Well I had to write an El Ratoncito Pérez story, didn’t I?

Thanks to @usedtobeguest123 for the prompt! Also I found this version of the original story and used it as reference, if anyone needs it. It’s super cute! Bruno finds out that his youngest sobrina missed out on a beloved tradition, and decides to fix it.

“No, that is not how it happened!” Pepa leaned forward in her chair, thumping her fist on the breakfast table. “I’m telling you, Bruno; Agustín didn’t break his leg on purpose. He’s clumsy, not stupid.”               “He totally did. I remember him telling me he did.” Bruno leant back in his chair, inhaling the smell of rich, dark coffee. How he loved coffee. “He was all like, ‘Nah, I don’t need a soft landing, Bruno. I-it’s all in the pursuit of love, of sweet Juileta…’”               “He did not say that.”               “Mmyeh, makes a better story than ‘ Agustín met the love of his life because he fell out of a tree onto her brother.’”

              “Mamá! Mamá, Mamá look!”               Antonio ran up to the table where his Mamá and tio were sitting, opened his mouth wide, and wobbled his front canine with his tongue. “Ah gah ah loof toof!”               Mirabel brought up the rear, squeezing her primo’s shoulder before sitting next to her tio. “We just realised it was wobbly and had to come tell you,” she said. “Any coffee left, Bruno?”               “Nope. Shoulda got here earlier, kid.”               “Tch, so selfish.”               Pepa sank to the floor, wrapping Antonio up in a huge hug and peppering his face with kisses, the tears welling up in her eyes before her knees hit the floor. “Ay, my baby! You’re all grown up! My hombrecito, my little buñuelo…”               “It feels really weird.”               “Stop moving it with your tongue, mi vida.”               “Ah, well,” Bruno said, sipping on the last of his coffee, “You’ll be getting a visit from El Ratoncito Pérez soon enough, I guess…”               Antonio and Mirabel looked at their tio; heads cocked, identical expressions on their faces. Mirabel inched forward in her chair. “El Raton…’”               “Who’s that, Mamá?” Antonio asked, looking up into Pepa’s face. “Do they live in town?”               Pepa winced.               “You know,” Bruno continued, leaning back in his chair with a nostalgic grin, “Ratoncito Pérez? Th-the little rat? I used to tell the kids about him every time they lost a tooth – I can’t believe you forgot, they loved that story! They were always so excited to see what he drew for them…”               “Bruno…”               “’coz, y’know, he leaves you a present in exchange for your baby teeth? Lives in a cookie box, with the little red satchel and the…wh-why are you looking at me like that, Pep?”               A tiny, grey cloud had appeared over Pepa’s head as she looked down at the floor, hands knotted in her dress. “Um, Bruno…we didn’t…I mean…”               She darted a look at her son, and covered his ears with her hands. “You were always the one who did El Ratoncito Pérez when the children were small,” she whispered. “After you…after you left, we, um…”               “I just gave my baby teeth to my Mamá,” came a small voice at Bruno’s shoulder. Bruno turned, heart sinking, to see Mirabel gazing into the middle distance, her expression blank. “She kept them in an old box of spices in her room. We painted it together.” She shook her head – just a tiny movement, almost more of a shiver. “So, everyone else got…they got presents, and a story, and I didn’t?”               “Oh. Oh, kiddo…”               At the sound of his voice, Mirabel looked at Bruno, a memory dawning in her eyes. “Camilo,” she began, and her voice cracked. “Um. He lost his first tooth just before I didn’t get my…um, like, the week before my gift ceremony. And he was so excited, I remember now…”               Bruno remembered that day. Camilo finding the little envelope under his pillow, showing everyone the little drawing inside that Bruno had done the night before, sticking it to the wall just above his bed. He’d drawn a tiny mouse-Camilo holding hands with El Ratoncito Pérez. His tiny curls and a big, wide smile with a gap in it. It was the last time he played that game with the kids before he went into the walls.               He wondered what had happened to that picture.               The cloud burst, slowly tinkling raindrops onto Pepa’s hair. “Mirabel…we didn’t –”               “No, Tia Pepa. It’s okay. It’s just another piece of magic that everyone else had. And I didn’t.”               Mirabel blinked hard, then stood up. “I’m gonna…I said I’d walk with Abuela into town today. I better go get ready.”               She pushed her chair out from the table, making an awful screech against the cobblestones, and walked away without looking back. Bruno watched her go, Antonio breaking free of his mother to run after her. Guilt lay heavy across Bruno’s chest; followed, quickly, by anger.               “Seriously, Pep?” he said, jerking his head to glare down at his sister. “You guys couldn’t even do that for her?”               She couldn’t look at him. “Bruno…it…it was your thing. We could never do it like you did. Your little drawings, the notes –”               “Then just put a coin under her pillow like everyone else in town does, jeez! She was a kid, Pepa, you guys didn’t think she deserved even that tiny bit of –”               “We didn’t want to replace you!”               “So that means Mirabel gets to suffer? Oh, wait; of course it did.”               Bruno stood up from the table. “Sorry, Pepa; I-I’m pretty mad at you and I don’t wanna shout. So, so I’m just gonna go.”               “Bruno –!”               “See you at dinner.” …

