Dr. Juan Moisés De La Serna
Fatima: The Final Secret

“Come on! Stop exaggerating,” the boys said when they heard me say that, “nobody stays in hospital for a month for tonsillitis.”

“Yes, my mother told me it had only been two days, then they gave me my first liquid food, but I think she just told me that to comfort me, because I really had a hard time not being able to eat, because despite the fever and everything else, at no point did my desire for food go away.”

“Did the wound hurt?” Santi asked.

“No, not at all! It was just my gut that hurt, it really craved something, anything, it kept telling me it was empty, I wrote to the nurse in my little notebook every time she came to put in the thermometer or make my bed, ‘I want to eat,’ with very big letters so she could see it properly.”

“‘You’ll have to wait! When the doctor tells me, I’ll bring you so much that you won’t be able to eat it all,’ she told me with a smile, but she left and nothing would convince her.”

“Then when the doctor came to see me and I showed him the message in the notebook, he would tell me:

‘Yes, I know, but you’ll have to wait a little longer, the wounds need time to heal.’”

“And I wrote to him:

‘I don’t have any wounds, what wounds are you talking about?’”

“‘You do,’ he answered me, ‘they’re on the inside and they’re doing very well.’ That was what he’d tell me after making me open my mouth and popping in a little stick, like a Popsicle stick, which sometimes made me gag.”

“‘Manu, be careful, don’t throw up on the doctor,’ my Mom would tell me whenever that happened.”

“I picked up my notebook again, I started writing there:

‘I can’t throw anything up because I don’t have anything inside me, or have you forgotten, since they don’t want to feed me here? They’ll be waiting for me to go home so I can eat there.’”

“That made everyone laugh, which I did not like and I got very angry, and I even started crying. Nobody understood the big problem that I had, the hunger that would not leave me in peace.”

“Well, that’s pretty much it, then one day I was eating just a puréed meal. It was an awful meal, but because I was so hungry, I said to myself:

‘If I don’t eat this, they won’t want to bring me anything else,’ and when I finished it, and it really wasn’t easy for me to swallow it, I remember being surprised. I said to myself, ‘Given how hungry I am, the fact that I can’t swallow it means it must be really bad.’”

“Well, after all that I did get better, the doctor discharged me, not that I knew what that meant, and he told me:

‘You have to be careful for a few days not to eat anything hard.’ I remember it very well because when I heard it, I thought about nougat, that very hard sweet my grandmother used to buy for Christmas, and I was about to write it in my notebook, but nougat was the last thing I wanted to eat at the time, so I left it because he said goodbye and left the room in a hurry.”

“Something else I haven’t forgotten is that my parents took me somewhere when we left. It was a coffee shop or something similar, I don’t know exactly, but they invited me to have ice cream. My mother told me when we entered that it was, ‘Everything you could want.’ Naturally, I chose a very large chocolate ice cream, and while I was eating it, I asked my father, very surprised and very quietly, because although the doctor had already told me I could talk now, I didn’t dare to, I was afraid that my throat would hurt:

‘And why am I getting this?’”

“’Because Manu, you’ve behaved like a man,’ he replied smiling.”

“Right, well, now that you’ve told us your story, we should also eat this chocolate cake, which I think we deserve for having listened to the whole thing,” and laughing, we all ate our slice of cake that they had brought us, and it really was delicious.

<<<<< >>>>>

Poring over my memories, because there had been a lot of changes, I finally found the place where I had stayed that first time I came. Several years had passed, I didn’t remember how many exactly at the time. I had some difficulty parking, because the whole place was packed with cars, and taking my travel bag, I headed for the door.

I went in and taking a look at the place, I thought, “Everything has changed so much!” I saw new faces; could I be in the wrong place? I turned around to leave, when a person who was entering just then said:

“It’s been such a long time!”

I gave him a good look and since I found it strange, because I didn’t think I’d ever seen him in my life, I asked him:

“Do we know each other?”

“Sure,” the man said smiling, “well, I’ve not forgotten you at least, but I see you’ve forgotten me.”

