"Blanca por dentro, verde por fuera. Si quieres que te lo diga, espera," said Tío Chucho, winking.
(Her brain offered the innocent answer: un pan . But the dark whisper in her ear said: la vergüenza. No. That wasn't right either.)
Everyone laughed. But for Isabel, the laughter died the moment she saw him across the table. A new guest. He didn't laugh. He just stared at her, and whispered a different answer. An answer that made her face burn. That night, she couldn't sleep. The riddles followed her. adivinanzas mal pensadas
"Tengo cabeza redonda, sin cuello ni nariz. Y si me tocas suave, me pongo muy feliz."
And the answer wasn't a drum at all. Fin (o principio) "Blanca por dentro, verde por fuera
"¡Un pera!" shouted the cousin.
She didn't answer. She couldn't. Because her own mal-pensada notebook was burning a hole in her mattress upstairs, and in it, under the riddle of the drum, she had written his name. But the dark whisper in her ear said: la vergüenza
She wrote them down in a notebook she hid under her mattress. Each one was a trap. Innocent on the surface. A child's rhyme. But with a second meaning that slithered underneath like a worm in a ripe fruit.