Reflections in the Mirror

by Luis A. Santamaría

  Daniel felt scared of himself. He’d come upstairs with the intention of leaving hard feelings behind and making up for lost time with Sofia, but the wound still hadn’t healed, and Sofia had dug around in it without realising.

  “How can you be so selfish?” she replied in a thin voice. “Do you know how hard it was for me when I found out that you were in a coma? My life literally stopped for weeks as visiting you in the hospital became top priority,” she whimpered. “Now I see I was wasting my time.”

  Daniel didn’t say anything. He hadn’t expected such a confession.

  “In that case, why didn’t you visit me in the village? It’s not far.”

  “You really don’t know?” she replied, holding his look.

  He shook his head.

  “Look, Daniel, despite the fact that I seem to insist on having your face stuck in my head, God knows why, the truth is you and I have only had a handful of conversations where nothing ever happened between us. Then you had the accident and, although you supposedly had a girlfriend and I wasn’t the person to do it, something in me made me hold out for you. Your death changed my world. I turned into a shadow. And suddenly, one fine day you wake up against all odds and, as if by magic, you disappear. I didn’t even get chance to hug you. I found out through Eva, the nurse, that you’d gone to live in the mountains. From the nurse! Can you imagine how humiliated and stupid I felt that day?” Sofia pointed at Daniel. Tears ran down her cheeks. “So if I didn’t go and see you all this time, idiot, it wasn’t because I didn’t want to,” she was shouting “it was because I loved you too much to make any sense all of it!”

  She covered her face with her hands and went off towards the stairs. Daniel tried to think of something coherent to say as he watched her walk away.

  “Sofia!” he called.

  She stopped and turned around. Her eyes gleamed. Daniel went closer until her could feel her warm breath with the contrast of the cold air. He looked inside for the right words at that decisive moment. He found nothing more than countless snippets of accumulated affection from the past few weeks. Then he knew that his rehabilitation hadn’t just prepared him to play again. There was something much deeper. He stretched his arm out and caressed her cheek, then her neck and behind her ear. She closed her eyes and half opened her mouth. Without stopping crying, she enjoyed his warm touch. And then it happened. Daniel’s lips came to hers, they took a breath before melting into one. When the kiss was over, to the beat of The Sound of Silence, Sofia grabbed Daniel by the neck and hugged him tight. Daniel felt her warmth.

  Hours later, when the first rays of sun beamed between the buildings, Daniel and Sofia finally brought their evening to an end. They promised to meet that same afternoon and said goodbye with a kiss before each of them went their separate ways between the street cleaners and the early morning office workers.

  He awoke on the seat of the metro. Her perfume hung on his clothes and he still felt the sensation of her lips on his. With a smile plastered on his face, he closed his eyes and let the best night of his life come to an end. If miracles did exist, that night Sofia had been Daniel’s.

  Daniel left the metro station with the intention of going to his father’s house – he’d decided he would go and live with him until he managed to find a new flat to rent, if his dad didn’t mind. The morning light offended him. He was exhausted, he could only think of getting home and resting; the next day would be the start of his new life. He turned the corner and saw something he wasn’t expecting: Jorge, who he hadn’t seen since the previous morning, standing on the pavement across the road. The unexpected sight, with his father’s skeletal appearance, made him shiver.

  “Dad! What are you doing here?” he called. “W-what’s wrong?”

  “Nothing, Son. Nothing’s wrong. You’ve done really well.” Jorge spoke with an angelic calmness.

  Daniel put his hand to his forehead, he suddenly felt a stabbing pain in his head. He took a step towards his father.

  “What’s happening to me?” Daniel thought of the recent attacks he’d been having over the last few days, the last had been in the stadium, when he thought he was dying. “Something tells me you know.”

  Jorge smiled with his lips but the rest of his face was impassive.

  “It’s been a pleasure spending this time with you, but now the time has come,” he said choosing each word with infinite delicacy. “I’ll see you on the other side, Son.”