Faced with what must have been an expression of surprise, he told me:

“Seven years have passed, but I still remember when you arrived that night and asked me if we had any rooms.”

Suddenly I remembered, the man I had met the first time I came, at least I assumed it was him, because the truth was that now I didn’t quite recognize him as he was. “Could I be so clueless?” I thought at the time, and to be polite I said:

“Yes! It’s been so long.”

“It was a horse caper,” the man told me smiling and raising his hand to his face.

I didn’t understand him, what would a horse have to do with anything? But I looked at him and suddenly saw a big scar that crossed his face. Was that why I’d not recognized him? Trying to be considerate, I asked:

“How did it happen?”

“Well, she got scared, forgot she wasn’t alone and she stopped suddenly and I got tossed over her head and I landed on my face. The poor animal wasn’t to blame, but my life changed at that moment,” the man was saying to me with a sad tone.

“How did it happen?” I pressed again. When I heard myself say it, I said to myself, “Manu, what a gossip you are, what do you care?”

Grateful to be able to chat a little about it with someone, something that was obvious from the outset, he thanked me for asking and told me:

“Well, you see, the truth is that I didn’t really know what had happened. What I do know is that the horse showed up back here on its own and some of the neighbors were surprised, so they went out to look for me. When they finally found me, I’d lost a lot of blood and my recovery was slow, but what it comes down to in life is that we don’t know what might happen to us when we go out into the street in the morning, whether or not we’re going to return in one piece. That being said, we can also have some mishap at home, who knows.”

Seeing that he was a little sad, I encouraged him by saying:

“Well, at least that’s all in the past now. I see you’re alright now, and that’s what matters.”

“Well son, you’re right, yes…, but I can get by,” the man told me and as if remembering himself at that moment, he asked me, “And do you want a room?”

“Of course!” I answered, “if there’s one free, because I see there are cars parked everywhere out there, it seems business is doing well.”

“There’ll be something free,” he said smiling, “there’s always room for old guests. What’s more, you brought us luck and I’ve not forgotten that.”

“How so?” I asked, in surprise. “What do you mean?”

“Yes, since you were here, we’ve not been closed for a single day, we’ve always had pilgrims,” he was saying, already with another more cheerful tone in his voice.

“Pilgrims?” I asked a little surprised, “and what did I have to do with that?”

“Yes, I looked it up, precisely on the day you left, talking to my wife, I said, ‘Look, let’s keep the prices affordable, and you’ll see, we won’t lack for guests,’ and that’s how it’s been. There have been other folk who’ve opened up their own places after us and they’ve been adding luxuries to their places, even televisions in the rooms and I wonder to myself, does someone who comes to pray for two or three days really need that? Can’t they go without it?”

“You see? And another thing I don’t understand,” he went on telling me, “is that eagerness to put armchairs and carpets in the rooms. Places that people only come to lie down and rest. Of course that’s their justification for putting up the prices, but that’s what they do. Then when the good weather ends, they have to close, because nobody comes to them, and folk know they’ll always have a comfortable bed to sleep in here and a nice dish of warm soup. Even in January, we have no lack of visitors who come here to ‘Spend some quiet days in prayer,’ as they say, that solitude is what they’re looking for.”

I was already starting to feel a little restless, because the truth is that the journey had been pretty rough, and because I didn’t want to get here too late, I had only stopped when the car needed some gas, so I said:

“Excuse me, I’m just going to see if they can give me a room.”

“No, sorry for keeping you, you must be tired,” he said and went through that front door that I remembered from the last time, although they had painted it differently.

The place had changed. I didn’t remember it being painted like that the time before, nor that it had such beautiful plants. I don’t pay much attention to details, but I have always really liked plants, I must get it from my mother, who has the balconies full of them.

I saw a very pretty young lady at the reception desk, which hadn’t been there last time either, and when I approached her to ask about the room, the man came back through the door again and said:

“It’s all sorted! Give him the key to 203.”

The young lady approached me with an odd look on her face, and when the man saw her, he said:

“Yes dear, he’s been here before, a long time ago.”

