-10 years ago-

"Mom, what's mint for?"

The gray-eyed woman smiled at her little daughter's curiosity. She had been asking for almost an hour about the usefulness of the various plants that adorned the front garden.

—It helps to heal stomach pain, like lemon verbena.

The six-year-old girl looked at her mother with admiration. She did not understand how she could know so many plants and how she could identify them all, for her the only difference she could notice between them was that some had a darker green and others a lighter green.

- Mommy, are you a witch?

The woman laughed at the idea of ​​the little girl and, before answering, put a lock of orange hair behind her ear. However, the unruly hair returned to its previous place hiding one of her daughter's large gray eyes.

"Of course not, do I have green skin and a big wart on the tip of my ugly nose?"

Monica placed a grain of dirt on the tip of her nose to pretend to have a wart and make her daughter laugh. The little girl pursed her lips in distaste and gave an innocent laugh.

"No ma ', but how do you know everything about these things ... In my books they say that witches made potions with plants." Also, you are always with that broom in your hands ...

The woman let out a soft laugh and held out her hand to the redhead. The sun was already setting and the next day her daughter had to go to school so she had to go to sleep early if she didn't want to see a crafty and angry red-haired pixie the next day.

"Leave that imagination for your dreams and let's go home."

The little girl obeyed her mother and gave her a smile.

"Okay, Mom."

Before entering, she plucked a white flower that grew between the space of one step and another at the entrance of her house, she would give it to her teacher the next day to see if, that way, she would stop being so angry because she forgot to do Tasks.

-Present-

Lia, which was how I called my best friend, looked around drowsily and confused, she looked at me for help, but I could only smile at her with pity. He reluctantly took his notebook, which had been closed for the whole class, and his case, which had served as a pillow, and gave the teacher a hateful look, then got up and left the room with a loud bang that woke the rest of the sleepy students.

History always bored her and, although I tried to wake her up by throwing paper balls at her as if it were a submachine gun, her sleep was too deep, not even an avalanche of paper could have awakened her.

The rest of the class passed slowly and bored, the monotonous voice of the teacher always invited the most absent-minded to sleep. Even those of us who were trying to pay attention, her voice took away the occasional yawn.

I was admiring the landscape outside the window when I heard the girl who sat next to me sobbing. I looked at her trying to remember her name, she was new and didn't speak much. She had Asian features, straight black hair, Cleopatra style, and porcelain-like skin. Kat. Her name was Kat. I moved a little closer to her to prevent the teacher from listening to us. I didn't feel like accompanying my best friend to the inspector. When I was close enough I spoke to him in a whisper.

- Are you okay, Kat?

The girl raised her confused gaze and looked into my eyes.

- Do you know me?

"Of course I know you, you sit next to me." I lied, I doubted that telling her that she couldn't even remember her name would help her feel better.

She smiled revealing uneven but extremely white teeth, like those in commercials.

-You're right.

- And why are you crying in history? I doubt it's because of Marie Antoinette.

She smiled again but a shadow of pain covered her gaze.

-Is nothing.

You could tell that whatever had happened to her was causing her a lot of pain, but if she didn't want to tell me I didn't have to keep asking, after all we had never exchanged more than a greeting and I doubt that I would tell a stranger her dramas It was helpful, so I gave him one last smile and refocused on the guillotine the teacher was drawing on the blackboard.

When the history class was finally over, I went to the inspector's room to join Lia. This room was too far from where I was, so when I arrived, Lia had already left the small room where Inspector López works and was waiting for me with a yellow paper folded in several places due to her nervousness, it was a summons to the attorney, of those that only occur in very special cases. It was like wearing a red A in times of the inquisition, but Lia wasn't worried about shame, what made her nervous was the possibility that her father would punish her and miss the appointment to the hairdresser that she had scheduled for a long time. almost a month.

"I don't know what's my fault that your classes are so boring." If her voice weren't so monotonous and flat I wouldn't fall asleep. Besides, she always talks about the same thing, I'm sure she doesn't know anything else about history other than "The French Revolution." I bet you that next year he will tell us about the amount of hair that Maria Antonieta had.

I laughed at her comment and found her right, we had been studying the famous revolution for almost three years.

We headed to the bathroom before re-entering the next class, Mathematics, another subject that invited you to fall into the arms of Morpheus.

"Now I'm going to have to stay after class this Friday."

In the hallway of the bathroom there was a curled-up girl who was crying profusely, she was alone and seemed not to notice our presence. What was happening to the girls in this school who were all crying? Was there a disease in the air?

I looked at Natalia, whose eyes were wide as a result of surprise, and we began to approach the girl carefully, she looked like an injured and scared animal. When I was close enough I stroked her back and spoke in a soft voice to which she responded with a start.

"Easy, what's wrong?"

The girl stopped her crying and began to sob more calmly although desperation kept coming through every pore of her body. She opened her eyes, which were red and irritated, and lifted her tear-stained face and ruined makeup.

"He ... He and he-she." I-she was my-my friend. My-my best friend-friend. She said between sobs.

-Calm calm.

He gave a heart-rending scream that made my hair stand on end.

"It hurts." I felt the blood leave my body, what if I was hurt? Maybe that was the cause of her crying. I looked over her body in search of blood that would reveal any wound but I did not find anything, although I could not see much either because she was lying on the floor in a fetal position, so much of her body was hidden. Scared, I spoke again.