“He says that if he’s crazy there’s no point in living.”
“You just told me you found a knife under his mattress and that he talked about suicide.”
“He’s thirteen years old—I don’t know whether to take it seriously.”
“Teenagers often commit suicide.”
They also talked about how to initiate treatment and break with the other psychiatrist. Let me take care of it, I know him, we all know each other in this profession. It’s best for Gaspar if his doctor is near his home and he doesn’t have to go into Buenos Aires several times a week. A bad relationship with his doctor could bring on unnecessary crises. I’ll take care of it. There won’t be legal problems, I know the system, too. I used to work in institutions.
“What about the medication? Gaspar says it doesn’t help, just makes him feels worse.”
The psychiatrist hesitated.
“We’re going to lower the dosage,” she said. “I can’t make a diagnosis in the first meeting, but I can try a different approach. Also, I don’t want you to force him to come to the sessions. He needs to come, but you should act as though you weren’t forcing him. Keep talking about it. Let him feel you’re worried. Talk about it every day.”
Luis talked about it so much he was left exhausted: by Gaspar’s sobbing, by the violence of his screams. But that wasn’t the worst part, and neither was Gaspar’s horrible thinness, which, Luis thought, if not for the fact that the country was a hellscape of power outages, protests, hyperinflation, and early elections, and that no one from the juvenile court ever visited them （maybe they were on strike?）， would have merited urgent intervention from a social worker. The worst had been one day when they’d had a strange, nearly silent argument, and afterward Gaspar had started to go back to his room—as he did every day; he spent too much time lying down, in bed or on the living-room sofa—but then stopped in the doorway, motionless. From the hallway, Luis saw that the boy’s knees were giving out, and he ran to catch him before he collapsed to the floor. He didn’t faint but he was drenched in sweat, even though the autumn afternoon was pretty cold. Luis, as he embraced him, felt how his body was shaking.
“Dad is in my room, don’t go in,” Gaspar told him.
Luis picked him up. He weighs less than a chair, he thought, and he carried Gaspar out to the yard because he couldn’t think what else to do. Still, he couldn’t help but steal a quick glance through the open door into the bedroom, and he swore he saw the intimidating, unmistakable figure of his younger brother, a flash of blond hair and his broad shoulders, long fingers, arms hanging down by his side. Unnerved, he sat on the garden bench and cradled the boy. You’re going to be okay, you’re going to be okay, until the boy interrupted him, unexpectedly:
“Quit lying.”
“You are going to be okay, Gaspar, I’m going to help you.”
“It was him. It’s better when he comes. Adela comes at night. She waves at me. They ate her face.”
“There’s no one else in the house, it’s just the two of us.”
The silence affirmed his words. In the distance, there was the sound of a neighbor mowing grass. The murmur of a TV, a few birds. The sun was still out. It was a beautiful day. The yellow roses swayed gently in the breeze: Luis had managed to revive the rose garden. The fact that Gaspar couldn’t enjoy the day seemed unfair to Luis, and he said so. He told Gaspar about the school he planned to send him to, about how he imagined them fixing up the house and the garden together, about his wish to start working, and about a nearby club where Gaspar could go back to playing sports, if he wanted. He didn’t know if Gaspar could hear him, nor did he notice when he fell asleep, but eventually he carried him inside to the living-room sofa and he sat down to wait, in silence, until he fell asleep too and dreamed of hallways and iron bars and the sea. When he woke up, Gaspar was looking at him in the half-darkness; the garden lights were on, and the house was full of shadows.
“Aren’t you uncomfortable there?”
“I’ll be sore everywhere tomorrow.”
Gaspar sat up, the blanket draped over his shoulders.
“Can that doctor see me tomorrow?” he asked.
Luis realized how much he loved his nephew as he watched him go into the office to see Isabel, the psychiatrist; he looked back before the door closed, and Luis gave him a dumb wave that Gaspar didn’t return. He had never felt so helpless and adrift, not even when he’d had to go into exile, or when, at his house in Brazil, he’d gotten news of comrades and friends who had disappeared or been murdered. It had all been monstrous, but that one look from Gaspar was worse. There’d been several nights when he imagined finding Gaspar dead in the bathtub, and he’d had dreams where the boy was covered in blood, others where he simply died in his sleep.
Gaspar emerged with the psychiatrist’s arm around his shoulders. They had been in there for a long time, almost two hours.
“See you on Friday? Gaspar and I decided we need to meet twice a week. We might add a third visit, if it’s necessary.”
Luis expected the psychiatrist to invite him in, but she said goodbye to both of them with a kiss on the cheek, saying, you can pay me next time.
And that was it.
In the car, Gaspar only said: I think this one is better.
Her mother had finally allowed her to call the house where Gaspar lived now with his uncle. Why had they taken him away like that, without warning? Gaspar has problems, dear. So what? We all have problems. Adela disappeared or she was killed, whatever, in the damned haunted house, and then they took Gaspar away too.
And Victoria cried and couldn’t sleep, and her mom called Gaspar’s uncle and told him about the situation and he told her about his own, and they went on talking.
“Gaspar’s uncle promised we’ll stay in touch. I’ll call him once a week. Everything’s fine. Gaspar is in treatment.”
“Treatment for what?”
“Vicky, you go to the psychologist too, it’s the same.”
“It’s not the same if I can’t see him.”
“Gaspar is in worse shape than you.”
“He’s not crazy.”
“You will get to see him, but he has to get better first.”
“Why do you all think I’m going to be bad for him?”
And her mom hugged her, but didn’t explain anymore. And Vicky saw Adela at least once a week, but out of the corner of her eye, like a shadow just behind her, and when she turned around no one was there. She told Pablo about it, and after he listened to her in the cool living room of his house that seemed so quiet to Victoria, he went to the bookshelf, took out a thin book with a green cover, and read: “There is the Hidebehind, which is always hiding behind something. No matter how many times or whichever way a man turns, it is always behind him, and that’s why nobody has been able to describe it, even though it is credited with having killed and devoured many a lumberjack.”
“Why the hell would you read me that?”
“You just reminded me of it. It’s Borges.”
He showed her the book’s cover.
“Is it a story?”