~Rebeca~ from 100 Años de Soledad (100 Years of Solitude) by Gabriel García Márquez.

 

 

 

“Out of nowhere, the house gets a new family member; a young girl named Rebeca who comes from a village no one has ever heard of, with a letter from a person no one knows, addressed to José Arcadio Buendía asking him to take her in. She carries a bag containing her parents’ bones around with her. They made an annoying clicking sound that kept popping up around the house. Rebeca only liked to eat the damp earth of the courtyard and the cake of the white wash that she picked off with her nails. It was obvious that her parents or whoever raised her, had scolded her for that habit because she did it secretly and with a feeling of guilt, trying to put away supplies so that she could when no one was looking.