Chapter Text
Mirabel Madrigal had woken up at her usual time and did her usual morining routine. The sun light was coming down nicely and warmed Casita making her even more homely.
Around her Mirabel’s family had been surprisingly already up, everyone but her parent’s and Abuela tended to wake up after her, but maybe she should’ve said not surprisingly considering what happened earlier in the week.
A summer storm barreled against their mountain all but flooding the valley, if it wasn’t for her Tía Pepa and her own clouds things would have gone way worse.
Amidst their cleaning and rebuilding Dolores ran to Abuela with haste and worry on her face and quickly informed her about a caravan full of people in need that had came through the mountains.
An eclectic itinerant theater troupe from Bogotá had gotten lost in their tour and the Madrigals in all their kindness have offered them their hospitality and service for their stay in their Encanto.
Her Mamá had spent a lot of her food treating their wounds while her Papá and Luisa helped them pick up the remains of their caravan. To her and her Mamá’s chagring seeing her Papá with splinters everywhere. How did it happen? No one knows and Mirabel doesn’t want to know.
Isabela was doing her usual Señorita Perfecta shtick while Abuela shook hands, assuaged anxieties and made plans to manage them.
Her Tía Pepa and her side of the family were doing the same chores they tended to do, safe for Antonio wich decided to come hang out with Mirabel.
And speaking of Mirabel. She had found herself useful for once! The many actors and actress’ had had their costumes ripped apart so she finally could make use of her skills!
…she felt a little bit bad for finding happiness in the misfortune of others, but they were just clothes! No one died! No one was hurt!... No one was hurt badly!
And that was how she found herself sat on a bench next to a pile of those same costumes.
Anyone who would take a moment to look at her, and there was one person who was looking at her, would see Mirabel with at utmost peaceful face, the sunlight casting a shadow on her face wich would go away as she inspected her finished works. Her last one was some sort of greek toga, wich she gave a small before leaving it on the pile of weird costumes besides her.
“Raawwrrr!” Antonio roared and appeared from under the massive pile of clothes. He was wearing an apparently need-to-be teared dress shirt and a wig with peices of red fabric dangling from it as if to mimic blood. “I will eat you Mirabel!”
“Oh no! Please don’t do it, I don’t wanna be eaten!” Mirabel responded with words drenched in sarcasm wich Antonio couldn’t differentiate from normal words.
“Here I come!... Ugh… ugh… oh…” Antonio tried to jump on his cousin but found himself stuck from the waist down in the clothes pile. “Can you pull me out? Please?”
“I don’t know.” Mirabel pondered with exageration. Rubbing her chin and then pursing her lips and making a thinkeres grimace. “Are you going to eat me if I do?”
“No…”
“All right!”
The older cousin took the younger one from the pile and Antonio began to writhe and shake.
“I lied!”
Antonio chased after Mirabel at the high speeds that his short legs could take him and his older cousin entertained him running away from him.
The run around in circles. Antonio with the earnet intent of a five year old and Mirabel twirling and jumping away from him with the finnese of a klutsy teen. Wich is to say not much finnese at all.
“You can’t catc-AYYYY!”
“No no no no no no no no no!”
Mirabel and Isbela both screamed as the younger of the sisters crashed against their Mother and made her drop the tray of food and drinks she was carrying.
The three Madrigal women turned to the ground and began to pick up the cups and finger foods that had fallen while Antonio stood to the side tense with all the guilt his small body could contain.
“I’m so sorry! I should’ve seen where I was going!” Mirabel apologized as she picked up the fallen things.
“Oh! Now you say that!” Isabela sneered at her.
“Isabela.” Julieta reproached her with the tone only parents can do and the oldest Madrigal girl sighed.
“Didn’t you have to mend some clothes?”
“I finished them already.” Mirabel spoke with badly hidden annoyance and their trio got up and after picking up all the salvageable food stuff.
“Then why did you not take them to Abuela? Those people want their costumes. They don’t want you and Antonio running around like-”
“Isabela!” Once again Julieta reproached her eldest daughter wich sighed once again at her Mamá’s voice. Julieta then turned to look at Mirabel and said tiredly but not unkindly. “Mirabel if you could please get those costumes to the Church? Your Abuela is there with the Director and Manager of the troupe, thank you Mirabel.”
Mirabel looks at her mother and sister leave without her, god knows where, and sighes dejectedly. Her mood evidently down.
“I’m sorry, Mira.” Antonio says while handing her the costume he had taken off. He sounded as downcast as he looked. “I’ll help you with-”
“Nope!” Mirabel said and popped the p at the end. She bent at the waist and flicked her cousin’s nose. “You are going home! Tía Pepa must really want to see you.”
“But-”
“Butts!?”
“No!” Antonio giggled. “But-”
“Just go, pequeñin.” Mirabel said as she rustled Antonio’s hair and sent him his Merry way to Casita. Mirabel sighs once again and moves to pick up and carry the big pile of costumes wich, now that she takes a good look at it, will take her at least two travels to the church or she risks falling down or the costumes falling down.
