“And the next day?” Simón asked.
“See, as I knew that he wouldn’t let himself be touched or seen by any of you, I said to myself, ‘Surely his wife will have to do it before we arrive so he’s already up by the time we get there,’ so I came earlier, when there was barely any light in the sky, to help in any way I could. Sure enough, when I arrived, she was already getting ready to carry him, and she got a fright when I called out, she wasn’t expecting anyone.”
“What are you doing here at this early hour? The sun’s barely up,” she asked me as soon as he saw me, when she opened the door.
“‘I’ve come to help you,’ I answered.”
“‘You’re an angel,’ she said quietly.”
“‘Please! That’s just because you don’t know me very well, ask my mother and you’ll see. She’s always telling me, ‘Santi, you’re a demon, you’re always messing about.’’”
“‘Well, that’ll be at home, you don’t behave like that here,’ she added, smiling as I entered.”
“I went in following her instructions and I found the man in the new bedroom already prepared because he’d heard me and the boy was asleep beside him.”
“‘And what are we gonna do with this one?’ I asked quietly so as not to wake him up.”
“‘Don’t worry, we can move him anywhere and he won’t even notice,’ his mother told me.”
“I took the man out and put him in the same chair he’d been sitting in the day before. The wife was patiently feeding him breakfast, spoonful by spoonful into his mouth. As I didn’t want to disturb them, I went to leave, but she noticed and asked me:
“‘Where are you going? Stay here, it’s still chilly.’”
“So I stayed there for a good while. Then I took out the mattress, so that it wouldn’t get in our way, and I did a little preparation for everything we needed to start the day’s work, and as soon as you guys arrived, you were surprised to see me there and I had to tell you that I’d been confused with the time and thought I was late and that you hadn’t waited for me, and that’s why I came to the house by myself. I saw that you looked at me with a weird expression, it seems that you didn’t believe me, but you didn’t have time to question me about it. It was just then that the boy came out and started to run after the hen and we all started laughing and you forgot about it. Now you know everything,” Santi told us, “there are no more mysteries. I’ve told you now because everything’s finished, and I don’t think they’d mind now.”
“We did leave everything really nice,” I told the others to change the subject, “and about the furniture you’re all asking me about? When I asked my mother to give me the crib, she nearly collapsed.”
“But son, I’m saving it for when you get married and you give me a little grandchild,” she’d told me very upset.
“What if I become a priest?” I answered.
“Stop that! Don’t mess around with that,” she said very seriously.
“No, I said that to you as a joke, but I’m serious about the crib. Please can you give it to me? It’s not doing anyone any good being kept here when there’s a little boy who could use it,” I said, trying to calm her down a little and get her to cave.
“No, the crib was yours, and it’ll be for my grandchildren when you have them,” she insisted.
“Mom, I know it was mine, well Carmen’s first, and after me, it was for the twins and finally Chelito, but look, that little boy I’m asking for has nowhere to sleep and he needs it now. If I get married and have children, and who knows if I will, I’d have to do very badly in my career and my new job to be unable to afford to buy a crib before I emigrate to America,” I was saying in a bid to convince her.
“Enough son, don’t say that, even in jest. Listen, your uncle left and didn’t want to come back here, and it’s not because of a lack of money, he has plenty as you know. Sometimes he’s even sent some to me, he says he doesn’t know what to give me, that money always comes in handy, and I say, he must have enough to spare.”
“Mom, money is never spare, but that shows that, even though he’s far away, he still remembers his beloved sister. Well, if I’m doing badly here with work, I’m leaving like him,” I said without thinking.
“No!” she said resoundingly.
“Well, I’m not leaving, but please give me the crib,” I begged.
“But you have to promise me that you’ll never emigrate,” she said, becoming very serious.
Also seriously, standing there in front of her, staring at her sitting in her chair, I said:
“Mom, I solemnly promise you that I’ll never emigrate to America.”
“Alright smooth talker, take the crib, but tell them to take good care of it,” she said, smiling.
“I’ll tell them what you’ve said. Ah Mom! Can I go to Germany at least?” I said very seriously.
She got up from the chair, and giving me a light smack on the head, said:
“No, not to Germany either. You stay here with me and give me grandchildren, and I won’t settle for one, that’s very boring.”
“I already know that,” I said, “I’ve envied the neighbors since I was little because there are seven of them, always playing and me here alone and bored. I still don’t know why whenever I asked you to let me go to their house to play with them, you always gave me the same answer, ‘No son, there are enough of them, I don’t want you to bother them,’ as if they would’ve noticed one more.”
“Well,” she said, laughing, “then the twins came along, so don’t complain, all of sudden there was two of them. You looked at them and said, ‘Which of them do I play with?’ They were toys to you. Alright, when are you taking the crib?” she asked me more calmly.
“Well tomorrow, so you won’t change your mind,” and giving her a kiss, I was leaving when I heard her say:
“You see what you’re like? You always get what you want.”
<<<<< >>>>>
Summer was coming to an end, we were only one week away from starting classes again and returning to our routine, just enough time to get some rest and enjoy spending time with our families, but unexpected things can happen in just a few days. Tono came that morning crying:
“Mom! Mom!” he screamed as he climbed the stairs.
“What’s wrong?” I asked when I opened the door, because I’d been the first one to hear him, and I’d rushed to open it, to see what had happened.
“No! Not you! I don’t want to talk to you,” he told me very angrily.
I was surprised, but he ran into the kitchen where my mother was preparing food.
“Mom! Mom!” the child kept calling very upset.
“Angel, what’s wrong with you?” she asked in alarm.
He closed the kitchen door behind him so that I wouldn’t go in after him, because I was following him down the hallway, although as he had been closing the door to the house, he was running and he reached where Mom was before I did. I went to open the kitchen door, but he told me from inside:
“Go away! You’re to blame, I don’t want to see you ever again, it’s all your fault.”
I stopped in my tracks. “What had I done? I don’t think I’ve done anything,” I thought, “plus, if he was out on the street playing with his friends and I was at home; surely it would have been a fight with one of them and he was taking it out on me.”
I didn’t really hear what he was talking about, but I immediately heard my mother say:
“Of course, I knew this was going to create problems for us.”
Opening the door, she glared at me and angrily said:
“You see!”