              She knew it didn’t matter. The family had been through so much together; grown so much together. So much had been forgiven, and talked over, and rationalised and analysed and swept under the rug. But still. It hurt.               Could you miss something you never even had? She’d barely known her Tio Bruno when she was small. And yeah, they were close now. He was – and she’d never say this out loud because it was kinda pathetic – probably her best friend. But she didn’t get to have his bedtime stories, or his hugs when she’d skinned her knee, or ticklefights or rides on his back. Everyone else had these touchstones of memory with him from their childhoods. She didn’t. It seemed there were a lot of things she didn’t get to have.               Mirabel had excused herself after dinner and spent the rest of the night reading the Family Book Club book up in her room until it was late enough that she could curl under the covers and close her eyes. For a long while, her brain was just a swirling mess of self-pity and sadness. Then, finally, she tipped over into the blank relief of sleep.               When she next opened her eyes, it was the middle of the night. The moon was full, and shining against her curtains, but everything else was thrown into shadow. She could hear her father snoring a few rooms down, the creak and shift of the house settling into itself. And something new. Scrabble-scrabble. Scrabble-scrabble. Scrabble.               Mirabel sat up, fumbling for her glasses. Her eyesight was, somehow, even worse than her Papi’s; everything was a mess of smudges without them.               In the middle of the floor was a shape. One of Antonio’s toys? How had that ended up in –               As she pushed her glasses into place, Mirabel realised it wasn’t a toy. It was a rat. A small, soft, mist-grey rat, with a miniature straw hat and – Mirabel’s chest tightened – a tiny red satchel, the strops looped over its front paws, stuffed with rolls of paper. The rat spotted her and turned its tiny head. Mirabel froze.               The rat scurried up the bedpost at the far left of her bed, making its way over the hills and valleys of her sheets until it was sitting on her knee. It sat up on its hind legs and looked at her, cocking its head this way and that, the moonlight caught in its beady, black eyes. Mirabel reached out one hand, and it snuffled at her fingers. It tickled, but Mirabel didn’t laugh. She barely wanted to breathe. This seemed like something from a dream, and if she made too loud a noise, she’d wake up.               The rat turned away from her, showing her the contents of its satchel. It squeaked, once, in an instructional kind of way. With shaking fingers, Mirabel took the scrolls of paper from the satchel, and laid them in her lap. With that, the rat gave her one last look, and was gone; down the bedpost, onto the floor, and lost in the shadows of her room. After a long, long moment, when her room fell quiet again, Mirabel leaned over and tugged the curtains open; just enough so she could read by the light of the moon. The first scroll, when she unfurled it, was no bigger than the palm of her hand.               ‘Dearest Mirabel,’ it read, ‘I must first apologise for the lateness of these missives. You see, I have been on a long and perilous adventure with my best friend, King Bubi (I shall tell you all about him in Letter #2). The terribly wicked cat, Don Pedro, dogged our steps at every turn (which was quite impolite of him, being a cat), and so I am only just now writing to you...’               There were so many letters. Each one had a new story, or a little drawing (her favourite one was of a Ratty Tio Bruno running away from a housecat who bore more than a passing similarity to Parce, Antonio’s jaguar friend), coloured in with coffee grinds and shaded with pencil. Mirabel spent the rest of the night hugging her knees, squinting as she read each story in turn, running her fingers over the small, untidy, familiar writing. She smiled a lot – pressing her hand to her mouth to stop the giggles – and often had to pause to wipe away a tear before it smudged anything she hadn’t read yet.               Just before sunrise, as her eyes were beginning to ache, she tucked the letters into her bedside drawer and snuggled down onto her pillow.               “Thank you, Ratoncito Pérez,” she whispered, closing her eyes again.