  Daniel didn’t even have chance to reply. To his right, a shrieking horn and behind it a bus. He didn’t have time to get out of the way. Then, nothing but the deepest darkness.

  33

  I couldn’t stop looking at myself in the mirror with my white dress. First from one side, then the other, and again then again. The more I looked at myself, the bigger my smile grew. I hardly recognised myself with the hair-do that they’d done at the hairdresser’s, I looked like one of those models from the magazines.

  Someone knocked on the door and made me jump. Two raps. Knock, knock. My heart went straight back to that first Friday that scared me so much, and that now... I don’t know, I simply couldn’t recall how life was before that Friday.

  I went to the door, stepping gingerly so as not to drag the train of the dress. There was a piece of paper sitting on the floor in front of the door. No doubt about it: it was him.

  Good morning, Angie! How did it go at the hairdresser’s? Don’t spend too much time looking in the mirror, or you’ll be late for our date. Anyway, I’m sure you look radiant.

  In five seconds I’ll be gone from behind your door. Instead I’ll be waiting for you at the altar.

  I held the note to my chest and squeezed it. I let myself have just one tear. I wiped it away and returned to the bedroom to put the finishing touches on my outfit. I couldn’t have been happier.

  34

  Kiko sped down the streets of Madrid as if he were in one of the action movies that he collected. At that speed, it was difficult to stay in control. He’d just managed to avoid a lady carrying her shopping and had been about to taste wet asphalt when, at a crossing, he’d gone through a traffic light on red. He thought that perhaps there were cases where cyclists ought to have bikes with flashing lights, like police cars or fire engines. He thought that today that would have been ideal.

  Why had Ricardo called him so urgently? Better not to think about it and concentrate on the road. The funny thing was that if he got hit by a car, he’d get to the hospital a lot faster.

  It felt like his legs were made of jelly when he jumped off his bike and chained it to a post. He was pleased to have made it in one piece. He walked down the corridor thinking that with his next pay cheque he’d invest in a motorbike.

  “Excuse me, I was called about an emergency regarding Daniel Santos,” he told the receptionist out of breath.

  “Wait a moment, please.”

  The woman behind the counter had little red veins around her nostrils and her hair roots showing grey.

  “Sorry, but it’s quite urgent. He’s my best friend,” insisted Kiko.

  “Yeah, yeah. Family and friends visiting is quite a common occurrence here... this isn’t exactly a zoo.” The greying receptionist didn’t take her eyes off of her computer screen.

  Since boyhood, Kiko had never got himself into fights, not even to defend himself. Daniel and Oscar always accused him of having no balls, but he was rather proud of always keeping his cool. However, after receiving an urgent call, leaving his house without even a wash and crossing the city by bike narrowly avoiding death, Kiko wasn’t in the mood to be messed around by a miserable receptionist.

  “Listen, lady.” He slammed his fist down on the countertop and the woman looked up. “Is it because I’m black?”

  The people closest to them turned around, and the woman blushed, camouflaging her veiny nose.

  “N-no, it’s nothing to do with you being black, sir,” she whispered, embarrassed. She then put on a smile with the intention of masking her blunder.<
br />
  “Are you smiling? Are you mocking me, you racist piece of..”

  “No, no!” the woman put her hands in front of her in a placatory gesture.

  “Look, I have rushed from the other side of the city and I have no idea what the hell has happened to my friend. I’m in no mood for little games, so tell me what in God’s name has happened to Daniel Santos!”

  Her hands were shaking. Would they call security? That was the last thing he needed.

  “He’s in his room, number two hundred and fifty-three. You can speak to his doctor there,” mumbled the receptionist who by now had gone pale and her nose looked like it would explode. “S-second floor.”

  Kiko had just won his first argument. He nodded feeling superior, said thank you and ran up the stairs without noticing that he had become the main attraction of reception.

