Alina wasn't prepared for the impact. The little girl slammed into her, and she fell backward onto the pavement. She instinctively twisted, pulling the child into her embrace to protect her from the fall.
Seriously? she thought, dazed. Do I look that old? Even a little kid was mistaking her for a mother.
"Hey, little one, you've got the wrong person. I'm not your mommy." Alina paused, confused. Is it possible I look just like her mother? But she was wearing her black Santa Catalina school uniform. Anyone could see she was still a student.
"Waaaah! Mommy, don't leave me!" The girl's denial made her cry even harder, positive her mother was abandoning her. "Maya is so scared! I don't know why I'm at Lolo and Lola's house, waaaah!"
The little girl's voice was piercing. She grabbed a fistful of Alina's blazer and refused to let go.
Alina had zero experience with children. She awkwardly held the sobbing girl, patting her back. "It's okay, don't cry. What's your name? How old are you?"
"My name is Maya Alcantara, and I'm four years old! Don't you remember, Mommy?" Maya looked up, her big, dark eyes swimming in tears. The mommy in front of her looked so much younger, and her eyes were looking at her like she was a stranger.
The girl's repeated "Mommy" was starting to give Alina a headache. And she had the same last name. As far as she knew, no other Alcantara families lived in this village.
Alina turned to the helpless-looking driver. "Mang Ben, please go to the security gate. Check the CCTV footage, see how she got in. And ask if anyone has reported a missing child."
"Yes, Ma'am. Right away."
After Mang Ben left, Alina lifted the little girl into the back seat of the car. She wet a tissue with her water bottle and gently began to clean the scrapes on the girl's knees.
"No more tears, okay? You're a little mess. Maya, do you remember your mommy and daddy's names?"
Maya nodded her head vigorously. "I remember! Mommy is Alina Alcantara, and Daddy is Joaquin Revilla."
Alina's heart stuttered. She knew her name. How could that be a coincidence? But... Joaquin Revilla? Alina didn't know anyone by that name.
"Alright, Maya. Let's test your memory again. If you answer all my questions, I'll give you a little prize, okay?" She had to get more information from this child.
"Okay!" Maya answered brightly.
Alina asked, "Besides your mommy and daddy, who else is in your family? Like... your grandparents?"
Maya held up her small fingers and began to count. "Lolo is Ricardo Alcantara, and Lola is Lilia-Anne. Oh! And my Tita, Tita Anna! This is Lolo and Lola's house. I remember... there's a little bird statue in the garden. I don't know my other lolo and lola's names. Daddy said they went somewhere very, very far away and are never coming back."
After she finished speaking, she blinked innocently and held out her hand, as if waiting for her mother's reward.
Alina stared at her, dumbfounded. All the information matched. She subconsciously looked around. Was someone deliberately playing a prank on her with this child?
Maya held her hand out to her, her eyes full of expectation.
Alina didn't have any toys to give a child. She felt the chocolate bottle in her pocket and simply gave it to her.
"Oh! It's Daddy's favorite chocolate! Mommy, you brought it!"
Maya recognized the brand. She happily twisted the cap off and poured one of the small candies into her hand.
Usually, her daddy was very strict with her. He could eat a lot of them himself, but he never let her have more than one. Stingy!
Now that Daddy wasn't here and Mommy was distracted, she could eat a few more.
Maya stole a glance at her mother. Seeing that she wasn't watching, she poured several more into her little hand. She stuffed them all into her mouth, her cheeks puffing out like a hamster's. But a second later, her little face wrinkled up.
So bitter! Why is it bitter?!
Alina was completely preoccupied and didn't pay much attention to Maya's reaction.
"Alina? Why are you standing outside by yourself?" The family's househelp, Mrs. Leonor, spotted Alina outside the gate as she was taking out the trash.
She opened the gate. "Sir and Ma'am are waiting for you inside. They were just asking me what time it was, wondering why Ben hadn't brought you home yet."
Maya looked up with a knowing expression. "It's Mrs. Leonor! Did Grandmother tell you I was coming today? I want to eat those fried quail eggs!"
Alina heard her clearly say Mrs. Leonor's name. She even knew she was the family's househelp, in charge of cooking and cleaning.
"Mrs. Leonor, I found this little girl at the gate. I sent Ben to the security post, but he's been gone a long time. Can you go find him for me?" Alina said.
Alina couldn't figure out whose child this was. It was getting dark. It was best to just bring her inside and let her parents handle it.
Maya gripped her mother's hand tightly, afraid that if she let go, her mommy would run away and abandon her again.
The villa had a digital keypad lock. To get in, you had to enter the code.
