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His name is Pedro Madrigal and he will never be an Mariposa, a butterfly. He’s born into the world on a grey march morning, sickly and small. His Mama says that she was sure he wouldn’t make it past the first night, let alone the first year of his life.
But somehow, he does. He is a sickly child and it’s not uncommon for him to be laid up in bed for weeks at a time from an illness. His Mama hovers over him a lot, making sure he’s okay and he appreciates it, he does but he feels smothered sometimes. He wishes Papa was around more but he was a fisherman and could be gone for weeks at a time, sometimes months.
He will say, he loves when she tells him stories, sitting by his bedside table and spooning him tales of knights, kings queens. Some from books, some made up in order to fulfil his need for stories. His favorite are the ones where the underdog becomes the hero and saves everyone. It makes him feel good, like he could be the hero that if he wasn’t so sick, but also jealous because he knows it won’t ever happen.
He tells his mother this once, in a fit of rage when he’s about 8 and to his surprise, she laughs which makes him mad. “How can you laugh at me Mama?” he cries. She kisses his forehead. “Mi oruga! You cannot do these things not because you’re unable to, you’ve simply haven’t emerged yet!”
“Emerged?” he asks, confused. “Si! From your cocoon! You are still forming! You’re not a mariposa yet.” He is confused, he is a boy, not a butterfly, or a caterpillar. She laughs, and says everyone is a caterpillar, until something in their life causes them to emerge from the cocoon and out into a mariposa. That will be him one day, he just needs to wait.
He asks her what it takes to emerge, curious and believing what he later thinks to be lies. She tells him it can be many things, an event in your life, meeting someone special, it varied from people to people. But everyone emerged sooner or later. Everyone.
That gives him hope, that maybe he can be a mariposa someday. He tells her this and she promises he will be. He just needs to get a little stronger.
But, he doesn’t feel like he ever emerges from the cocoon, still a caterpillar. He gets stronger and older, and with time his frequent sicknesses start to become rarer and rare. But he doesn’t ever feel like he’s changed, instead he feels like he’s a ghost, not quite real but he doesn’t know how to explain it to his parents. He tried to once, but then Mama looked at him oddly so he stopped, and assured her it was a joke.
He continues to grow, feeling out of place and just going through the motions. He becomes a carpenter, he decides he doesn’t like the sea and he needs a job. But it feels wrong, even though he is good at it. Then one day, when he is in his twenties, he thinks maybe he’s found the thing, or rather person that will make him emerge. He spies her across the town square, also up on a street lamp trying to see over the crowd, holding a candle. At that moment, he knows that he knows her, despite being the first time they ever met. He’s not sure how, but she’s familiar.
Her name is Alma Sánchez, and she and her family just moved there from Bogotá. She’s a few years younger than him, and not married as he finds when he approaches her, unable to stop himself. She’s definitely beautiful and she is forward and asks him, instead of it being him who asks, if he would like to have dinner. He says yes, not sure why.
It’s also the first time she appears, over Alma’s shoulder as they speak. She is but a wisp of glowing light, he can barely make her out. A girl, maybe in her teens dressed in a long blue skirt with a white blouse decorated with butterflies. Her hair is curly and short, cut to the chin. She’s there for only a second, and then she’s gone.
He and Alma start dating; it feels right, but also because he hopes she will let help him emerge. And because society expected it of him. A handsome bachelor like himself, with a good job and sweet as could be not being wed? That wasn’t right, they might think something was wrong with him. He briefly wonders, to his horror if he is homosexual, but he finds he’s not drawn to men so it can’t be that.
But Alma doesn’t cause his emergence, and it’s not her fault. He just can’t love her. Oh he did love her, just not like that. Each time he sees her, he feels like they met before but he can’t place it. His love for her reminds him of the love he has for his parents or grandparents. He asked his Mama once what falling in love was like and it didn’t feel anything like this.
Still, they wed as she is in love with him. By now he thinks that his Mama lied to make him feel better, and he’s not a oruga or maybe, he’s not able to emerge. Mama said everyone emerged but Pedro knows not all caterpillars survive the cocooning, some die. Alma gets pregnant, and he once again thinks briefly, maybe he will emerge. But their triplets are born, and he loves them but he can’t help feel like he doesn’t love them like a father should. He asks his father what it feels like, and it’s nothing like this. It’s a familial love, yes, but something is missing. Julieta though…there was something different about her from her siblings. Something special about her that would draw his attention, but he doesn’t know what it is.