…

              Bruno woke up to a small, twitching nose pressing into his palm. “Wha…” he muttered blearily, before sitting up in bed, wiping the sleep from his eyes. Rosa sat on the edge of his mattress, her satchel wonky on her back, hat hanging off one ear. Bruno had been so pleased to find the old costumes tucked away with the rest of his stuff. He couldn’t remember how he’d made the hat.               “Hey, mi vida,” he murmured sleepily, gently removing Rosa’s outfit. “Did you have fun in your first starring role?”               Rosa was his ingenue; at only a few months old, she was just starting to learn the ropes of Bruno’s troupe of performing rats. She needed her big break. Plus, it was less likely Mirabel would recognise her. A little suspension of disbelief went a long way to make a really good story.               “C’mon,” he said, lying back down and letting Rosa make a temporary nest in his hair, “we can get a little more sleep before she wakes up.” If Mirabel was anything like her sisters, Dolores and Camilo, she would burst in here in, oh, about an hour or so, to show him her gifts from Ratoncito Pérez. And, just like the old days, he’d smile and ask questions and muss her hair and wish he had a big pot of coffee because it was really, really early, kiddo, can we do this at the breakfast table?               He couldn’t wait.

Baby Mirabel AU: Adults Nighttime Routine

* Julieta and Agustin : A+ parenting

* Wasn’t it obvious? This is their baby

* Julieta would take Mirabel into the room where Agustin was already change into his pajamas

* Julieta would pass Mirabel to her esposo

* Agustin face lights up whenever he sees her and with Mirabel in his arms he felt on top of the world

* The routine is simple Agustin would change her diaper

* He would then play airplane with her

* He loves doing it because it makes Mirabel laugh

* Her laugh is the cutest thing possible

* He would not put a shirt on her letting her just sleep in a diaper

* The little bow she wear throughout the day would be off

* He would let Mirabel try to crawl around the bed

* Or would go to one side of the bed and help Mirabel crawl towards him

* Julieta would come out change and with her hair down

* She would go towards the bed with a smile loving the sight she sees

* Agustin wouldn’t be Agustin without him falling out the bed and onto the floor

* Julieta quickly got to Mirabel first making sure she doesn’t fall out of the bed

* “Ay Agustin” luckily she had a spare arepa for this moment

* She gives him the arepa while holding Mirabel

* She puts herself and Mirabel under the covers while Agustin gets himself together

* Mirabel would take Julieta’s hand and play with it, slowly yawning as she wind down

* Agustin would get in too and would start to take a finger and drag it up and down her little legs

* The calming motion the parents put on her, made her more sleepy

* Mirabel falls asleep with the two looking at her

* On his birthday Agustin thank Dios everyday for having his daughters with him. He would walk towards the window and pull Mira close to his chest

* To smell see, feel, and hear her . Looking at her again so small and innocent makes him smile (Happy Birthday Agustín)

* Pepa and Felix: I went into their routine a bit before

* They still sing to her but they are very hands on

* Like the last couple , however they communicate with touch often times Mirabel fall asleep with them much quicker

* Especially since they tired her out faster

* Baby Mira likes watching Pepa brush her hair

* For Pepa it’s relaxing it also help that Mirabel looks so fascinated by it

* Felix would then scoop Mirabel up holding her with one hand

* Which causes Pepa to panic since she is so small

* Felix would laugh it off saying he did this to all of the kids, he just could do it with Mirabel again

