“He threw her out into the street while she was pregnant, believing she had been unfaithful: 10 years later, a red light showed him 4 pairs of eyes identical to his own and he discovered the truth that brought him to his knees.”

But the real challenge wasn’t the law. It was them.

They went to get the girls from the small tenement room where an elderly neighbor looked after them at night. When the luxury car stopped in that rough neighborhood, people came out to watch.
Mauricio got out, followed by Victoria.
Upon seeing their mother, the four girls dropped their old toys and ran. The impact of four small bodies against Victoria almost knocked her over. They cried, shouted “Mama!” in a cacophony of pure love that made Mauricio feel like the biggest intruder on the planet.

He stayed behind, by the car, feeling unworthy to breathe the same air.
Then Valentina, the eldest, broke away from the hug and looked at him. Then she looked at her mother.
“Mommy… who is he? He’s the man who bought us gum yesterday.”

Victoria wiped her tears, stood up, and looked at Mauricio. It was an eternity. She had the power to destroy him right then and there, to tell him he was a stranger, a driver, a nobody.
But Victoria saw the raw regret in the eyes of the man she had once loved. She saw the gray hairs he hadn’t had before, his defeated posture.
She sighed, making a decision that would change everyone’s fate.

“Girls,” Victoria said, her voice trembling but firm. “Do you remember when I told you that Dad had gone very far away and didn’t know how to get back?”
The four of them nodded, their eyes wide.