The boy cries. He looks between the adults’ legs, among the balloons, among the voices that are not hers.
In the middle of the party, there is a Spider-Man carrying children, taking photos, fulfilling the role of a hero in a rented costume. But this little boy doesn’t want photos or wall-crawlers: he wants his mom. And for a moment, while someone lifts him up to calm him down, he has no idea that the arms holding him are exactly the ones he was looking for.
The woman slowly takes off the mask. Underneath there is no Marvel superhero; there is her: his mother, smiling in the red-and-blue suit, soaked with heat. The boy’s crying suddenly stops, and what follows is a tight hug, like someone who never wants to get lost again. The scene, recorded at a children’s party in Mexico, went viral because it reminded people of something simple: no costume can hide a mother from her child.