* Mirabel loves it, she would grabs Felix’s hands and sit upright laughing

* Felix would then start to sing a slow song dancing with Mirabel in his hands

* Mirabel would babble, and he would pretend she is singing along with him

* Pepa laughs at it every time without fail

* These two would put Mirabel to sleep the fastest

* Bruno is oddly enough the only person who doesn’t need to be active to get Mira to sleep

* All he has to do is lay down next to her

* Mirabel can’t sleep without him

* He would tell all his telenovas

* It’s that simple and easy

* If he is not in the bed while she is trying to sleep Mirabel won’t sleep either

* Bruno’s sleepless nights is cure because he falls asleep along with her

* He also taps her belly in a rhythmic motion

* If he’s not tired she’s not tired and it can cause a grumpy baby

* And no one wants a grumpy baby no matter how cute she looks

* So Bruno is force to lay down, his thoughts don’t haunt him since his thoughts would turn to Mirabel

* Truly is beneficial for the both of them. Mirabel wants her tio next to her and Bruno gets some sleep

* Alma by accident is the one that keeps Mirabel up the most

* Alma is good at telling stories

* Mirabel pays the most attention to when she does

* Alma is also the only person who can get Mirabel to sit there while she change

* Mirabel is usually a wiggly baby which makes her staying still for anything difficult

* Alma would tell story after story, it would be until midnight when she realize she kept Mirabel up for so long

* Mirabel would babble so much she never yawn it’s after she is done telling that Mirabel yawn.

* There is no point to do anything else since Mirabel automatically goes to sleep

* Abuela would be the one to stay up even after Mirabel is sleeping, she probably sleeps the latest after checking everyone one more time

Happy Father’s Day and Juneteenth! Happy birthday my favorite himbo

Who wants some Grumpy Bruno fanfic? Me, I do. So I wrote some.

I've seen a lot of Stop Infantalising Bruno discourse recently, and I wanted to write a situation where he could be a grumpy, sleep deprived old man and still (hopefully!) be loveable. Because I personally love those little flashes of temper we get from him...plus, it gave me a chance to find some fun Spanish swears!

Also I've resigned myself to every single one of these having a book reference in them; my real life is either selling books or writing them so I guess I have them on the brain haha. You can check out more of my fanfic (and the translations for the Spanish that I got from Babbel.com) here.

