Page 99 of One Year Ago in Spain
He was truly gone.
Oh god.
Had he returned to the sleeping half of him? Could he?
Or was it already too late?
Claire scrambled for her phone and stabbed at the screen, failing several times before she managed to call a taxi. While she waited for it to arrive, she tried the hospital, but they wouldn’t release any information to her. None of the de Leóns answered their phones, either.
As soon as the taxi pulled up, Claire flung herself into it before the driver could even park.
“Madrid,” she said, her heart in her throat. “Hospital Universitario La Paz. ¡Rápido, por favor!”
Claire
At half pastone in the morning, the taxi pulled up in front of the hospital. Claire grabbed a handful of cash from her wallet and thrust it at the driver.
“Señora, esto es demasiado.”
He tried to count out change for her, but she waved him off, already flinging open the car door.
“Keep it!” she shouted as she ran toward the hospital entrance.
But when she got there, Claire slammed into the glass door.
What? Why wasn’t it opening?
She looked for a handle somewhere, but no, these were sliding doors, ones she’d never even thought about on previous visits because they’d just parted as soon as she approached.
Claire tried to read the words etched into the glass. There was a range of times—8a.m.to 8p.m.—which corresponded with visiting hours. She didn’t understand the rest, though, so she pulled out her translation app to scan it.
For Emergencies After Hours, Please Go to the Emergency Department→
She sprinted toward the emergency room.
There was a security guard at the entrance.
Why was a guard there? The main entrance never had a guard posted out front. Was it just because it was the middle of the night?
“Buenas noches. ¿Necesita ayuda, señora?”Good evening. Do you need assistance, miss?
“Sí,” Claire said. “Quiero…” She had to think word by word to say things coherently in Spanish, and that was incredibly difficult since the only thing she could hear in her head right now wasPlease be okay, Matías, please be okay, please be okay.
“Quiero visitar a mi novio,” she finally said.I want to visit my boyfriend.
“Disculpe, ahora no se puede.” He shook his head. “Puede volver a las ocho.” He pointed to his watch, then held up eight fingers.
“Eight o’clock? That’s six and a half hours away, I can’t wait until then!” Claire tried to look behind the guard, hoping she could get the attention of the woman stationed at the intake desk. “Um…es importante. Now…¡ahora!”
He shifted to block her view of the emergency room and crossed his arms. “Señora. No.”
“But it’s an emergency!”
“¿Ustedtiene una emergencia?” He pointed at Claire.Doyouhave an emergency?
Yes,she wanted to say.My boyfriend’s soul is trying to return to his comatose body, and I need to get inside to see if he succeeded or…
“Mi novio está…” But Claire didn’t know how to explain any of that in Spanish, nor did she want to use her phone to do it, because it wouldn’t make sense anyway, would it? Soledad and Aracely had reacted to Claire’s revelation about Matías’s soul in the way any sane person would. Why would this guard be anydifferent? Part of his job, Claire realized, was to keep hysterical people like her away from the patients who actually needed care.