He also sees the girl again, he told his mother when it happened the last time and she just smiled, and patted his hand, just saying that perhaps god was trying to tell him she was important. But how? He didn’t know.
His children are born and hours later they are running, Alma barely able to keep up having just given birth as they flee their home. Their friends and family are with them, though not all. Alma’s parents and siblings didn’t make it out of the town, and he didn’t know where his parents were.
Alma cradles the babies close as they move through the river. He can’t help but feel jealous, that he wishes he can love them like she did. But he can’t summon the feelings. The raiders are upon him and he’s scared, so very scared. Mama said that sometimes events, good or bad, will cause you to emerge. He pleads with the raiders, for their humanity, wondering if this will be the moment but instead he is killed, a blade piercing his heart.
His name is Pedro Madrigal and he never emerged from the cocoon. But Alma did. He realizes in the aftermath, watching the Encanto form, that his Mama had been right. People were just caterpillars and mariposas waiting to emerge. And his death, the birth of the children and this place, was her cocoon. The sweet, shy oruga cocoons into the stern, trauma filled mariposa who rules with a strict fist. He also realizes, or rather comes to the same conclusion as before, that not everyone gets to emerge.
It’s unfair, and he’s sad and a bit jealous. He watches the children grow, going from babies to infants, to toddlers to children. He still cannot place it, but something is different about Julieta. The love he feels for her is also different, she reminds him of his Mama and he doesn’t understand why. The children grow until, one day they are five and three glowing doors appear, one for each child.
They open the doors, and receive gifts. Despite what Alma thought, he wasn’t the one giving the gifts, he’s not actually sure where it comes from or how Casita was created.
Casita has become a good friend, they talk for hours upon hours, as he has no one else to talk to. He feels like he knows her from somewhere, but cannot place it. He is a ghost now, destined to haunt this home. But it still doesn’t feel right, he feels like he can’t even be a proper ghost. Something is missing.
“Good gifts, don’t you think?” she asks him. He agrees, mostly. He’s worried, about how Alma has changed since her emergence. He worries these gifts might be…too much for children their age. They were already starting to feel pressure to be perfect, even without this new magic at their disposable. But he has no choice, he has no influence over what is happening.
“They seem fine.” he says eventually. With the gifts, he realizes that they emerge from the cocoon, though they still have much growing to do, this will be the pivotal turning point in their lives. He feels jealous, again and it shows on his face. Casita laughs, a laugh he has come to know as she knows something he doesn’t. “What?” he asks. But she just says everyone emerges. He huffs, obviously not. He died. Casita just laughs again.
He sees her again, when Julieta opens her door. He’s surprised to see her, and even more surprised Casita sees her too, waving at her. “How do you know her?” he demands. Casita just shakes a tile, like she’s shaking her head. “Don’t you listen?” He never figures out what she means.
The children continue to grow, and though Bruno will go from sweet and shy to sullen and withdrawn, Pepa will become worried about her clouds and Julieta will always be overworked, the will stay relatively the same.
The age, get older, turning from children into teens and then into young adults. The girl does not appear again, not until the children are 16 years old and a family, trying to find a new home, stumble upon the Encanto, having climbed over the mountain. It’s a man, his wife and their two children. The girl, older than his triplets and the boy, slightly younger, by a year.
Alma is panicked when she sees them, worried they are raiders but quickly learns that while the civil war has ended (officially anyway) the country is still with strife and a great war, later renamed World War 1, was under way. They are refugees seeking a home, as their home had become too dangerous to live in.
They are welcomed, albeit hesitantly. And almost immediately, Julieta is forced to heal the poor boy with her food as he steps on a beehive (the tree it had been on had been downed by a storm), the day after he arrives. He is apologetic, but also instantly smitten with Julieta and her gift. Alma was worried outsiders might view their magic as the devils work, and try to condemn them but they see it as a miracle just like the rest of the town. He blushes and apologizes over and over, not able to stop himself from blushing.
He knows this boy, somehow. He should feel macho, territorial, like who is this boy talking to his daughter? But he doesn’t. Seeing them together reminds him of his Mama and Papa, and how Papa would blush when Mama was near. The girl appears by his side. She never usually pays him much attention, she just stares far ahead.
“Who are you?!” he screams. She doesn’t respond, but she does look at him with a smirk before vanishing.
