Dependence

Throughout this story I was thinking a lot about dependence. As I was reading, I found myself trying to figure out which characters depended on which other characters. At first I thought (and partially assumed) that Senora Consuelo was dependent upon Aura, as Senora is very old and needs help with many things. Then as I continued reading, I began to believe the roles might be reversed. Aura, when talking about Senora, said, “She loves me. She sacrifices herself for me” (123). Therefore Aura made it seem like she relies on Senora, not the other way around. However, I’m inclined to believe this is a case of codependence. Whether Aura is real or not, Senora still depended on Aura to bring her a sense of youth, beauty, and energy. Aura depended on Senora for life because Senora is her reality. Aura mentions this on page 23 when she says to Felipe, “She has more life than I do”.

            Many parts of this book are very strange and confusing. After I finished reading, I was very unsure of who was who and what was really going on. However one thing that was clear, along with dependence, was a sense of love. Love was evident in the novel between Aura and Senora, Senora and General Llorente, and Aura and Felipe. If two people that love each other, they will make sacrifices for the other person, and this is what stood out to me in the story. It is important to note that being in love always involves some degree of dependence on one another. Therefore, those two ideas really go hand in hand.