Women in Blue – Rosa

By: Gladys Luna

María (Bárbara Mori), Ángeles (Ximena Sariñana) and Octavio (Miguel Rodarte) are gathered at Vicente’s (Antonio Trejo) house to read Rosa’s (Ángeles Cruz) diary and understand a little more about who appears to be The Undresser. It is like this how we are taken into a ride back to the past to where everything started. Rosa is talking to the Mother Superior Claudia (Talía Marcela) about her son Manolo  who has turned eighteen years old and left the house. Right that moment, screams can be heard coming from outside so the women run towards it to find out what is happening. Once they’re outside, Rosa sees one of the priests (Juan José Pucheta) screaming in pain while covering his eye that had been hurt by a kid named Benito (Leonardo Cervantes). The kid is hidden and still holding the knife he used to hurt the priest but Rosa manages to make him trust her and hand her the knife. Vicente recalls how Rosa couldn’t have kids so that is why she decided to adopt them and take care of them instead. María, Ángeles and Octavio check what used to be Rosa’s room and find a picture of her with Norberto (Juan Menchaca), a married man that used to date Rose and used to visit her every once in a while. Vicente tells them that when the man died, he went to his funeral but was kicked out by his wife who recognized him as one of the kids of her husband’s lover. Vicente shows them the notebook in which they used to draw when they were kids and shows them the monsters and strange creatures that Benito used to draw.

As the days passes by, Rosa notices that Benito won’t speak at all and would always have nightmares and pee the bed so, she talks to the Mother Superior about it and is suggested to admit him into a psychiatric hospital so they could help him but Rosa is convinced that with a bit of love and understanding, Benito would heal so, she promises herself that she would take care of him. Soon after, she introduces him to her other adoptive kids Camila (Ana Paula del Moral), Antonio (Oleg Mondragón) and Vicente (Jorge Briseño) and lets them know that he will be the new member of the family. That night, Rosa is giving Benito a bath as the same time that she takes the chance to get more information about his life but the kid remains in complete silence. Right then, Norberto shows up and tells Rosa that he’ll wait for her at her room and after he leaves, Benito splashes some water on the woman’s face showing his discontent but she believes he only wants to play. Once she tucks him to bed, she goes to meet Norberto who questions her about adopting another kid and the woman asks him to move in with her so they can raise the kids together but he reminds her of his marital situation. In the middle of the night, Rosa hears a scream coming from Benito’s room and she finds out he has just woken up from a nightmare. Something that makes the woman to want to dig further into the kid’s life to finally help him heal.

The next day, Rosa goes to the police station asking to allow her to have more information about Benito and his parents. At first, Agent Morales (Luis Gerardo León) refuses to provide her with the details she needs but soon, he changes his mind when the woman tells her what the kid has been going through. Morales explains that Benito lived with his parents Jacinta (Marcela Peregrino) and René (Leonardo Alonso) but the last one was an alcoholic and violent towards the mother, something that the kid was aware of. One night, after beating her, Jacinta decided to escape the house along with her son and start a new life. Soon, Jacinta started working at a water treatment plant; Benito would walk her every day to the bus stop and pick her up at the same spot every afternoon until one day, she didn’t show up. He waited for her until the night came and one of the bus drivers decided to give him a ride to the water plant in which the kid witnessed how his father murdered his mother and threw her into one of the tanks where her body was found later. That night, Rosa decides to go through his stuff to try to learn more about him but he catches her and she promises she would never do that again. Rosa feels sorry for the kid and decides to give him a chord therapy which consists in showing him how to bread the rope in order to keep his mind busy and sane. Much to her surprise, the kid soon becomes into a very great one at doing that.

Norberto visits Rosa again and this time, they are dancing in the room when suddenly, they hear someone is fighting; the couple runs out of the room and find out that Benito and Vicente are on the floor punching each other. Once they are separated, Vicente explains that Benito was spying on them so he wanted to give him a lesson. Rosa takes Benito to his room and tells him that maybe the Mother Superior was right and he needs to be admitted into a hospital and it is then when Benito finally decides to speak and tells her that he will say everything she needs to know if she allows him to stay and she agrees. Back to the present, Octavio believes that when someone has witnessed that kind of violence is nearly impossible not to end up doing the same but Ángeles immediately retorts saying that her parents were murdered in front of her and still, she does not hate anyone or is a murderer. María starts to feel overwhelmed by everything that is happening so she decides to go outside and get some fresh air. The woman is followed by Octavio who sits next to her by the house stairs and take out his flask to share a drink with her. They take the chance to talk about their kiss and María admits that although she knows it was wrong, it doesn’t feel like it but at the moment she is way too confused to make a clear decision about where she is going and she wouldn’t like to hurt him. Octavio says that she doesn’t have to worry about him since he is used to be in pain all the time and proceeds to tell his story about how his eleven months old baby died right under his watch just because he fell asleep. He still blames himself for it and feels that if he was not able to take care of his son, much less the city. They hug each other but then Ángeles comes out and tells them that she might have found something useful in the diary.

In the diary, Rosa explains how Benito is now seventeen years old and has grown fonder of the garden; she believes he had gotten better and that makes her happy until one day, he kills Vicente’s dog claiming that it attacked him. Vicente, who had never truly trusted him, only confirms that the guy is the devil himself. Rosa convinces him to make amends with his brother but he refuses and instead, he confesses that he knows Benito has been exchanging letters with his father who is now in jail and encourages to read them. Rosa searches Benito’s room but can’t find anything so, she goes to the place in which he spends most of his time which is the garden and it is there where she finds a box that contains all of the letters next to his parents’ picture. Benito catches her with the box in her hands and questions her about it. Rosa asks him if he was the one who told his father where him and his mother’s whereabouts and that if he knew what he was going to do to her and he confesses that he did so, Rosa slaps him and asks him to leave the house and he promises that he’ll leave in the morning then, she locks herself in her room and writes in her diary that she is afraid for her life. In the middle of the night, the roar of a thunder wakes her up so, she goes to the check on the others and when she goes to Benito’s room, she sees a note that says “the time has come”. The woman searches for him everywhere and Vicente, feeling that something bad is about to happen, goes straight to the police to tell them that his mother is in danger. When the police arrive to the house, they find Rosa’s body, with her hands tied up and her head inside a bucket of water but there are not traces of Benito. Although Vicente gave his mother’s diary to the police, he was still taken to give his statement since there was no one else there to blame. María suggests to inform Gerardo (Horacio García Rojas) about their findings as soon as possible before The Undresser kills again and once again, we see Gabina (Amorita Rasgado) enjoying the night at the city fair with Chava (Alejandro Guerrero).