Th boys name he finds out is Agustín, and he is in love with Julieta. And not long after, she is too. And like with Julieta, something is different with this boy, he’s important.
They grow, fall in love and become adults. Pepa meets Felix, or rather re-meets him as he’s a former classmate and rival turned lover and then husband, and Bruno hides away, choosing to swear off love. He’s worried about Bruno, he’s worried about all of them. But he fears, Alma and her need for perfection and obsession with knowing what could hurt them has caused a domino affect for poor Bruno. It’s not that he doesn’t want to wed, but because his reputation has made it so people avoid him or the only ones interested are those who hope marrying into the family will give them a gift. The prestige of being married to a Madrigal. It’s a sad truth, but Bruno seems resigned to it. Pedro wishes Bruno, any of them, never emerged when they did. They are not wild butterflies, dancing in meadows and in the sun. They are framed and part of a collection and Alma is the collector, forgetting that she was once a mariposa too.
His name is Pedro Madrigal, and he will never be a mariposa. And his children will only ever be mariposas that are framed and wings glued down for collection, not free to fly and be the great butterflies they were meant to be And now it’s happening with his grandchildren.
Isabela is the first grandchild born, beautiful and radiant to Julieta and Agustin. A beautiful babe, but she annoys him, some how. Something about her, even as a newborn grates his nerves. He doesn’t hate her, but rather there is…jealousy? Yes, jealousy. He’s not sure why. Little Dolores, shy and sweet is born a week later. He likes her but he feels like he doesn’t know her well. With each birth, she appears, just for a moment.
They get their gifts, emerging from the cocoons to become part of the collection, or rather Dolores becomes a part of it. Alma wants to make Isabela a collector, like her. And Dolores, well she becomes trapped and glued down, but more importantly becomes her cousin’s shadow. Second best, often forgotten about. Then comes Luisa, Camilio each one following suit. He doesn’t understand why Alma wants to preserve them. They deserve to be free, wings untethered. He asks Casita to do something about it once, wanting to free them from the frames, not able to do it himself and she just said he will free them with time. How? He’s dead. He doesn’t know.
He is desperate to free them. Maybe if he frees them, he will emerge. He knows it’s foolish to think that, he is dead after all, how can he emerge? But something small, in the back of his mind clutches to hope. Something about Julieta, but he doesn’t know what even as he paces for hours upon hours trying to come up with the solution. It drives him mad, it drives him insane. He wants to die, he doesn’t want to be a ghost anymore.
His name is Pedro Madrigal, he will never be a mariposa, his children are forever part of a collection, and he is dying, for the second time. He thought he would be happy, but now he is scared. It starts off slow, he is walking through the courtyard when he spies Pepa and Felix, the latter rubbing her stomach. They were pregnant with Camilo, just about three months along when the first pulse hits. For a moment, he fades into nothingness, not existing and forgetting everything. Then he reappears, scared and confused.
“Casita! What just happened!” His best friend of over three decades, he turns to her for answers. She tuts, and wags a tile at him like it’s a finger and he’s a naughty kid. “It’s starting.”
“What’s starting. I don’t understand!” he begs and pleads.
“The cocoon, you silly boy!” He doesn’t understand, why can’t she just tell him. He tries to but she won’t tell him. He’s scared. He’s so very scared. It happens again a few days later, growing steadily more frequent as time passes.
And then something different happens, he starts forgetting things. He looks at Julieta and can’t remember her name, or he looks at Alma and thinks she’s not his wife. He’s going crazy, he decides. It seemed even in death, he was made to suffer.
A month after the first pulse, Julieta and Agustín hold a small party in the heart of Casita. “We’re pregnant!” they say to everyone’s shock. Everyone was positive that after Luisa being a breech birth and Julieta nearly dying from blood loss, they weren’t going to have another, stopping at two. And they had meant to stop at two, but God had given them a miracle, this baby was unplanned but welcomed.
The girl reappeared once more, hands behind her back. “Who are you?” she never responded before. “A better question to ask is….who are you?” she asked in reply this time. What? That made no sense, he was Pedro Madrigal! He told her that. She laughed “Are you sure?” she said before vanishing.
That was infuriating. Casita was no help as always. As the months passed, the pulses were getting more frequent, and she was staring to appear more and more, dancing around the house or singing little songs.
“Who are you?” was always replied with: “But who are you?”
Pedro Madrigal is mad, dying and crazed. And he doesn’t understand it. And then, it’s night, March 5 going on to 6th when the pulses start happening in quick succession, one after another.
