Esperanza’s father comes to her early in the morning to tell her that his father has died. He cries in her arms. She knows that he will have to take a flight to Mexico in order to be with his brothers and sisters for the funeral. As the eldest, she will have to tell the rest of the family the news and make sure her siblings don’t disturb their father for the day. She thinks about how sad she would be if her own father died, and she continues to “hold and hold and hold him” (56). 

Aunt Lupe was once a beautiful woman with swimmer’s legs, but Esperanza only knows her aunt as a sick woman with withered legs. Esperanza tries to determine why some people get sick with disease and others do not. She doesn’t know why, but she knows that Aunt Lupe has been sick so long that everyone is used to it. Lupe is mostly bed ridden, blind, and her dark apartment is filthy. Esperanza hates to visit her alone, but she takes her library books and reads to Aunt Lupe. She even reads Lupe her own poetry. Aunt Lupe tells her that her poetry is good: “That’s very good…You just remember to keep writing, Esperanza.