The plateau of Anduza had a strange way of keeping silence.
Not the empty silence of lifeless nights. The kind that breathed, that left room for the ocean below to beat against the rocks with a patience only water knows. The sky was open and full, starred in a way that seemed excessive, as if someone had spilled light without care.
Mr. Zell was sitting at the edge of the cliff with his hands resting on his knees and his eyes lifted upward. Beside him, Fredon was counting.
— Nine hundred and ninety-seven... nine hundred and ninety-eight...
Zell said nothing. He watched his grandson with a gaze that judged neither haste nor slowness. A gaze that was simply present, as it had always been.
— Nine hundred and ninety-nine... — Fredon made a dramatic pause, raised his finger to the sky as if he were planting a flag. — One thousand.
He went quiet for a second, pleased with himself.
Zell placed his hand on his grandson's head and ran his fingers through his hair with a lightness that didn't match hands so old and so worn.
— Fredon.
— Grandpa?
— Do you really think you can count all the stars in the sky?
Fredon turned with a smile that didn't fit on his face.
— Yes, grandpa. All of them. — He paused as if what came next was the most serious thing he'd ever said. — And when I'm done, I'm going to take one for myself.
Zell went quiet. Then pulled out a slow smile, the kind that doesn't rush.
— Then if you take one, take one for me too.
— I'll take loads just for you, grandpa! — Fredon shouted, already on his feet, arms wide open to the sky.
— Good. — Said Zell, looking back at the stars. — I won't forget that, Fredon.
The boy sat back down, his shoulder leaning against his grandfather's arm. The ocean continued below, indifferent and eternal. They stayed like that for a while without needing words.
It was Fredon who broke the silence.
— Grandpa... what's on the other side of that ocean?
Zell looked toward the horizon where the sky and water met in a dark line. When he spoke, it was slowly, like someone measuring each word before letting it go.
— A great world lies behind that ocean. With wonders you still can't imagine. Things I myself have only seen a part of.
Fredon frowned, looking at that line on the horizon.
— Would you like to go there someday?
— No, grandpa. — He said, leaning closer into his grandfather. — I'm going to stay here. With you. Until our lives are over.
Zell didn't respond. He kept looking at the ocean with a smile that Fredon couldn't read. The kind of smile that holds something words can't say.
Then he coughed.
It was a deep cough that came from inside and shook the old man's shoulders. Fredon jumped to his feet.
— Grandpa Zell, are you alright?
Zell raised a hand, calming his grandson before panic could take hold.
— I am, Fredon. A rest will make me much better.
Fredon stood looking at him for a second with those eyes that still didn't know how to lie to themselves. Then he crouched down, pulled his grandfather's arm over his shoulder and carried him on his back with that disproportionate strength that fear lends to children.
He climbed the dirt path to the house with quick steps, breathing heavy, without letting go of his grandfather for a moment. The house was simple, stone walls, low ceiling, a window that looked out to sea. He laid him down with a care that didn't match the urgency that had brought him there.
— There. — He said, pulling up the blanket.
Zell opened his eyes and looked at his grandson.
— Don't worry. I'll be fine.
Fredon nodded, but stood in the doorway longer than he needed to, as if his feet didn't want to leave. Then he went.
---
Morning arrived with the smell of the sea and the sound of birds.
Fredon woke, went to his grandfather's room. The door was half-open. Zell was sleeping, his chest rising and falling calmly. He left without making a sound, picked up the fishing rod and descended through the forest toward the waterfall.
The path was the kind his feet already knew by heart. Raised roots, a crooked stone before the bend, a low branch that needed dodging. He heard the water before he saw it.
He reached the bank and shouted without thinking.
— Hey, Zelma!
The shout that answered was not one of greeting. Zelma shot out of the water with a face as red as embers, her clothes still half-twisted, screaming his name as if he had done the worst thing in the world, and disappeared up the path without looking back.
Fredon stood there with the rod in his hand.
— What's her problem.
He shrugged and went to fish.
He stayed there a while with his feet in the cold water, watching the hook beneath the surface. On one of the times he pulled the rod back, the line came up with nothing, and he was left with his hand stretched out over the still water.
The surface began to glow faintly beneath his palm.
