When we first watch the series The Accident, we already know that something terrible is going to happen. But what actually unfolds is more than just a tragedy. On the birthday of Emiliano and Daniela’s son Rodri, three children tragically lose their lives while playing in a bouncy castle. However, a little girl, Paula – Fabian’s daughter – is blown up into the air in the bouncy castle and disappears for three long days. Miraculously, she is found alive. How she survived remains a mystery, and people start to believe that she might be a gift from God, that maybe the Virgin Mary protected her during all this. What really happened to this innocent child? This is the journey we are about to delve into and uncover.
Warning spoilers!
What could have happened to Paula when she got lost?
Paula was the daughter of Fabian, a psychiatrist, and Roxana Gallardo, a theater artist. Her parents had separated and Paula lived with her father. Roxana had chosen her passion for theater and fame over her family, which caused them to grow apart. Paula was the lucky little girl, the only one who survived that terrible accident. The very accident that had happened due to Emiliano’s mistake and caused the bouncy castle to go up in the air. Unfortunately, Paula’s three friends died in the process. But when the bouncy castle started to go up, it took Paula with it too. The poor girl screamed and screamed, but for three days no one found her. Even though Rodri had died, Fabian and Daniela were still searching for Paula in the jungle by the river. A whole search team was out there looking for her too. Everyone believed that there was a good chance that Paula had not made it – she might have fallen into the river or gotten lost in the jungle. But one day, as Daniela, Fabian and the search team were searching the river area, they finally found her. Paula was lying under a cave next to the waterfall. She was alive but unconscious, so they rushed her to the hospital.
When Paula woke up, everything changed. She started talking about seeing the Virgin Mary and soon everyone was after her – from curious people to the media. Everyone thought that maybe it was the Virgin Mary who had protected her. But when we watched the series, we saw that there was a sculpture of the Virgin Mary in the cave next to the river fountain. So would it be too far-fetched to think that what Paula saw was nothing more than the sculpture and that she could have hallucinated it in her semi-conscious state, since she had no food or sleep for three days? It is also possible that during those terrible days, Paula imagined that the Virgin Mary was talking to her. After all, children often create imaginary figures to comfort themselves.
Maybe Paula was so scared and lonely that she imagined a higher power was watching over her. Or maybe she believed that talking to the Virgin Mary, with the river water around her and the strength she somehow found within herself, gave her the will to survive. Whatever the case, Paula truly believed that she had seen the Virgin Mary and that she had been blessed by her presence. She became known as the miracle child. Everyone began to believe that perhaps she had survived thanks to the Virgin Mary’s blessing. But if you think about it logically, it was probably the water in the river that kept her alive – not a miracle or divine blessing. Soon the tabloids were full of stories about Paula and people swarmed around her house. She began to feel different, to feel special. You can imagine how a little girl must feel in that situation. She truly believed that she was blessed by the Virgin Mary and that she even had the power to heal the pain of others.
What impact did this have on Paula?
Paula was treated like an outsider at school when her classmates started laughing at her. To get attention, she would sometimes go out and tell stories about how she was the “child prodigy.” But her father Fabian, a psychiatrist, didn’t approve of this at all. He knew it was messing with her psyche. Things got worse when her mother Roxana came back into her life. As I told you before, Roxana, a theater actress, loved the attention and wanted Paula to be in the spotlight to increase her own fame. She took Paula to interviews, and the poor child started to feel the pressure. Paula hated it – she didn’t want to feel special or different; she just wanted to be treated like any other child. When her parents started fighting for custody of her again, Paula realized that it was her father who really cared about her, and not just the fame. She knew that staying with him would protect her from the media and allow her to live a normal life instead of being exploited for attention like her mother was.
At the end of the series, Paula told her father that she didn’t want to talk about the Virgin Mary anymore. She knew that no one would believe her – not her father, not her friends, not the world. It was something deeply personal and she wanted to keep it that way. She’s like a little child who has imaginary friends. If she really believes she saw the Virgin Mary, then we as viewers, just like her logical father who is a psychiatrist, should let the child be a child rather than try to rationalize it. As she gets older she will probably get over it, but for now the best thing for her is if believing in it helps her cope with such a terrible accident. She deserves that comfort.