“Is it the same room as last time? You’ve no idea how much I’d appreciate that,” I said smiling.

“Sure, I remember commenting when you left about how well-behaved you’d been there, no noise or distractions, just the view of the countryside and also that you’d risen to see the sunrise.”

“What a memory you have, with all the guests that must have passed through here since then,” I commented.

“Yes, that’s true, but you also told me something that I’ll never forget. We were chatting, because I saw that you were very curious and interested in a lot of things, you answered a question I’d asked you, I don’t remember what it was now, but you said, ‘I’m an atheist,’ and that’s now etched on my memory. Why was an atheist going to bother coming to this place and ask all those questions that you were asking me? I remember that from that moment, when you asked me something, I was very careful of the answer I was going to give you. I didn’t know if you had any police friends and perhaps there would be consequences later.”

I was very surprised, I did remember at that moment that there had been a change in his attitude and it felt like this friendly gentleman, who always had a little time to chat with me and clear up any questions that I had, had been avoiding me after a certain point, as if he didn’t want to speak with me anymore, and I hadn’t known why.

I’d attributed it to the fact that every time I saw him I detained him with all my questions. I was sure I was keeping him from any work at hand and that he was too polite and wouldn’t tell me, “I can’t help you just now.” Still, what I was hearing in these moments surprised me and I had to say:

“What are you saying? You thought I had a police friend and I was going to say something to him? About what?”

“I don’t know,” the man said, shrugging, “because you asked so many questions, I wondered why you wanted the information.” Ending the conversation, he said, “I’ve already said to my wife to prepare something for your dinner for when you freshen up a little.”

“It’s alright, don’t trouble yourself,” I said, “I see it’s already too late and the kitchen must be closed.”

“Yes,” he said, laughing, “but my wife has the key and doesn’t have to bother anyone. She’s the one who makes it and she’s very happy to do so, you’ll see later when she tells you the same thing.”

I climbed the steps, remembering the first time I had climbed them and everything that had happened there. Now that I was remembering, it seemed like a movie I had watched sitting in a movie theater, and not my own experiences, and I said to myself, “So now, what will happen to me? Because I really don’t know why I came.”

I left those thoughts for another time. I was too tired; with two strides I was in front of the room I knew so well.

The door had been changed. It was made of a better quality of wood than the one I remembered. “They’ve really made a lot of renovations. It’s natural I suppose, time spoils everything,” I thought standing there, as I inserted the key into the lock.

I opened it slowly, with curiosity, remembering what had happened to me inside those four walls, those experiences that had changed my life, and I looked around after turning on the light. “My” lamp had been taken away, the one that made me dream so much.

“Well this one is fine, too,” I told myself, “the other one must have broken or been replaced by a more modern one.”

How silly I was to hope that everything would still be the same as when I left it. I passed in front of the closet mirror, which was still there in its place, facing the foot of the bed, reflecting my image as I passed.

I looked at myself, how I had changed and “How skinny I was!” as my mother would tell me. She was right, I had to put on a little weight so that my bones wouldn’t be quite so visible.

“Just fill out those bones,” Mom would say, insisting that I eat a little more.

“Leave him be, he’s an adult now,” Dad would say, “he knows how to look after himself.”

I went over to look out the window. My window was still there. Of course it was, as much as they might change a room, it’s not as if they’re going to move the window from where it was before.

What they had removed were the curtains. Now it had some modern Persian blinds and some net curtains that I didn’t remember from before. They’d also removed the table that I’d once used to take notes in my notebook about what had happened to me on that day so as not to forget it.

I remember the times when I wrote down the conversation I’d had with the owner and the amount of information he had given me.

Now, next to the closet was a desk. It was a modern piece of furniture with a drawer on runners and a modern looking chair in front of it. I left the bag there and went to wash my hands. I could tell that there was also something here that had changed, but I didn’t pay it much attention. I finished up quickly and went downstairs to the dining room. I didn’t want to make them wait, since they had been so kind as to prepare me something for dinner in spite of how late it was.