She begins to organize and pick up the costumes hoping to get at least half of them in her arms until she hears a voice coming from behind her.
“Would you want some help with that?”
Mirabel turns and beside her she finds a teenage boy. She can only assume him to be some years older than her for she has look up to find his face. With big round glasses, some baby fat still clinging to his face and no visible facial hair on his tanned skin he would the picture of the gangly teen if not for the… mass he had on his torso.
“Um- I- I don’t- I- I- What?” Mirabel stammers and her face reddens.
“Would you like my help with the costumes?” The teenage boy repites and uses his hands to point towards the Church. “It’s really far and it’s a lot of costumes so…”
¡Oh! ¡Si si si si si! ¡Gracias!” Mirabel quickly says and takes a step to let the boy grab a bit from the pile.
“Great!” The boy grabs all but a handful of the costumes in his arms. “C’mon then!” He says with a smile as he begins to walk.
Mirabel sees him walk for a bit…
…and for a bit more…
…and then the bit becomes quite a bit…
…and then she shakes her head, grabs the rest of the costumes and quickly runs to catch up to him.
“I didn’t get your name!” Mirabel gasps when she catches up to the boy. “I don’t think I’ve seen you around.”
“Julio, nice to meet you.” Julio offers her his hand from under the pile of costumes and she shakes it. “I’m with the troupe. I actually was asked to help you bring the costumes.”
“Why didn’t you do that earlier?” Mirabel asks him with confusion on her face.
Julio cringes and with a small voice says. “You looked happy while you were fixing them and I didn’t want to interrupt you.”
“Oh, well that’s nice!” Mirabel says while feeling funny and quickly changes the subject. “What do you help with in the troupe?”
“I help with the choreography.”
“Really?”
“Yes!” Julio smiles a non-chalant smile. “Do I not look the part?”
Mirabel quickly tries to come up with an answer for her surprise.
You are so gangly.
You are so… big.
You are so…
“Aren’t you a bit young to do that?” It’s what she finally settles on.
“Aren’t you a bit young to fix like a hundred costumes?”
“I’m fifteen!” Mirabel yells.
“And I’m sixteen.” Julio says back.
The two teens laugh at the argument they had found themselves with. One putting forth one activity the other was too young to do and the other rebutting it, and like so they arrived at the Church’s entrance.
Two agitated voices could be heard from inside the Church and both teens winced when they heard them. They made haste to enter and non of them noticed the young girl waiting by the entrance filing her nails.
“I must ask you again to reconsider!” Alma yelled at a group of two in the middle pews. “Think about the people who live here! About their livelyhoods.”
“What about our livelyhoods?” An equally loud and yet unchanging voice yelled as well. “We have to be in Cartagena in a week for a show. We can’t just stay here.”
Alma Madrigal was visibly annoyed and Mirabel looks surprised when she found her Abuela argueing with someone who looks barely Luisa’s age.
“Ay no, Martín…” Julio sighs besides her.
“Can’t you just see things my… our way?” Abuela turns to the other one of the two people she was with, a young man who looked actually Isabela’s age and was on the ganglier side with sharp edges and thin arms. “It’s dangerous for us if you go to the outside.”
“Señora Madrigal.” He says while pinching the bridge of his long nose. “You are talking to Martín, not me. You already know I share his opinion.”
“But-”
“Are you gonna make us stay or something?” The gangly young man asks her to wich Abuela shakes her head with vigor. “Then we are leaving. We have our family out there and they are expecting us.”
“Wich Mauri said to you yesterday and I repeated to you ten minutes ago.” Martín, apparently, speaks again with the same intense and yet monotone voice.
“You… you must reconsider!” Alma once again tries to interject.
“Good afternoon, Señora Madrigal.” Martín says and sits in the pews with finality and begins to read and scribble on some papers.
Alma turns around to the gangly man, apparently, as if to spur him to do something about the other young man, and the young man only shrugs before grabbing an apple from his clothes and taking a bite of it.
Alma walks out of the Church with barely restrained anger on her face, not noticing the two teens carrying costumes.
“You should’ve seen them, Julio!” Mirabel flinches at the appareance of a girl apparently a bit younger than herself. With longer straighter hair wich covered her ears but the same round cheeks with baby fat she herself had. “Martín and her were yelling at each other for an hour! Although it got boring after the first ten minutes.”
“Thanks for taking care of the costumes, primo.” The gangly man, Mauri apparently, steps besides them taking a bite from his apple and giving him a wink. “Although you could’ve arrived earlier.”
The young girl besides them laughs as Julio sighs and Mirabel feels out of place or as if she is being judged or something. Julio stops sighing and looks at the young-barely-man in the front pews.
“¡Martín!” He says but Martín is still focused on th papers. “¡Martín!” He tries again.
The younger girl and Mauri step beside him and the three of them sigh.
“Ok, on three.” The girl says and the other two nod. Mirabel now feels extremely out of place. “One, two , three!”
“¡TÍO MARTÍN!” The three cousins, apparently, yell at the same time and the yet-to-be-man that cna’t be older than Luisa turns around.
“¿Qué?”