Fredon blinked. He looked at his hand, looked at the water. The glow had disappeared. Just water and stone and the reflection of the trees above.
He frowned, lowered his hand slowly, and said nothing.
---
He came back home with four fish, pleased with the morning.
— Grandpa! — He called as soon as he stepped inside. — I brought fish! Grandpa, are you—
He stopped.
He heard the breathing before he reached the room. Laboured, heavy, struggling. The kind of breathing that shouldn't be that way.
He went in.
Mr. Zell was lying with his eyes half-open, his chest working too hard to do something that should be simple. The colour had left his face.
Fredon dropped the fish on the floor without noticing. He ran to the bed, took his grandfather's hand, tried to give him water, tried to speak, tried to call out to him. He could see that nothing was working and panic rose up his throat like smoke.
He left the house running.
He went straight to the cliff, grabbed the wooden hook fastened to the rope that descended from the mountain down to the village below, and threw himself into the void. The wind struck his face as he descended, the rope singing above, the village growing until his feet touched the makeshift wooden platform. He took the steps three at a time and entered the village at a run.
---
Doctor Olsen's green door creaked every time it opened.
Fredon walked in without knocking.
— Doctor Olsen! My grandfather is very ill, I need—
Olsen was attending to a woman seated in a chair, stethoscope around his neck. When he saw Fredon's face, he excused himself to the patient with a brief gesture and stepped outside.
— Mr. Zell? — He asked, already out on the street. His voice came out lower than it should have, as if the name cost something.
— He's breathing very badly, I tried to help but I can't—
Olsen didn't let him finish. He closed his fist, opened it, and in his palm appeared a three-pointed star spinning slowly with a white, quiet light. He threw it to the ground.
— Come.
The two stepped onto the star and the world accelerated. Within seconds they were at the door of the stone house on top of the mountain.
They went in. Olsen went straight to the room. At the door he turned to Fredon, and there was something in the doctor's eyes that Fredon couldn't name.
— Wait out here.
— But I—
— Fredon. — It wasn't harshness. It was something else. — Your grandfather is going to want to talk to you. Save your strength for that.
Fredon stood in the corridor with his fists clenched, listening to the muffled sounds coming from inside. His grandfather's breathing. The doctor's low voice. The silence that followed.
He waited.
The door opened. Olsen came out and stood still in the corridor, facing Fredon. He said nothing for a moment. There was a tension in the doctor's jaw, something he was holding back with force.
— You can go in. Your grandfather wants to talk to you.
Fredon looked at him searching for something more. Olsen's eyes were red at the edges, only that, only enough for someone who knew how to see. Fredon didn't know.
He went in.
---
Mr. Zell was in bed with the blanket pulled up to his chest and his smile in place. The cough had eased but hadn't gone away.
Fredon came in and the tears arrived before the words.
— Grandpa, I can do something, tell me what you need, I'll go and get it, I'll do it—
— Don't cry, Fredon. — Said Zell, his voice hoarse but steady. — Wasn't it you who told me you don't cry because you're a man?
Fredon wiped his face with the back of his hand.
— Yes, grandpa. Sorry.
Zell looked at him for a moment with that gaze Fredon had known for as long as he could remember being a person.
— My time has come. — He said simply. — You and I already knew this day would come.
— No, grandpa, Doctor Olsen can—
— Listen to me.
Fredon closed his mouth. The tears kept coming but he stayed quiet.
— I want you to be free. — Said Zell, his voice lower now, like someone speaking of something they had thought about for a long time. — Live your life. Make friends. Have adventures to tell, like the ones I always told you. Go and see what's on the other side of that ocean.
— Grandpa...
— What's happening to me now is the normal cycle of life. What matters is that we live in the best way possible, without regret. — He coughed once. Looked at his grandson with a smile that reached his eyes. — And you were the best thi—
He stopped.
The smile stayed. His eyes stayed open, but there was no longer anyone inside them looking out.
The room fell silent.
In the corridor, Olsen pressed his back against the wall, closed his eyes for a moment, and said nothing.
Outside, the ocean kept beating against the rocks with the same patience as always. The stars were still in the sky, a thousand of them or more, waiting for someone to count them.
Fredon said nothing.
He sat at the edge of the bed with his grandfather's hand between his own, on the day he turned fourteen, completely alone in the world for the first time.