Who is Dedé, and what do we learn about her? What is Dedé’s attitude toward her life and toward the visitor she is expecting?

Bélgica Adela "Dedé" Mirabal-Reyes, the second oldest of the Mirabal sisters, and the only one to survive the Trujillo regime. She is married to Jaimito during the action of the story, but the reader learns that they divorced in 1984. They have three sons: Enrique, Rafael, and David. Unlike those of her sisters, Dede's chapters are narrated in third person. Dede is not keen to do the interview. However, Alvarez uses the technique of rhetorical questions to imply that the reader is, at times, inside Dede's head, with access to what she is thinking or wondering. For instance, when Dede questions why the woman is coming to interview her in March, not in November like most interviewers, she thinks, "Doesn't she have seven more months of anonymity?" When the narrator explains that everyone wants to buy insurance from her because she is famous, she asks, "Can she help it?"