Alina asked her, "Maya, you said you've been to your Grandfather and Grandmother's house before. Why don't you enter the password?"
Maya nodded. She stood on her tiptoes and pressed a series of numbers on the keypad.
Click. The code was correct. The lock disengaged. Maya grabbed the handle, pushed the door open, and cheered.
Lilia-Anne, hearing her younger daughter arrive, called out from the living room. "Why are you so late? Go wash your hands, dinner is getting cold."
Ricardo Alcantara put down his newspaper. He saw his daughter's disheveled appearance and frowned. He was just about to scold her when he noticed the small child standing beside her.
"Why did you bring a child home? Who is she?"
"Hi, Grandfather! Hi, Grandmother!" Maya waved at them proactively.
In the past, her grandparents would have happily rushed over to hug her. But today, they just stood there, frowning, as if they didn't recognize her. She got scared and hid behind her mother.
"What is she saying? Alina, what is the meaning of this? I expect a reasonable explanation," Ricardo said, sitting in his chair, his voice radiating the full, unadulterated authority of a man in charge.
Even at home, his tone with his daughters was always like a command, often leaving them feeling suffocated.
Her older sister, Anna, hadn't been able to stand the suffocating family atmosphere. She was always fighting with their father. The moment she got into university, she supported herself with scholarships and part-time jobs, refusing to take a single peso from the family. After graduation, she never came home. Their father never said anything, and rarely mentioned her. Even when Alina tried to bring up her sister's new life, their father's expression remained cold.
After Anna left, their father's educational philosophy was transferred entirely to his younger daughter.
The restrictions on her life multiplied. Alina finally understood what her sister had felt. But her parents' control over her was even stricter than it had been with Anna. She couldn't just walk away so easily.
Alina explained, "I found her at the gate. Her name is Maya Alcantara. She said... she said I'm her mother. She knew everyone's names."
She wasn't an idiot. This simple information wasn't enough to prove any real connection to their family.
But it was just too strange.
The moment Lilia-Anne saw Maya, her expression changed to one of shock.
"Ric, look at this child. Doesn't she look exactly like Alina when she was little?"
On the shelf was an old photo of the two sisters. Lilia-Anne grabbed the frame and compared it. They were practically identical.
If someone was trying to mess with the Alcantara family, it wouldn't be easy to find a child who looked this much like Alina.
Ricardo said nothing. Just then, Ben returned.
"Sir, we checked with the guards. They said they didn't let any unauthorized people in, and they don't know where the child came from. We checked the CCTV footage. It seems... it seems the child just appeared out of nowhere. There was no adult with her. She's been wandering around the village for most of the afternoon."
Appeared out of nowhere?
Ricardo didn't believe that kind of nonsense.
"Maya, how did you get in here? Was there another adult with you?" Alina asked.
She answered honestly, "I don't know. I was supposed to go to school today. I was in my classroom, and then suddenly I was here, and my teacher was gone."
Maya put her small backpack on the floor, unzipped it, and took out a small toy train to show her mother.
"Look, Mommy! This is the present our teacher gave us. A little train. You press here and it moves all by itself." Maya demonstrated it for her.
The little train bumped into Alina's shoe. She picked it up to give it back to Maya, but she accidentally saw the small sticker on the toy. The manufacturing date read: 2050.
A toy manufactured fifteen years in the future? How was that possible?
An idea popped into Alina's head. "Maya, do you know what the date is today? The year?"
"I know! It's September 1st, 2050. It's the first day of school. Mommy and Daddy took me to kindergarten," Maya said.
Alina's brain shut down.
"That's enough! Fifteen years in the future? This is getting ridiculous!" Ricardo stood up. "Call the police. If we can't find this child's family, we'll hand her over to them."
Maya was startled by her grandfather and shrank behind her mother again. "Why call the police? Mommy and Grandfather and Grandmother are right here," she whispered.
Alina also privately agreed with calling the police. But after discovering just this morning that she was nothing but a villainess in a novel, her tolerance for the absurd had increased significantly. If this world was just a book, then bizarre things like this weren't so hard to accept.
"Dad," Alina said, looking up, "maybe... maybe Maya really is from the future."
Ricardo snorted. "Do you have any idea what you're saying?"
Lilia-Anne, always the peacemaker between her husband and daughter, stepped in. "Well, Ric, how many children in the world could possibly look that much like Alina when she was little? Maybe she really is related to us."
"Is this your secret illegitimate daughter?" Lilia-Anne asked, looking at her husband with a sharp, meaningful gaze. "Did you stage this whole drama to try and trick me?"