to articulate a word. Her eyes were right there, just inches from mine; her heavy breathing met mine and slightly misted her half-displaced glasses; her cheeks, completely flushed, almost dazzled my sight, and her body… her body was sitting on mine, still as if waiting for some instructions that didn't seem to arrive.