“Spiders are some of the most eff…um, effic…some of the most…”                Bruno glanced over Antonio’s shoulder at the encyclopaedia. “‘Efficient’,” he said. “Don’t worry, kid; that’s a big word, even for me.”                Antonio smiled gratefully, turning back to the page. “Okay. Efffishant. Spiders are some of the most efffishant hunters in the animal ki..kingdom. They spin webs to…”                Another weeknight; another Family Weirdo Club Bedtime. Mirabel was nestled in a comfortable spot under the gigantic tree in the middle of Antonio’s room, Chispi by her side, while Bruno and Antonio were curled up together in the pile of leaves, cushions, extra bedding and general comfy detritus that made up the best reading nook in the Encanto. Bruno was half asleep, lying back against a pillow Mirabel had sewed for Antonio out of his oldest, softest, most faded ruana. Was this the seventeenth time he’d heard about how spiders catch their prey, or the sixteenth? Mmyeh, didn’t matter. Kid was getting better with his reading. Pepa was happy, Mirabel got time and space to knit so she was happy. Hence, Bruno was happy.                A shadow fell over the pair. Bruno looked up into the amber eyes of the most dangerous, unpredictable creature in the entire Encanto – including his sisters. And it was looking directly down at him.                “Um,” Bruno said warily, as Parce the jaguar edged a little closer. “H-hi, Kitty?”                “Parce wants to snuggle!” Antonio chirped, delighted.                “W-well, that’s great, kiddo,” Bruno said, edging up the cushion pile, eyes never leaving the big cat in front of him, “but Tio Bruno super doesn’t want to snuggle.”                It wasn’t that Bruno disliked cats. He just didn’t trust them. They had weird, intense stares – Parce was always watching him – and Bruno didn’t like human eye contact, let alone eye contact with a creature that could pick its teeth with his ribs. Plus, y’know, he was a rat guy. Rats and cats didn’t exactly get along.                Parce put one giant paw on Bruno’s stomach.                “Ah-heh…um…Antonio…?”                “Parce,” Antontio said – that big, innocent grin never leaving his face – “come look at the pictures with me! Look at the spider webs!”                Parce gave Bruno one last, long stare, before removing his paw and leaping over the pair in a single bound.                “Eep,” Bruno would have said, if he weren’t an incredibly brave and constantly stoic man. Which, you know. He was. Parce laid his massive head across Antonio’s belly and yawned, showing off a set of huge, white canines, before closing his eyes and dozing for the rest of Storytime. Bruno had to admit, it wasn’t his best work. His performance of the titular Frog in Oi, Frog! left much to be desired. As much as he loved spending time with Antonio, he kinda just wanted to get in his own bedroom – with his pets that wouldn’t turn on him in the blink of an eye and eat him alive – and have a good, restful night’s sleep.                And, of course, because he was Bruno Madrigal and his life was one big cosmic joke, he had sleep visions all night. Not about the jaguar, that was a blessing, at least. No; these were weird, twisted half-prophecies, showing him a mix of things from the past, blurred over with green, sandy film of time. Pepa in particular showed up a lot, that night – twenty-seven years old, in her soaked wedding dress with her hair stuck to her forehead, dancing at Dolores’ wedding far off in the future. Why was he thinking about Pepa? Everything was fine with Pepa. Wasn’t it?                Did Pepa still hate him for the wedding thing?                What if he did it again at Dolores’ wedding? What if he opened his big mouth and ruined everything?                Was that what the vision was trying to warn him about?                Shut up, Bruno. You need to sleep. Go to sleep…now. Now. Now? Please go to sleep…                In the end, Bruno estimated he got about two hours’ sleep. At five to nine, he finally gave up, dragged himself downstairs, poured himself the largest cup of coffee possible, and sat through Morning Briefing, not registering a word, barely noticing his family. As soon as the last syllable of ‘La Familia Madrigal’ left his mouth, he downed the last of his coffee, slammed the cup down, and hauled himself back upstairs to bed.                Low moods didn’t hit very often, these days. Bruno had been working on his coping mechanisms – meditating, getting fresh air, affirmations, blah blah blah. But when he was tired, they hit him all the harder. Add to that the fun of reliving the past and the future at the same time all night? Day was shot before it began. He buried his face in the pillow, curled himself up in his sheets, and prepared himself for a day of sifting through sickly green thoughts and not much else. Dios, he was tired. His head felt like it was about to fall off his neck and shatter. Couldn’t even sleep right. Tu es loco, ‘Brunito,’ he thought spitefully to himself. Loco, tarado, maldito…                About an hour later, the door creaked open.                “Hey, Bruno…”                “Not in the mood, Félix,” Bruno said, not lifting his head from the pillow, his voice muffled.                “Bro, I just gotta ask you if –”                “Vete a freír espárragos, Félix, seriously,” Bruno growled, propping himself up on one arm. “Que te folle un pez, I just want five minutes on my…uh…oh.”                