  The corridor was busy. Doctors, nurses and visitors came and went without a second glance at him. At the end of the corridor, he saw something that froze his blood. Ricardo stood leaning his hands against the wall, as if he was holding it up or pushing it down. Kiko almost floated over those few feet to reach him. If it was bad news, he wasn’t going to be able to deal with it.

  “Ricardo, wh-what’s happened?”

  His father had always told him: never ask a question you don’t want to know the answer to. He hated to disobey him.

  Ricardo looked at him with red eyes. He looked like he wanted to say something but he wasn’t even able to make the simplest of sounds. Then he hugged him, and Kiko hugged him back. It’s bad news. It’s over, he thought.

  One of the nurses silently stepped out of the room.

  “Daniel Santos’ family?”

  Kiko and Ricardo turned, drying their tears.

  “You can come in.”

  The first rays of morning sun flooded the room with the bed standing on the opposite side. Lying on it, Daniel saw them come him. Ricardo was the first to throw himself on to his brother.

  “You’re awake!” he spluttered, squeezing his face against Daniel’s chest. “It’s a miracle.”

  Kiko, watching on from a few feet away, felt weak at the knees.

  “Careful, it’s better not to touch him,” the nurse reproved from the door. “He’s still weak. I’ll leave you alone with him as long as you promise to behave yourselves.”

  Ricardo and Kiko agreed and the young woman left the room.

  “What happened?” Daniel looked around as if he had just woken up from a long nap. “Where am I?”

  Ricardo looked at his face: pale and sickly. But his expression was that of a stranger’s.

  “You’re in the hospital. You had an accident. But don’t worry, you’re going to be alright,” Ricardo explained in barely a whisper, as if speaking louder would make Daniel switch back off. “How do you feel?”

  “Dizzy. I remember the accident. I got run over by a bus.”

  Ricardo and Kiko exchanged looks.

  “You’re still confused,” interrupted Kiko. “You tripped over a ball during a game and hit your head hard. It was almost a year ago. You’ve been in a coma ever since.”

  “What are you saying? That’s not right. I mean, it is, but...” Daniel struggled to find the right words. “But I got better. My knee recovered and they promoted me to the first team.”

  Kiko and Ricardo frowned. Those were the words of a madman.

  “Don’t look at me like that!” cried Daniel. “You were both there at my welcome-home party. You organised it all so that it was a surprise. It was in your bar, Ricky. And the next day I got hit by a bus. I got run over as I was going over to see...”

  He stopped all of a sudden and looked at his brother.

  “Where’s Dad?”

  As he remembered his father, flashes of memory started filling Daniel’s mind, jigsaw pieces that helped him put the puzzle together: his father’s erratic behaviour, the black suit, the party, the bus. A perfect plan to end up with him lying in a hospital bed. But why would his father do that?

  “Danny, Dad died.” Ricardo announced in dismay. “He died a few days after your accident at the game, that’s why you didn’t know. The doctors said it was a heart attack, but I think he died of a broken heart.”

  Kiko edged over to the window, wanting to disappear. They weren’t supposed to bring that up so soon. Months of being in a coma and a dead dad? There wasn’t a beer in the world that could help you get over that.

  Daniel was pensive. That didn’t make any sense. If what his brother was saying were true, if their father had been dead for months, who had he been living with these last few weeks? Who had helped him recover from his knee injury to then cause him another even more brutal accident? And most importantly, why?

  Then he realised.

  There hadn’t been any bus, nor a plan to end his life. He hadn’t shared a bench and locker room with the players from the first team; he hadn’t even been promoted. He hadn’t been in the village with his father nor anyone at all, because he hadn’t been there since he was a boy. Did Manu even exist? Maybe not.

  Daniel felt his knee to check his theory: he couldn’t find any trace of a scar. He’d never broken his leg. It had been his head that he’d hit. Had his father died with the purpose of rescuing him from the claws of death? Had that been his last sacrifice?