The pulses racked his body, and for brief moments he ceased to exist, forgetting everything. When he reappeared, the girl was always there, watching him with a, knowing gaze.
“Casita! Please, I’m scared! I can’t do this anymore, tell me what’s going on!” he screams.
Casita would roll her eyes if she could “Aye! I don’t know how you can be so dense! I’ve told you time and time again, everyone emerges from the cocoon eventually!”
“That…I’m dead Casita!” Why is she doing this? Casita laughs that laugh, and it’s so infuriating.
“Are you? Are you really?”
“Yes! Of course I am! I am a ghost!”
“But your heart is beating!” What? What is Casita talking about? Her heart isn’t….her heart can’t….why can she feel her heart beat? Pedro shouldn’t be able to feel it, and yet it pounds within him, the pulsating consuming her.
Wait…
Her? She wasn’t a girl.
“It’s nearly time.” Casita tells her…him?
That’s…what’s happening? She looks down at her hands and instead of the rough, calloused hands she’s used to, they’re small and dainty.
“Casita?” Pedro, is so scared. The house doesn’t respond, instead there is chaos all around her as the door to Julieta’s room is thrown open and Agustín screams into the courtyard.
“It’s time! Casita wake up Pepa and Alma! We don’t have much time, the baby is coming quick!”
The Baby?
She’s moving on autopilot, phasing through the walls until she’s right beside her. Julieta is propped up in bed, panting heavily as she clutches her stomach. Below her is a pool of bodily fluids, her water having broken. Within minutes, Pepa and Alma are there, helping to start the process. The contractions are coming fast and hard. It’s going to be a fast birth. Julieta cries out in pain with each one, gripping the bedsheets tightly with Agustín by her side. Alma murmurs soothing words, wiping the sweat from Julieta's brow, while Pepa coaches her through the breathing exercises.
Pedro watches in a daze, her heart pounding in her chest. Why does it feel like she is being hurtled towards something?
“You’re nearly here…Mirabel.” says Casita.
The words echo in Pedro's mind as he watches the scene unfold before him. Mirabel. That's her name. But how can that be? He was Pedro, a man who died long ago.
“Who am I….What am I?” she asks Casita.
“A mariposa leaving her cocoon! I told you bebé, everyone turns into a mariposa, but the cocoon is different for everyone! For some it’s an emotional or situational thing, others though the only way to become the Mariposa is to change on the outside!”
In that moment of realization, she understood the truth. Pedro Madrigal was never a real person; he never existed to begin with. She wasn't a caterpillar who never emerged from her cocoon; Pedro WAS the cocoon, and by extension Julieta. Everything she did as Pedro, meeting Alma, having Julieta happened so she could get to this next part.
“Mama, I’m scared.” she says again, eyes wide in fear. Mirabel is trembling as she starts to feel a pull, tugging her towards Julieta.
“Don’t fight it! You’re nearly here! This is your moment Mariposa!”
Julieta screams as a contraction hits, they were coming faster and harder now. Mirabel felt herself being pulled towards the bed, towards Julieta, as if gravity itself was drawing her in.
“Mama…”
“Shhh, don’t worry Bebe. Go to her.”
“What do I do Mama? I don’t want to forget you.”
“Aye, my bebé. This is who you were always meant to be. I am proud to have helped you to this next stage. You may forget me, but you’ll never lose me.”
The pull is strong now, and she is fading in and out of existence with every second. She can see her head beginning to crown as her mother pushes with all her might to bring her into the world. It’s taking everything not to give in.
Her mother? Yes…Mama.
“But-”
“Go. Emerge. You are lucky, you are emerging as a fully formed Mariposa. You, who can never be trapped or glued down. Free them Mirabel, show her how to let them go.” With a cry, she gives in to the pull, as she bursts through the cocoon.
She emerges with a cry, the world bursting into focus around her. Everything was bright and loud, overwhelming her senses. She screams like she’s being murdered.
“Girl! You have another girl!”
She cries and screams as hands touch her, rubbing cold things across her skin. She is scared and wants it all to go away. But then something is wrapping around her, and it reminds her of home and she looks up to see a face looking down at her and she feels so happy.
“My Mirabel! My beautiful bebé!” Julieta cries as she holds her close.
On March 6, 1935 at 12:34 in the morning, Mirabel Madrigal finally emerges from her cocoon, after more than sixty years of waiting.