Ariel Hernandez is a five-year-old Cuban boy rescued from a broken raft by fishermen after watching everyone else on the raft, including his mother, perish. Though just a boy stranded on a raft in the ocean, Ariel becomes much more than just a child to Miami Cubans, and to Lizet. He becomes a symbol of the way immigrant experiences are skewed to suit political and ideological narratives, a symbol of all immigrant experience. When Ariel is deported, both Lizet and the community as a whole feel they have lost a part of themselves. 

Ariel is often described as larger than life, almost holy or god-like: glowing, enormous, and much larger than a typical child. This description reflects the power he has been given, and the way his story was coopted by Cubans and politicians alike, as a symbol of flawed immigration policy. For Lizet, Ariel is both a force and a hope for a new beginning: He is a baby version of herself, of the immigrant within her and within every member of her family.