The lady was sitting a steaming plate down on a table. The rest of the dining room had been cleared. It was empty, clean and lonely at that time, although they had turned all the lights on. I smiled at her from the door, she looked the same, it seemed like time hadn’t passed for her, and I told her so.

“You’re very kind to say so son, but time doesn’t forgive anyone, and I’m not what I used to be, if you saw how my knees are getting,” she said smiling.

“That’ll be because you don’t rest all day,” I said.

“That’s true enough, but I don’t know how to be still, so many years doing the same thing… but let’s not talk about me, what about you? What is it that made you decide to come back?” she was saying slowly, almost with an air of confidentially. “What? Are you back at your research again?”

I watched her closely, and said:

“What do you mean? I don’t understand, it’s just a trip to remember old…”

“Yes, old what…?” she interrupted, “because you’re not going to tell me that nothing happened to you. You can’t tell me that. I know something happened to you, right?”

“Wait, what are you referring to?” I asked in surprise.

“It’s alright, I understand if you don’t want to tell me. Don’t worry, the day you want to share it, you know who you can talk to in confidence,” she was saying softly.

I didn’t quite understand it. Yes, something had indeed happened to me, but I wasn’t going to tell a stranger, I couldn’t even imagine doing that.

I took the spoon and began to fill it with the soup that she had brought me, which smelled so good, so I could eat it and finish up.

“Son, there are some things in this life…,” she was saying, “…that get easier when you share them, don’t you forget that.”

Turning around, she went into the kitchen to bring me the second course, that cod that I think only she knows how to make so delicious.

CHAPTER 6.

I was walking quickly. The rain fell heavily and because it was very windy, an umbrella would have been useless. I hadn’t even taken it, so my whole face was getting soaked.

When I turned a corner, someone crossed my path, I was as scatter-brained as ever, but certainly justified under the circumstances, because I was in a hurry, not just because I was getting drenched but because I was late too, which I’ve never liked. I kept walking, when I heard:

“Don Manuel.”

I stopped in my tracks and turned around, then I noticed who had called me, it was the person who had crossed my path a moment ago.

“How long has it been since we’ve seen each other?” she asked.

I hadn’t recognized her before, but I did now, it was the librarian, but I couldn’t remember at that moment what she was called, but masking my confusion, I said:

“How are you? And what’s with this ‘Don’ Manuel? Has time made you forget that we’re friends and all the hours that we spent together?”

“It’s like looking for a needle in a haystack,” she said. “Did you continue researching the subject?” she asked me.

“Yes,” I said and added, “what do you think about meeting for a coffee this evening and reminiscing about old times? I’m in a bit of a hurry just now, they’re waiting for me.”

“I think that would be good, I’m also in a hurry, besides there’s not really time to be standing around here on the street with this rain.” Turning around, she said, “six at our place.”

She left me almost mid-sentence, before I had the chance to respond. I watched as she disappeared around the corner, and thought, “At our place, where would that be?” I had no idea where she meant at that moment, after all the years that had passed since I last saw her, how would I remember that little detail?

Returning to reality, I saw how the rain was pouring down and I was soaking wet. Although the raincoat I was wearing was long, the bottom of my pants were already saturated. I started walking, a little concerned because I was going to be late with the minutes I’d lost with the encounter, so I picked up the pace, well as much as the stones on the ground would allow me to, because when they’re wet, it’s better to be careful if you don’t want to end up falling.

“Where could that place she had just told me be?” I asked myself. I kept thinking about it as I walked, when suddenly I found the solution to the problem; I know where she works. I’ll go there when she’s about to leave and I’ll say that I’ve come to look for her, that way I’ll look like a gentleman and she won’t know I’ve forgotten the place for our appointment.

“The years aren’t kind, I never would have forgotten such a thing in my younger days,” and regretful to realize that my memory was not what it was, I continued on my way.

<<<<< >>>>>

I looked at the clock, and at that point I remembered the appointment I had at six as she had told me. I left the book I had in my hands, and decided to get ready so I would arrive a little before she finished her work, that way if there was anything new I could check it out before going to get that coffee.

