“What about the charts,” I improvised, “the medical records?” Had any immortal ever been at the hospital? Did the Elders have a protocol to deal with a situation such as this one?
Apparently not, because for the first time Alexander hesitated. “It could be arranged for new records to be made. But maybe it would be better if we wait to change him until he’s home.”
His eyes narrowed on me. “Talking to Bécquer will change nothing,” he said, his words confirming my suspicion that he had sensed my feelings. “Bécquer will choose to be immortal.”
“I only want to say goodbye while he is still human.”
“I’ll let him know. But you must promise you won’t wake him up tonight.”
I swallowed hard. “I promise.”
“All right, then. I’ll leave now. When Federico comes, tell him we’ll reconvene at Bécquer’s house by noon tomorrow.”
I nodded, a useless gesture because Alexander was already gone. The pressing beeping of the machine announcing it had been disconnected told me time had resumed its course for us.
Soon a nurse came in — the night nurse I had not met before. I told her Bécquer had broken his arm struggling against the straps that bound him to his bed. The fact that she didn’t question the unlikeness of my explanation, nor argue when I told her he didn’t need a cast, just to have his arm set, made me guess Alexander was controlling her mind.
When Federico arrived later that night, Bécquer was still unconscious. The immortal blood healing his body had raised his temperature so that his skin was hot to the touch, and the few times he opened his eyes, he had not recognized me. But Federico reassured me Bécquer would be better by morning.
“You should go now,” he insisted. “You shouldn’t be present when I talk to them.”
He didn’t explain further and I didn’t ask. Instead, I asked him to tell Bécquer that I wanted to talk with him before he became immortal.
Federico promised and, out of excuses to stay, I left.
I left, reluctantly, because I knew quite well as I closed the door that Bécquer would be immortal the next day and I would never see him again.
It hurt to walk.
Chapter Twenty-One: Red Roses
I called Ryan from the hospital. He was home, I knew, because he had left a voice message before, telling me so and demanding to know whether I had stayed at the hospital. For once, I didn’t resent his challenging me, because his call had distracted Beatriz and saved Bécquer’s life and mine.
It was after midnight by the time Ryan arrived to pick me up. Exhausted physically and mentally, I wanted nothing more than to go home. But my car was at Bécquer’s and if I didn’t retrieve it now, I risked running into the Elders the next day. I didn’t want to meet the Elders nor Bécquer unless he asked for me before being turned immortal. I had no choice but to get the car now.
Ryan frowned when I asked him to drive me to Bécquer’s house. “We can go together to see him tomorrow. Your car will be safe there till then.”
I shook my head. “I’d rather go now.”
“Why?”
I recognized the tension in his voice, a clear warning that he was ready to fight were I to forbid him to see Bécquer. I was too tired to argue with him. So I didn’t. I didn’t tell him he couldn’t see Bécquer. I told him the truth instead.
Yes, I still believed any relationship between humans and immortals was unwise, dangerous even, but Ryan was eighteen, no longer a baby for me to cradle and protect. And if I couldn’t stop him from seeing Bécquer, I owed him the truth so he could make a more informed decision on his own. So, on the way to Bécquer’s house, I told him what I knew about the immortals.
“You don’t expect me to believe that, do you?” Ryan asked me when I finished.
I shrugged. “It’s the truth.”
“It’s absurd.” With the same determination he had shown at six when he argued that Santa Claus did not exist, he argued now that immortals did not, could not be. But the very fact that he was arguing told me a part of him believed already. The part that questioned my explanation of what had happened when Beatriz kidnapped him on Halloween.
By the time we reached Bécquer’s house, he had run out of questions.
“Drive safe,” I told him as he stopped the car. Ryan didn’t answer and when I bent to kiss him, he withdrew his face from me. By the time I reached my car, the screech of tires on gravel had faded away.
Bécquer didn’t call the next day, or the following, and my hope of seeing him before he became immortal dissipated as the days passed. On Tuesday, when I was certain he would not call, I took his diary out of the envelope and read it in one sitting. Based on the dates of his entries, he had written it the previous week, when he was human.
It was the Bécquer of his Rhymes and Legends, the one who came through his writing, a Bécquer curious and naive, and terribly romantic. In his unaffected style, he described his obsession with Lucrezia, his love for Julia — the girl Cesar drove away from him with lies, and later married — his acceptance of a marriage of convenience with Casta, imposed on them by her father’s knowledge of the immortals and his threat to expose Bécquer to the Bishop. Bécquer had accepted mainly out of hope that a marriage blessed by the Church would put an end to his curse. He was wrong: his attraction to Lucrezia did not go away, but with time, Bécquer grew fond of his wife and very much in love with his children, including Emilio, my ancestor.
His love for this baby who was not his and must have been for him a constant reminder of his failure as a husband, underscored a gentleness of his character that only enhanced my feelings for him. Feelings I knew I had to push out of my mind for Bécquer was immortal once more, and I could not see him again.
Although it hurt, I had to accept that Bécquer was gone from my life. The only palpable proof he had ever existed was my two-book deal and the name of an agent I had yet to contact.
That, and a distraught Ryan, still upset with me because Bécquer was immortal. As if it was my fault.
But it was I who’d told him, and so he blamed me as he had blamed me for his father’s leaving when he was eight. I understood his anger at me was his defense against the pain of finding out Bécquer had lied to him and knew he would eventually work through his pain and forgive me. But not just yet.
I had not asked Ryan if he had seen Bécquer and he had not volunteered any information. My guess was that he had tried and Bécquer had rejected him. I also noticed his showers had gotten longer, an indication that he was dating a new girl. A girl that was not Emily, Madison told me one day out of the blue. “Because I know you don’t like Emily and you’ll be happy they have broken up.”
She was partially right. I liked Emily, but not the fact that she was still doing drugs.
Madison didn’t tell me who Ryan’s new girl was and I didn’t ask. It was an unspoken understanding between us that her first loyalty was to her brother and I knew it would have been useless to challenge that.
A week had passed since Bécquer’s suicide attempt, when the doorbell rang.
Abby’s mother was supposed to pick Madison up and drive both girls to the movies, so I assumed it was Abby at the door. I called to Madison from my study and, when she didn’t answer — not surprisingly because I could hear her up in her room, arguing fast and furious on her phone — I got up and opened the door.
It wasn’t Abby, but Bécquer who stood outside. Bécquer with a bouquet of roses in one hand and a smile upon his lips.