There, standing in Bruno’s bedroom doorway, was Félix. Holding a scandalised Antonio in his arms.                “Félix,” Bruno said, scrambling into a sitting position. “I-I-I’m sorry, I didn’t –”                “It’s alright, Tio Bruno,” Antonio said primly. “I’m not allowed to copy bad words. Camilo taught me to say tresero, and Mamá said…”                “Okay, okay, hombre,” Félix interrupted, jostling the kid in his arms. “Hey, let’s just see if your sister can look after you today, ‘kay? Tio Bruno is…tired.”                “Félix…”                The side-eye Félix gave him reminded Bruno of his sister, which sent another spike of shame through his guts. “S’alright. Get some rest, bro.”                And they were gone. Bruno fell back against the mattress, pressed the pillow over his face, and swore some more. The really, really bad ones, this time. Well, it had taken a few months, but he finally messed up things with Antonio. The quirky, harmless image of Fun Tio Bruno had been shattered in the amount of time it took him to tell his Pá to piss off. There goes Family Weirdo Club. He’d never be asked to babysit again. He’d been doing such a good job with not using bad words around the kids, too. Stupid sleep visions. Stupid gift. Stupid him.                Somewhere around an hour later, just as his temper was starting to cool and congeal into a thick layer of self-pity (and sleep was still a thousand miles away), the door opened again. Bruno pressed his hands against the pillow still strewn over his face and let out a long, strangled noise somewhere between a scream and a sob. “Please,” he moaned, “I am exhausted, and I’m in such a bad mood, please just leave me alone to…”                Two gigantic paws hit the mattress with a thump. Bruno lifted the pillow away to find Parce staring down at him.                “Erm…h-hey, Kitty,” he gulped. “Félix send you to eat me for cursing in front of his kid?”                Parce titled his head this way and that, before hauling himself up onto the bed. The mattress groaned a little beneath the extra weight, and Bruno suddenly had images of shattered wood and feathers flying through the air. Bruno scooched up the bed, away from the gigantic cat, but Parce butted his huge head none too gently against his cheek with a deep, low ‘mmrow’. Something was tied around his neck; a green ribbon, with a scroll of paper tied to it. Bruno tentatively reached for it, snatching his hand away as soon as possible. Parce started kneading the mattress, staring into the middle distance, as Bruno unfurled the scroll with shaking fingers.                It was a drawing. A drawing of Bruno and Antonio, holding hands. Or, at least, Bruno suspected they were holding hands. Their palms kinda intermeshed. Bruno’s hair came down to his waist in long, grey scribbles, while Antonio’s manic smile went outside of his face. Bruno loved it instantly. Written in the corner in huge wobbly script, was a message.                ‘TIO BRUNO. GET WELL SOON. PARCE WANTS TO SNUGL WITH YO TIL YU ARE HAPPEE AGAIN. LOVE, ANTONIO MADRIGAL.’                In a neater, smaller hand underneath was written;                ‘Don’t worry, Parce won’t eat your rats. Unless you say more bad words. Come find us after your nap. Dolores xoxo’                Bruno felt his heart melt into a lump of warm, gooey affection. “So I haven’t totally messed up then, huh?” he asked Parce. Parce purred, blinking slowly. “Okay,” Bruno sighed, letting the drawing flutter to the floor and stuffing the pillow back under his head, “I guess you can stay and snugg—oof!”                Parce pressed his head against Bruno’s cheek again, so hard it moved Bruno’s head to the side, all the while purring even louder. “Pfffttt, ppfffbtttt, pff,” Bruno sputtered, getting a fine mist of jaguar hair across his nose and mouth. Parce didn’t smell like Bruno thought he would; like blood and viscera and abject terror. He smelled like…like a warm, clean animal. “Come on, now, settle down.” He reached up, haltingly, and held out his hand for Parce to love on instead. The big cat pressed his cheek against Bruno’s knuckles, eyes closed in contentment.                “Hey, y-you’re actually kinda cute, aren’tcha?” Bruno murmured with a small smile, his fingers getting lost in the thick, white fluff of Parce’s chest. Parce blinked down at him, eyes soft and full of affection. How had he ever thought this cat was creepy? He was just…well, intense. Plus, c’mon; it’s not like Bruno could complain about someone having a staring problem, now was it?                “Good Kitty, such a nice kittycat, yes you are…”                Parce turned around a handful of times in Bruno’s lap (“watch the paws,” Bruno winced, “watch the paws –!”) before settling down across his stomach, purring so loudly Bruno swore he could feel it in his bones. The weight of Parce across his torso was enough to help him relax, just a little bit – feeling the warmth and sturdy weight of this creature that had chosen, apparently, to spend time with him. Even if he was a screwup who swore in front of five-year-olds. “Thanks, buddy,” Bruno said with a yawn, reaching up to scratch behind one gigantic, spotted ear. Parce made a friendly noise in the back of his throat, tail twitching against the bare skin of Bruno’s arm, then laid his head along Bruno’s chest and closed his eyes. And, after a long moment, Bruno did the same.