On the way I was thinking, “I don’t think there’s any literature I don’t know about, because I’ve been paying careful attention to everything that has come out, but surely something has passed me by and she’ll tell me about it right away.”

With that in mind, I arrived at the library door. I still had lots of energy and when I quickened my pace there was no one who could get ahead of me.

When I went through the library door, I stood there, surprised to see a young lady in her place. “Could she be ill? Maybe she caught a cold this morning with all that rain.”

I was about to turn around when I thought, “If I don’t have her phone number, I can’t call her either,” and with the idea of asking the girl who I assumed must be her substitute, I went over to the counter.

“Good afternoon!” I said when I got there.

“Finally, thank goodness the day has gotten better, because this morning was terrible. I don’t know where so much rain could have come from, it seemed like it was never going to stop. What can I do for you?” said the young lady in a friendly voice, standing there looking at me with a smile.

“I came to see your colleague, but I see she’s not here,” I answered her.

Her smile disappearing, she looked at me strangely.

“Colleague?”

“Yes,” I said a little confused.

“Pillar?” she said immediately, as if she had just remembered.

“Yes, Pilar,” I answered, giving a little snort, happy to finally remember that name.

Staring at me, the young lady told me:

“Well, surely you know she hasn’t been around for a long time?”

“Well, it’s been a while yes, I’ve been busy, you know how things are. You get caught up in things and you don’t have time for anything, and before you know it, the days have passed,” I answered, lowering my head in embarrassment. “Why are you asking me that?” I asked her a little taken aback. Why would she care if I came to see Pilar often or not?

“Well, because Pilar retired years ago. I don’t know how long ago, because I’ve only been working here for a few months. When she left, they hired someone else, but I took the librarian’s exams and they gave me this position, because the person who was here replacing her, was only temporary,” she said very seriously.

I was listening to her as if a distant voice was informing me, because I was lost in my own thoughts.

How could she have retired? It couldn’t be true surely, this person must be mistaken. Something suddenly hit me. Of course! She was older than I was, but not by that much, I had been all over the place lately!

“Alright,” I said to the girl, “I won’t bother you any further. Oh, and could you tell me where she lives?”

But before she had time to answer, I heard someone talking behind me.

“Don Manuel, I see you’re as punctual as ever, and as I’d imagined, you’ve come through here first to see if there was anything new.”

I didn’t even have time to react. I saw her approaching the girl, walking as quickly as ever, going around the counter and after giving her two kisses, she asked her with a smile:

“How are you? Are you bored? Be patient, rainy days you know, people are warmer at home.”

“Look, before we leave, I want you to see something,” she said to me.

She had come to my side, then walked decisively down one of the corridors and I followed, but not without saying goodbye to the lady at the counter who must have taken me for a bit of a fool.

“What do you want to show me Pilar?” I asked as I followed her.

“I see you haven’t forgotten my name, despite how long it’s been since we last saw one another,” she said turning her face and smiling.

I had the impulse to tell her that the young lady had just reminded me, but I restrained myself. No, she’s not going to believe that I have memory lapses already, and I said:

“So Pilar, what’s going on in your life? They just told me that you’ve retired.”

“Well, the truth is that I didn’t like it anymore, even though I was trying to… how can I put it? Re-engage, but it was impossible. They wanted new people, especially people who knew how to use the new technologies that were coming out, because as you can see, everything has really changed since the computers arrived, it’s not the same anymore. People prefer to find the answers easily, rather than spend hours going over tomes to find what they need.”

“Well,” I said, “it’s always good to move forward, but now I don’t know what’s happening, it seems we’re all in such an almighty hurry, even if we don’t have much to do, we’re almost running, what times we live in!”

“Yes,” she said, “to then waste time watching television.”

“Well, I don’t watch it much, but I do like to watch the news.”

“Of course, and that’ll have made you stop reading the newspaper every day as you always used to.”

“No, I still have that habit and I don’t think anyone can take that away from me. I’ve been doing it for so many years, but yes, it is true that it’s more comfortable to sit and watch something and have someone telling you, rather than to be reading. On top of that, my eyes are not what they used to be.”

