Caray, Caray!

We open with Max seeing Diana at the mall. Max is wearing that ugly light-blue sweater again. Also white bucks. Diana now holds her stomach all the time. I suppose the fake pregnancy belly they gave her is droopy and she has to hold it up. Max is impactado: Diana—you’re pregnant? What a shock. Is this your husband’s baby? Or is it the fruit of our love? She tells him it’s her husband’s. But she has that usual vacant look. You don’t know what she means.

Gaviota and Paco are at the prison bedside of “Alacran,” the criminal who kidnapped the girls. What happened to my daughters, she asks.

FM and Bruno are complaining about Andres. FM says that Andres is coming over in two hours to tell Max the truth. They call him an “astuto” and a “zorro,” both of which seem to mean the same thing—a “fox,” or rather a sly, cunning, tricky individual.

Pilar is at the beach shrieking at Larry that he must marry her. She does not shriek as loud as Deborah, fortunately. He points out that he’s not exactly running back to her since she stood him up at the church in front of everyone. He says, You’re obsessed with marrying me, but now I have doubts. A real rocket scientist, Larry is. She complains about Gaby, and he says that Pilar should not insult her because Gaby is an angel. No, she’s a dead fly, and a muerta de hambre, and a maldita sirvienta mugrosa (or a “damned filthy servant”). She says that Gaby will not steal Larry. Now she shrieks almost as shrilly as Deborah.

Back at the mall, Max does not believe Diana’s parentage story, because Diego is in a wheelchair. Diana says they slept together before the wedding. How do you know, Max asks. A woman knows. You mean you slept with me and him at the same time? No, she says, and now she really begins spinning the BS. She slept with Diego lots of times. That time on the island with Max—it was just an accident. She reminds him that he knew Diego was her boyfriend and their wedding was planned before that incident. You’re too busy believing the lies told by Camila and Doc Evil to remember.
I’m not the same Diana. One day Gaviota will get back all she has lost, and we are going to destroy the Irascibles.

Alacran now recounts how Octavia paid him to get rid of the girls. There’s another flashback to how he gave the girls to Granny M, who is a filthy beggar with no teeth. We hear again how a hurricane killed her hubby. This is your lucky day, he says. How would you like $20,000—and two little girls. Don’t ask any questions, etc. He calls the girls “mocosas,” which is slang for brats. Does any one know if this derives from “snotnose,” i.e., mucus-y?

After going back and forth with a lot of repetition we get the big news that no surprise the homeless woman is Granny M.
Alacron begs Fedora’s forgiveness and says he was only following orders. He dies.

Max calls Lala from the mall to get Gaviota’s number.

Gaby and Diana are at another mall. Diana tells about her lie. She says she hates Max like he deserves. (wasn’t she telling Gaby two days ago that she still loved Max?)

Gaviota is rejoicing about having found her daughters. She says that something told her they were her daughters, but now she is sure. Now she knows why Granny M always looked nervous when she asked about the girls.
She asks Doc Reynosa to take her to Granny’s house, but tells Paco that he can’t come.

Gaby and Diana discuss how Diego will be jealous if he finds out she saw Max.

Max goes to see Gaviota, but as we know, she is not there. He meets with Paco.

Andres is talking to Deborah at the little house. (I thought he was coming to the big house, but I suppose I was wrong.) They go back and forth about various blackmail and exposure plans. She calls him a piece of trash, and he slaps her. He says he’ll send her to prison. A thief like you? Ha. Let’s talk like adults,--we each know things about the other. There is a sort of truce.

Granny M and Gaviota begin the torturously slow, tedious exposition of how Gaviota now knows who the girls are. I cannot bear to recount.

Gaby and Diana continue talking at the mall about how they shouldn’t tell Max he is the baby’s father.

Max is asking Paco about the girls. He says Gaviota has poisoned Diana against him. Paco says that she didn’t have to do that. Max has done it all by himself. Paco says how Gaviota is going to recover her fortune and will be powerful, etc. Paco says that Max’s family destroyed them. Your mother made someone kidnap the kids. But now we know who they are: they are Diana and Gaby.
But Diana told me her parents were dead, Max exclaims, using his best powers of deductive reasoning. They don’t know, Paco says.
How do you know they’re the real daughters? We just met in prison with your mom’s accomplice. Your mother ordered it and provided $20,000 given to a beggar woman, Miguelina, etc. And by the way, your sainted aunt Yolanda helped out too. And worst of all, your father killed Fedora’s husband.

Gaviota continues recounting her story to Granny M.

Max sits down stiffly with all the weight of the horrible things he has learned about his family.

Yolanda gets a phone call from Doc Evil saying that Granny DS’s blood tests came out great—she’s healthy as a horse. Octavia is not happy to hear this news. That old bag has nine lives of a cat, she says, sneering.
Yolanda is trying to get Octavia to return the perfume business to Gaviota. Octavia is still sticking to her story—she doesn’t think Gaviota deserves it all—since with Octavia’s brilliant stewardship over 20 years, the business has tripled in value. Octavia does not understand the time value of money.

Gaviota is telling Granny that her recovery of everything is imminent, and she thanks Granny M for taking such good care of her girls, making them so sober and pure of heart. Granny says she’s sorry she didn’t tell her sooner—she didn’t know Gaviota was the real mother. Gaviota says she has nothing to apologize for, and she will be eternally grateful. Granny wants to know when they are going to tell the girls the good news.

Max is saying to Paco that now he understands why Diana hates him. I was an idiot. I shouldn’t have believed the lies. Now he asks about the baby. Paco tells him it’s Diego’s. So should he believe this? Hmmm, let’s see. They castigate him for believing lies from Doc Evil, but they want to punish him by . . . lying to him!

Granny M wants Gaviota to tell the girls—they’ll be so happy. But no, because it won’t fit in with the absurd rationale the writers have concocted for Fedora’s revenge plan. It seems she is afraid that the girls will reject her (why? Because she was falsely accused? What shame!) So that means she has to recover her fortune first and restore the girls to their rightful place as society babes in the mansion. By buying their love, she will be sure. Granny M agrees to this deception.

Gaviota is back at the bar. Jorge the waiter congratulates her on finding her daughters. She says that Granny will keep the secret. Jorge tells her that Max was just looking for her. Paco says that he told Max the secret about the girls (but not the secret about Diana’s baby). Got that, folks?

Max is back at home letting Octavia have it. How could you separate two girls from their mother and send their mother to prison? Have some respect, Yolanda pipes up. He points out that Yolanda was part of the plot too.

Back at Casa Soriano, Diego is asking Diana suspiciously about her trip to buy a robe. Pancho happens to be there. You really went out in hopes of running into Max, he taunts her. Pancho may be the brightest bulb of this dim bunch.

Max finishes off by telling his mother that Gaviota has finally found her two daughters. Octavia asks, Really? Who are they? (Again—didn’t she know this?) Diana and Gaby. She looks impactada. You don’t know which she thinks is worse, that her sons are in love with a nurse and a servant or that they are in love with the daughters of the hated Gaviota.

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