Bruno enjoys watching his sister flit around the kitchen and bring warmth to the sterility. Though their Magic is gone, life and love flow so easily from her movements that the room fills and expands with it. Her hair takes the sun streaming in through the window and spills it over her face and hands as she works, and the brightness settles him.
He hasn't been able to do this – just embe/em with his family in years. The light they had seemed to find without him only served to drive him further into the shadows... skulking around, haunting them. It's almost unnerving to find himself craving their presence now, in a way he hasn't let himself do since... well. Since.
It's equally disconcerting to find they want the same.
I've missed you, mijo.
It's been...a long time.
They've missed you, too.
The simple admission, the simple affection given him by his family staves off the darkness.
But who is he now, when all comes to light?
Who can he be?
Julieta hums while she works, a habit she passed on to him, though her voice is much more suited to song than his. It's an old nursery rhyme floating around the vegetables she dices, an airy and sweet tune, and he leans against the door frame, letting the forgotten music wrap him up in a hug.
It looks like they're having soup tonight, and probably a lot more of it in the days to come as it is a large, filling meal they can have cheaply. The vegetables chopped, she begins to gather the oils, spices, and cookware she needs, the humming becoming more absent and free form as she tries to discern Señora Guzmán's organizational choices...
"Why would you – ?"
...as she disagrees with Señora Guzmán's organizational choices.
"Pots and pans belong near the stove, Tía." She chides the kitchen. "And spices do not go near the sink..."
He has to stifle a laugh as Julieta takes issue with almost everything, and he can see her fighting the impulse to put the kitchen to rights in her own way.
It takes her a few minutes to finally find all she needs, and after she's filled the pot with water to begin a broth, she sets it on the counter beside her and says, "Casita, would you mind... oh..."
The light dims as she trails off, looking forlornly at the half-filled pot. "I guess...you would mind, huh?"
Her movements slow and then stop as she stares around at the knife and cutting board, the cupboards, the stone countertops. "What are we going to do… without you?"
And then she breaks.
The tears flow freely down her cheeks and speckle her apron and seize his heart. He's not conscious of moving, just being there, wrapping his arms around her and letting her lean into him. It's the first time in ten years he's reached to comfort his sister and found her, and the sensation nearly overwhelms him. He can't take a full breath for the love and loss and grief and joy fighting together in his chest, and his eyes sting.
She weeps silently into his shoulder for a few minutes, sniffs, and hiccoughs.
He takes a deep breath in and lets it out.
"...uno... dos... tres..." he murmurs.
She stills, but after a moment, matches him, inhaling and exhaling to his count.
"...four... five... six..."
They stand embracing under the sunlit window, breathing, existing, breaking together.
Breathe in... uno... dos... tres...
Breathe out... four... five.. six...
Inhale.
Exhale.
Eventually, the grief makes room for her voice.
"Pepa never really got the hang of the counting." She says. "Too impatient."
He gives a small chuckle. "I could have told you that."
A shadow crosses her face. She tries to shake it off with a half-smile and weak hug, but he sees it.
There are a lot of things he could have told her but didn't.
There are a lot of things he should tell her now but can't.
"I'm sorry," she sniffs again and runs a hand across her eyes, putting some distance between them. "I'm being silly. Crying over a pot."
"No sillier than crying over a lost door." He replies. "Or a... lost brother."
He keeps his eyes on the floor, not willing to watch the light and dark battle for his sister. He doesn't know which he wants to win.
He's never thought he deserved the light less than at Julieta's feet.
For Mirabel.
For Casita.
For the ten years he'd made Julieta pay for his memory in tears.
"Corázon." The hands that cup his face smell of fresh-cut produce and pressed herbs. Her fingers lift his chin. "I-I don't need to know where you've been... you're here now, and you're still my brother."
The light swells in her eyes and washes over him, pushing back the darkness. Not ridding him of it, no, but bearing him aloft so that he won't drown.
"...really?"
"Really."
"I... I've missed you... mana." The word is rusty in his mouth and can only be whispered into her hair as she embraces him once more. "I've missed you."
They hold each other a few moments more, until the sunlight dims as it starts to dip behind the mountain. She looks up at the clock on the wall and sighs. He wipes his eyes and fidgets with the hem of the ruana, suddenly self-conscious. "I-I suppose I'll let you..."
"Stay, please." Her eyes twinkle even as her lips tremble. "If I can't have Casita, I need someone to boss around."
"Bribery, blackmail, extortion, indentureship..." He counts off on his fingers. "Glad to know nothing's changed."
She hands him the pot and points to the stove. "Everything's changed... for the good."