“Of course, you won’t give up the habit because it’s fallen out of fashion, but young people, what do you think? Watching television without making any effort to find out about things and they’ll gradually stop working harder and harder and they’ll stop reading altogether,” she was saying to me a little sadly.

“Don’t exaggerate, there have always been distractions and reading has endured,” I added to cheer her up.

“Yes, but hear me well, isn’t it true that people in your younger days read more than they do today? You have to admit that we liked reading more than the younger folk of today.”

“Well, you’re right about that,” I was saying, when I saw her stop.

“All the information you want, you have it here.”

We had reached where she wanted, she stopped there and showed me a device.

“What?” I asked right away. “What are you talking about?”

“Yep, everything is stored on here and all you have to do is select a date and the information comes out for you, straight away.”

“What are you telling me? That the newspapers are all archived in there? Because that would be great for me, a what-do-you-call-it like this, because I have material from all these years of research, which I can’t fit anywhere at home. When one of my nephews comes to pay me a visit, not that it’s often, but when they pass by where I live, they ring the bell downstairs and if I answer them, they say:

‘Hello uncle Manu!’ and they come in to see me for a while. That’s because their parents always tell them that since I’m a loner, I must get bored a lot, and because they hear it so much, they come to keep me company for a while. Well, he asks me why I don’t throw away all those old papers.”

“And what do they think of all your work?” Pilar asked me.

“Well, the truth is that no one in my family has ever understood, although as they know, I’m very stubborn and I was never gonna let it go, and they’ve never asked me to give up.”

I keyed in a date where she told me, and immediately the newspaper I wanted appeared on the screen, of course I just searched for something I already knew, to see if it worked.

“How much time and money this invention would have saved me before,” I said looking at her.

“Yes, she said and miles, I know you’ve had to make many trips to collect all that information.”

Well, what have you dedicated yourself to since you don’t have to go to work every day? How have you been spending your time? I was asking her curiously.

Blushing like a schoolgirl who had been caught hiding something, she said:

“I’ve dedicated myself to writing.”

“Writing?” I asked surprised. “Writing what?”

“Well, memories, experiences, in short, part of my life between these four walls, my views on many things,” she was telling me and had lowered her voice, it was clear that she didn’t want anyone to find out.

“Tell me! Tell me! I’m sure it’s very interesting,” I interrupted her with curiosity.

“Look,” she said, looking at the clock, “let’s go, or we’re going to be too late for coffee, and we’ll get there at dinner time, but I promise I’ll tell you.”

We shut down that device and headed down the corridor to the exit, where we said goodbye to the lady. Pilar gave her another two kisses as she had when she arrived and said:

“Keep holding down the fort for me!”

As a farewell, I said to her:

“I’ll be back some day when I have more time to take a look at that little gadget you have, bye!”

Looking at me with an expression on her face that told me she had no idea what I was referring to, she said:

“Well, I’ll be here, come back whenever you want.”

I left behind Pilar, and started walking quickly, because I didn’t want her to leave me behind, but it was hard for me to stay by her side.

I noticed that time had not sapped away that energy that she always had, and that although now she would not have to walk so much through the corridors of the library, her legs were as agile as ever. Suddenly she stopped there in the middle of the street, and she started thinking.

“Look, seeing as we’re together, we don’t need to go to our coffee shop, I’m thinking of something I’d like to show you,” she was telling me with a smile.

Without asking any questions, because I thought, “She always has first-hand information,” I said:

“Whatever you want. Let’s go to wherever you’re talking about.”

We went to the Rúa da Raiña and in surprise I said:

“So where are we going?”

At that point, we passed by the door of a coffee shop, and she said:

“Look, this looks like a good place to get a coffee, what do you think?”

I liked the place too, although in reality it didn’t matter to me, so we entered and asked for one right there at the counter, which really surprised me.

I had assumed she would take advantage of the fact that we would be sitting quietly to show me what she had just told me about, but I was wrong, she didn’t want to sit down at all. When I proposed it, she said: