I. The Broken Miracle (October 11th, 2003)
In a Colombian town where the river whispered lullabies beneath a sky of shy stars, twenty-eight-year-old Johana Vides López gave birth to Jhoset Arias Vides on October 11th, 2003. Years of silent losses—pregnancies that faded like whispers in the fog, nights of muted crying—turned Jhoset's first cry into a beacon that cut through the darkness.
Johana, with her prematurely white, almost silver hair falling in soft waves over her shoulders and her light-blue eyes, heirloom of a half-European lineage thinned by generations, looked at her son with a tenderness that seemed to defy the world. Manuel Arias, thirty-two, his gaze hardened by years of work on the land and a heart burdened by farewells, held Johana's hand as if anchoring an eternal future.
Still fragile, Jhoset was born with the thick black hair of his paternal grandfather and the slightly sharp eyes of Manuel, a distinctive trait of the Arias—stubborn men who seemed to carry the earth in their skin. In the room lit by a flickering kerosene lamp, Johana cradled Jhoset while the wind brought in the sweet scent of guayacán trees.
> "He's our miracle," she whispered, her voice trembling with love.
Manuel, with a rare smile softening his features, nodded.
> "Our piece of heaven."
But October 11th, the date of his birth, already seemed to bear an invisible weight. No one noticed it then, but the crickets sang more softly that night, and the river carried a deeper murmur, as if fate had woven a thread of shadow alongside Jhoset's first breath.
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II. The Shadow of the Fourth Birthday (October 11th, 2007)
Jhoset's fourth birthday was meant to be a day of light. The house was decorated with red balloons tied to the iron gate; a flowered tablecloth covered the wooden table, and an empty box waited for the chocolate cake Johana had ordered.
Jhoset, with his messy black hair and eyes shining with excitement, ran around the yard on the wooden horse Manuel had carved with his calloused hands. Johana, her silver hair braided and tied back, laughed as she hung streamers; her laughter was like an echo of the river. Manuel, sleeves rolled up, winked at Jhoset:
> "Today you'll be the king of the town, little man."
Johana bent down and kissed his forehead.
> "We'll bring the cake in a bit, my love."
Jhoset, smiling wide and showing the gap of a missing tooth, nodded and hugged his wooden horse.
But October 11th, a date that should have been a celebration, brought a cruel shadow. Johana and Manuel left in their old truck to pick up the cake in the neighboring town, Johana's laughter still echoing inside the house.
Hours later, the phone rang. Silvia, his maternal grandmother—hands calloused, gaze gentle—answered with a calm that shattered as soon as she heard the words: a crash at a curve, a reckless driver, twisted metal. Johana and Manuel would not be coming back.
Silvia dropped the phone, her hands trembling like leaves in the wind. She found Jhoset in the yard, rocking on his wooden horse, and knelt in front of him.
> "They're resting now, little one," she said, her voice breaking. "In a very beautiful place."
Jhoset, his eyes wide and confused, pointed at the table.
> "What about the cake?"
Silvia wrapped him in an embrace, her heart breaking under the weight of the merciful lie. Silence settled over the house, heavier than the night, and the date October 11th began to whisper an omen no one dared to name.
It hadn't been abandonment; it was fate putting out the lights Jhoset loved most, as if his birth were tied to death.
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III. The Refuge of Words (2007–2013)
Silvia and Pedro, the grandparents, became Jhoset's entire world. The cracked-tile house smelled of freshly baked bread, of wax polish on the furniture, and of the earthy scent of the yard where a guayacán tree grew.
Silvia's rocking chair, placed by the window, creaked in rhythm with the afternoons as she knitted scarves from colored yarn that caught the light of the setting sun. Jhoset, sitting cross-legged on the floor, played with leftover strands of yarn, imagining they were threads of clouds.
Silvia, her gray hair tied in a bun and her eyes wrinkled by smiles, sang him folk verses—stories of impossible loves, rivers that spoke, forgotten heroes.
> "You'll have your own story too, little one," she would say, stroking his black hair.
> "Will my story have dragons?" five-year-old Jhoset asked.
Silvia laughed, her laughter like an echo of Johana's.
> "If you want, it'll have every dragon in the world."
Pedro, his paternal grandfather, was a man of contrasts. A former high-ranking soldier, with scars that spoke of battles he never described, he had traded his uniform for books.
His wooden chest, kept in a corner of the dining room, was full of worn spines: adventure novels, poetry collections, ancient myths. Every afternoon he sat with Jhoset under the guayacán, reading aloud in a deep voice, inventing accents for knights and kings.
One night, beneath a sky sprinkled with stars, Pedro opened a dusty book and told a fable:
> "The Vidae, ancient kings, ruled a world where the stars obeyed the marks carved into their skin. Funny, isn't it? Sounds a lot like your mother's last name—Vides."
Nine-year-old Jhoset traced an imaginary line on his wrist.
> "What if I have a mark like that?" he asked.
Pedro smiled, though his clouded eyes carried sadness.
> "You'll find it, little one. The stars always call their own."
Those nights beneath the guayacán became his refuge. Silvia taught him to grind coffee; Pedro took him to the river at dawn to skip stones.
> "Every bounce is a wish," he'd say.
And Jhoset wished for his parents to return.
But even in those peaceful moments, the shadow of his birthday lurked. Every October 11th, Silvia and Pedro exchanged tense glances, afraid the date might claim something again.
Jhoset kept writing anyway, though his verses darkened with questions:
> Why does the sky go silent when I blow out the candles?
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IV. The Emptiness of Dates (2014)
On October 11th, 2014—his eleventh birthday—Jhoset woke up expecting a special day. Silvia had promised a vanilla cake, his favorite, and spent the morning kneading dough in the kitchen. Pedro chose a new book, promising a story about star knights.
Jhoset helped hang garlands in the yard. But the house was too quiet.
At noon, he found Silvia in her rocking chair, motionless, the half-finished scarf in her lap. Her hands, always warm, were cold.
Jhoset's scream shattered the silence.
Pedro tried to fill the void, but his voice lost its warmth. Two months later, grief swallowed him too—Jhoset found him beneath the guayacán with an open book on his chest.
At eleven years old, Jhoset lost his refuge.
His birthday had claimed another life. The neighbors whispered:
> "That boy, born in October… he carries a shadow."
And Jhoset began to wonder if they were right.
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V. The Poisoned Inheritance (2015)
Silvia and Pedro's will left half their belongings to Jhoset, locked away until adulthood, with a monthly stipend for his guardian. The news awakened greed among relatives who gathered like shadows.
None wanted to care for an eleven-year-old boy.
His maternal grandparents, living in Europe, called through a crackling phone line:
> "We love him, but we're old and sick… we can't bring him here."
Their promises of letters faded like echoes across the ocean.
A line formed in Jhoset's notebook:
> Everyone leaves, and the river never brings them back.
In the end, Lauren—a distant aunt—volunteered. Her smile was sharp. She promised stability, but her eyes revealed the truth: she saw Jhoset as a monthly check.
He was dragged away from the guayacanes and the river and taken to an apartment in Bogotá's Kennedy district.
The bus ride blurred into a landscape shifting from trees to concrete.
And the shadow of his birthday followed him.
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VI. Shadows in the City (2015–2019)
Lauren's apartment was a cold, white-walled box that smelled of detergent.
In public, she was the devoted aunt. In private, she monitored expenses like a drill sergeant. Her sons, José and Ángel, were her pride—Jhoset was an unwanted obligation.
At home, insults flew freely.
Pages were torn from his notebooks. Bruises were dismissed as "accidents." Teachers looked away.
Jhoset hid in the library, escaping into fantasy books—worlds where heroes mattered, where loneliness wasn't a curse.
But each year, October 11th whispered tragedy.
And at fifteen, Jhoset wondered if his existence truly brought death.
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VII. Nicole, a Fragile Haven (2019)
Nicole arrived in his life like a beam of sunlight piercing clouds. With her ponytail and easy smile, she sat next to him during recess and asked about his book:
> "You like this one? I do too."
Her warmth scared him more than cruelty ever had.
Still, she stayed.
She shared food, books, and small moments under a dead tree.
> "If you could have any power, what would it be?"
> "Flying," he murmured. "So I could go far away."
Nicole hid her growing affection, a quiet love he never noticed.
But fear made him withdraw.
And a fragile refuge began to crack.
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VIII. The Feared Betrayal (October 9th, 2019)
Rumors spread—José and Ángel planned to humiliate him.
Jhoset's fear twisted reality: what if Nicole was part of it?
It wasn't true, but trauma blinded him.
Behind the gym, she asked:
> "Are you okay, Jhoset?"
> "I'm fine."
That night, he wrote:
> Smiles lie, and the heart shatters.
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IX. The Scream in the Classroom (October 11th, 2019)
On the morning of his sixteenth birthday, Jhoset broke.
Nicole tried to reach him:
> "Why won't you talk to me?"
> "I don't want you to hurt me."
In the yard, he snapped.
He confronted his cousins, lashed out, and was beaten to the ground. Nicole threw herself over him, screaming:
> "Don't touch him!"
But Jhoset was already gone inside.
Broken by fear.
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X. The Bridge of Ashes (October 11th, 2019)
At sunset, rain fell like liquid ash over the Bridge of the Martyrs.
Jhoset gripped the rusted railing, the Bogotá River whispering oblivion below.
He opened his notebook:
> Sink into silence, where the stars can't find me.
He remembered Pedro's stories of the Vidae.
Silvia's humming.
Nicole's smile.
But fear drowned all warmth.
> "I don't want to go on," he whispered.
He let go.
But before the river claimed him, a light flashed—alive, like a heartbeat of stars.
And a soft voice echoed in his mind:
> "Not yet, our son."
Reality trembled.
Magic breathed.
The world shifted.
---
XI. Echoes of Loss
News spread: a body had been found.
José and Ángel faced their cruelty.
Nicole collapsed, her scream torn from a love she never confessed.
Silvia's chair rocked in the wind.
Pedro's stories stayed locked away.
Jhoset's verses drifted downriver—an epitaph with no witnesses.---