  “I’m sorry, Danny.” Kiko came over and perched on the edge of his bed. “Are you alright?”

  Daniel was still wrapped up in his thoughts. What had really happened? Did I die? He felt stupid just thinking it.

  “Danny?” repeated Kiko. He looked worriedly at Ricardo.

  “I’m better than ever,” Daniel said in the end. “Thanks, guys. Thanks a lot.”

  That reaction was as unexpected as finding a florist in the Congress of Deputies.

  “How are you two? Come on, tell me stuff,” Daniel wanted to know.

  Kiko cleared his throat before starting one of the most bizarre conversations of his life.

  “I went to Cuba for a few weeks,” he said as if it was nothing special. “When I got back, I finished my teaching course.”

  “Awesome!”

  “Thanks, mate. Oscar, who’ll be here any minute, has created two new burgers. I think they’re disgusting, but I’d never say that to his face. He’s also got some girl gossip, but better that comes from him.”

  He finished with a wink.

  “What about you?” Daniel turned to his brother. “How many millions have you earned in my absence.”

  There was a knock at the door. A second later, Oscar came in looking dejected. A blonde girl was at his side, and gave Daniel a good first impression.

  “Danny, you’re awake!”

  Kiko couldn’t keep the smile off his face as he watched Oscar cry like a child into Daniel’s arms.

  “You’re going to finish me off!” Daniel teased, freeing himself from his friend’s tentacles. “I’m so happy to see you!”

  “Me too! I knew you were alive, I knew it!” Oscar looked him up and down. “Mate, you look gross.”

  Daniel burst out laughing.

  “I want to introduce you to someone.” Oscar turned around.

  “You must be Almudena,” Daniel guessed. “Pleased to meet you.”

  Daniel immediately realised his mistake as he saw his friends’ faces. Daniel could explain how, although he’d never met her, he knew all about Oscar’s new girlfriend as he’d told Daniel everything during his regular hospital visits. He could also explain how, although being in a coma, he had received the news via email directly in the village, a village that he’d only been to in spirit, and an email that only existed in his unconscious mind. But who would believe him? He himself wasn’t all that convinced of it all. But then that was the only possibility. If not, how could he have known who Almudena was? He thought that if he told them, they’d think he was crazy, and he wasn’t keen on swapping his hospital bed for one in a loony bin, so he decided to change tack.

  “How did you two meet?”

/>   Half an hour later, Oscar and Almudena were still telling their romantic love story, from the train journeys to the evening in the burger bar. Daniel already knew every detail, but he acted surprised, and even let out a no way! or two to make it more believable.

  “Shall I tell you what I thought of Oscar the first time I saw him?” Almudena asked.

  “I think I’m gonna go,” Kiko said with his eyes half closed.

  “We’ll get off too,” joined Oscar. “Come on, gorgeous, let’s let Daniel get some rest.”

  “Oh, Ricardo,” Oscar turned from the door, “What happened to the English man sharing Daniel’s room?”

  That was the first time Daniel noticed the empty bed between him and the door.

  “He passed away a few days ago,” Ricardo replied, pulling a face. “He was very old.”

  Daniel didn’t know who they were talking about.

  Only as he looked at the nightstand next to the other bed he had a revelation. On top was a plant pot, and inside floated a flower with white petals. It was a lotus flower.

  The last time the two brothers had spent any time together was a few hours before the fateful accident, when they had almost come to blows.

  “The doctors have said that they’ll release you in a few days,” Ricardo said, cursing his idiocy. If he wanted to break the ice, he could have started with something less obvious.

  Daniel smiled.

  “I know. How are you? How are Teresa and the little one?”

  Ricardo cleared his throat signalling that it wasn’t good news.

  “You’re lucky, you’ll be coming out of hospital just in time for the good weather.”

  The abrupt change of subject made Daniel frown, then he noticed that his brother didn’t have his hair gelled; actually it was a mess. And that greying beard? That was new.