Book 1- The Outsider to Encanto

Chapter Twenty-One: What Else Can They Do?

Julieta finished putting out the dishes of food and Pepa poured the three of them a glass of wine each.

"No husbands, no brother, no kids, no Mamá screaming at me to calm down every five minutes," Pepa listed. She laid back on the blanket, wine in hand.

"Pepa," Julieta said.

"What?"

Catherine hid her smirk by taking a sip of wine.

"This is relaxing," Pepa continued.

"Your gift must be exhausting," Catherine said. "Both of you."

"That's sweet of you to say," Julieta said. "But all I have to do is cook."

"But all the time? I feel like I never see you do anything but eat, cook, and give food out to the village but even then you've got a small fire going beside you in case you need to make more."

"She has a point, Juli," Pepa said. "You work too hard."

"It also mustn't be easy when your every emotion affects the weather," Catherine said.

"Meh."

She sounds like her brother when she does that. "I can imagine how tiring it must be. Have you ever thought of just, letting go? You know, just let yourself feel what you feel?"

"I can't let that happen, the encanto will never recover. I let myself feel what I feel, and suddenly there's a hurricane."

Catherine went back to drinking her wine as Pepa calmed herself down.

"Hm... Catherine?" Julieta said after a momentary silence. "Tell me, what do you think of our Brunito?"

Catherine suddenly felt cornered. Backed into a wall with two weapons of mass destruction aimed at her head.

Pepa laughed and sat up.

"I didn't think it was possible for her to become any more white!"

"Please, don't misunderstand, I just want to know where you two are up to in the future Bruno has seen."

"Oh," Catherine muttered. "Well, I mean... I don't really want to talk about Bruno to his sisters."

"And I don't want to talk about Bruno," Pepa said. "I want to know about cultural differences. I'm curious! The biggest difference between London and Encanto? It was London, right?"

"Right," Catherine said. She took a moment to think. Biggest difference... "The music and want to celebrate everything was a shock. How close you all are to your families..."

"You're not close to your family?" Julieta asked. "Oh! Sorry, I just remembered..."

"Yeah, mine's dead," Catherine said. "But even before we weren't that close. You're not likely to come across a house with three generations living under one roof let's put it that way. Not impossible, I'm sure some people do! But also, not very common. Oh! The men!" Catherine exclaimed. Pepa and Julieta's eyes went wide and they giggle.

"What do you mean?" Julieta asked.

"Men in Colombia are very... intimate to put it delicately. Don't get me wrong, I like it. It's the best time of my life, but ah... it would never happen like that in London. Back home it's 'don't talk about it, don't think about it, certainly don't act upon it'. The only proof there should be of it happening is a married woman's growing stomach. Here it's... well... They're gentleman back home in their own way, but they're also gentlemen here in their own way."

"She just spoke about Bruno without actually talking about Bruno."

"And you're his sisters. Oh my God," Catherine buried her face in her hands and pulled her knees to her chin. The ground can swallow me now, please.