The Return
The private jet touched down on Santiago’s runway like a whisper—an elegant ghost cutting through the morning fog. Sebastián Ferrer stepped out, his expression unreadable behind the tinted sunglasses. At forty-five, he was a man who had built empires out of numbers and glass.
Once a boy from southern Chile, now an international magnate with offices in Hong Kong, New York, and London.
His life was immaculate—steel, marble, and silence. His success had become his armor, and loneliness the price he paid willingly for it. He hadn’t seen his parents, Manuel and Carmen, in nearly six years.
Calls were rare, short, and always ended with his mother saying, “We’re fine, son,” even when he knew it wasn’t true. To ease his guilt, he had done what he did best—throw money at the problem.
He had sent half a million dollars to his cousin Javier, with simple instructions: “Build them the best house in the village. Make sure they have everything they need.” That morning, when a massive deal in Asia fell through, Sebastián suddenly found himself with forty-eight free hours—an anomaly in his perfectly calculated life.
From his office window, he looked out toward the snow-covered Andes and felt something strange—nostalgia, though he mistook it for boredom.
He wanted to see the house he’d paid for, to see his parents living in comfort. Without telling anyone, he made an impulsive decision. No chauffeur, no assistant.
He took his matte-black Mercedes G-Wagon, entered the address of his hometown into the GPS, and began driving south—toward a past he thought he’d outgrown.
The Storm
The highway soon narrowed into winding roads, then rough gravel paths. The dry Santiago skies darkened to heavy gray, and soon the rain began—a southern storm, fierce and endless.
As the rain pounded against the windshield, memories came flooding back. The sound of water dripping from leaky ceilings, the smell of wet firewood, the constant chill of damp clothes.
He had once promised himself he’d never feel that kind of cold again.
He smiled arrogantly. Not anymore, he thought. His parents were probably watching the rain through a double-glazed window in a new, warm home.
He was about to see proof of how far he’d come.
But when he reached the village, everything felt smaller, duller, poorer than he remembered. The once colorful wooden houses were now gray and worn, the streets thick with mud. He turned into the old street where he’d grown up—expecting to see a bright new house.
The story doesn’t end here –
it continues on the next page.
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