Ximena saw a woman who seemed to be in her late forties. She looked at Ximena in confusion, as if it was strange to see her here. The wrinkles on her face were a gift given by time. Since she looked puzzled and was frowning, the lines on her face looked much more apparent at the moment.
Ximena looked at her and then glanced at the bunch of white daisies that were in her hand. "You are?" she asked bewildered yet politely.
The woman walked over to the grave-site and placed the daisies in front of the headstone of Ximena's parents. She then took out a cloth that she had brought with her and began wiping the dust from the headstone. "This is the final resting place of my older sister and her husband. Who are you?" she asked and then turned to glance at Ximena. When she saw the astonished expression on Ximena's face, she frowned slightly. "I had noticed flowers in front of their tombstone several times before when I would come here... Were those flowers from you?" she asked as she continued cleaning the headstone.
Ximena's eyes had been fixed on the woman the whole time. First, she was stunned to see her here, and then she felt confused by what the woman had said. After thinking for a moment, she said, "Your sister and her husband are buried here?"
The woman nodded with a small smile and answered, "Yes. Is there anything wrong?" She stopped wiping the tombstone and straightened her back. "The real question is... who are you?" she asked.
"I, I..." Ximena hesitated. Looking at the photos of her parents on the tombstone, she pursed her lips into a tight straight line. However, because there were too many unanswered questions and confusion in her heart, she didn't tell the woman who she was. Instead, she looked at the woman and said, "As far as I know, she didn't have a sister. Right?"
Upon hearing that, the woman's expression had suddenly become solemn. She stroked the tombstone gently as if deep in thought about something and then with a bitter smile on her lips, she mumbled, "It was quite a long time ago. Many things happened so long ago that they seemed to have been forgotten now..." She sighed deeply, without saying any more and then looked at Ximena. "It doesn't matter who you are. Thank you for visiting my sister and my brother-in-law. Sometimes I'm too busy and don't get the chance to come and visit them."
While she said that, the woman began to clear the plant litter and weeds around the grave.
Ximena watched what she was doing and didn't move. Instead, she regarded her quietly. Although Ximena couldn't be entirely sure, because she hadn't done a detailed investigation yet, either way, she didn't have any impression of this woman that could possibly be her aunt. Nevertheless, if that woman wasn't her mother's younger sister, then what was the reason for her being here?
With these thoughts playing on in her mind, she stepped forward and joined the woman, removing the weeds around the grave. At the same time, she engaged in small talk with the woman while she weeded. After chatting for a while, Ximena learned that the woman was working as a nanny for a family. She also found out that something had happened to her when she had been younger, and because of that incident, she had never married to this day. However, she didn't go into any details about what it was that had happened, so Ximena had no clue of what it could have been.
By the time they had finished and left the cemetery, it was getting dark, and the street lights were gradually beginning to turn on.
Ximena drove her roadster, heading to the urban area at a moderate speed. She had offered to give the woman a ride out, but the woman declined. She didn't want to inconvenience Ximena and said that she would take the last bus back. That being the case, Ximena hadn't insisted on driving her back.
While Ximena was thinking about the woman, her cellphone rang. After glancing at the screen on the phone, she pressed the key to answer the call.
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