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From the shadows (an extract)

Juan Jos Mills

Translated from the Spanish by Margaret Jull Costa

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Sergio OKane was asking Damin Lobo which fish he identified with more:
The shark or the sardine?
Definitely not the shark, answered Lobo, I dont have a sharks aggressive
nature, Im far too squeamish for that. Nor with the sardine. I dont know, perhaps I
identify most with the eel.
Why an eel?
Well, its not particularly gregarious, it blends into the background, and lives
in warm tropical waters. Because I do tend to feel the cold.
Sergio OKane did not exist, he was a figment of Damin Lobos imagination,
which he used as a way of talking to himself, keeping up a running commentary on
everything that happened to him, usually at the very moment it happened, in an
imaginary interview that went on from morning till night. The encounter was shown
on television around the world, with a simultaneous translation for non-Spanishspeaking countries. In Lobos fantasy, it was broadcast live in front of a studio
audience and enjoyed huge viewing figures.
OKane started out as an inner voice, with no face and no history. As the years
passed, however, Damin Lobo had gradually endowed him with both a physical
appearance and a brief biography. Born in Madrid, OKane was the son of an
American diplomat, hence his surname. He was about forty-five, white, five foot nine
tall and, although fairly slim, he had a slightly prominent belly. He always wore a
dark suit, a white shirt and had a penchant for rather loud ties and gold tie pins. He
fastened the middle button of his jacket when he got up and unfastened it when he sat
down - a casually elegant gesture that fascinated Damin.

3
What made his face so magnetic were his yellow eyes and his very full lips,
which, when he smiled, revealed an enormous number of teeth, of which he appeared
to have more than his fair share. In the midst of these other prominent features, his
neat, very correct nose went almost unnoticed. He had a deeply receding hairline too,
but, far from trying to disguise this, he wore his hair combed back from his broad,
smooth forehead.
So youre still unemployed after being summarily dismissed two months ago
from the company where youd worked for twenty-five years, OKane had said.
And which I joined when I was just eighteen, added Damin.
That must have been very hard to take. Tell us, what is your view of heartless
capitalism?
Damin Lobo thought for a moment, then said that capitalism had been the
element he grew up in, like a fish in water.
Although without any understanding of that element, of course, he added,
just as the octopus doesnt need to understand the ocean in order to live in it.
And within that particular ecosystem, Seor Lobo, which fish do you identify
with more, the shark or the sardine?
Definitely not the shark, answered Lobo, I dont have a sharks aggressive
nature, Im far too squeamish for that. Nor with the sardine. I dont know, perhaps I
identify most with the eel.
The studio audience laughed. They often laughed at Damins remarks, even
when these were not necessarily witty, but if he imagined that they laughed, then they
laughed, they had no choice.
Now, while this imaginary interview with OKane was going on in Damins
head, his hand was raising to his lips a cup of tea that was still too hot to drink. He

4
was standing at the end of the bar in a dark, narrow caf, at a distance from the other
customers, like an eel hiding in a crevice at the bottom of the sea. He had just had
lunch with his father and sister, who lived in Calle de Arturo Soria, and had decided
to go for a short walk before catching the metro back home.
OKanes reference to heartless capitalism reminded him of that family lunch,
which he began to describe to the imaginary interviewer while waiting for his tea to
cool.
You see, he began, my older sister, who is Chinese, lives with my father.
Why is that?
You mean, why does she live with my father?
No, why is she Chinese?
Oh, they adopted her when she was a baby because they couldnt have
children; then, two years later, to their great surprise, my mother fell pregnant, and I
arrived.
When they werent expecting you? asked OKane.
Exactly. When they werent expecting me.
The audience waited in suspenseful silence. They were all swimming like fish
into the net. Damin Lobo and Sergio OKane saw this and did as they usually did.
The presenter let the camera focus on a close-up of his yellow eyes, which flickered
with flames reminiscent of solar storms, and, with a look, he urged his guest to
continue his story.
As I said, Damin Lobo went on, after a pause intended to increase the
tension, my older sister is two years my senior, and so when I was fourteen, she was
sixteen and already a well-developed young Chinese girl.

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At this point, there was a murmuring among the audience, the kind that usually
precedes laughter or, at the very least, a smile. Damin Lobo saw the approving look
in Sergio OKanes eyes, and instantly understood where he should take the story.
Well, you can imagine the rest. There was I, a rampant adolescent, and there
was she, a well-developed young Chinese girl She would emerge from the
bathroom wearing only a towel or walk across the living room half-naked
And werent you worried by the fact that she was your sister? asked Sergio
OKane, suppressing the first ripples of laughter.
Well, yes, officially she was my sister, but she hadnt come out of my mothers
womb, and my fathers sperm had nothing to do with her creation. More than that, she
belonged to a different ethnic group; in short, her origins had nothing to do with mine.
In the circumstances, I dont think it would be right to describe my desires as
incestuous. Nor indeed hers.
So she was attracted to you too?
Im not sure if it was attraction exactly, but right from when I was very young,
she began playing with my penis.
The audience burst out laughing, and this time the presenter made no attempt to
stop them. For his part, Damin remained serious, as he always did when the audience
laughed, knowing that his impassivity only increased the comic effect of his remarks.
The programme, he thought, must already be a trending topic on Twitter.
You say she began playing with your penis, said Sergio OKane when the
laughter had subsided.
Yes, one of my earliest memories is of her asking me to pull down my trousers
so that she could play with it. Sometimes, shed come into my bedroom and remove

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my pyjama bottoms. She would grab hold of my penis, put it in this position or that,
squeeze it, or put it in her mouth
He was interrupted by another wave of laughter, forcing him to fall silent, and
this time he added to his habitual poker-face a carefully-rehearsed look of
bemusement, as if he couldnt understand why they were laughing.
When Sergio OKane, who had also joined in the laughter, managed to silence
the audience, Damin Lobo went on:
She always wanted to go with me to the bathroom so that she could hold my
penis while I was peeing. She was obsessed with it.
And what did your parents say?
They knew nothing about it, because she knew when it was safe to do it.
And what did you think?
I didnt think anything, because those games started when I was so young,
theyd become part of everyday life.
And did they never stop?
Never, although, of course, the consequences changed as I grew older.
The audience was laughing only intermittently now, so as not to miss a word of
what the interviewee was saying.
But why are you telling me all this? asked OKane.
Because your reference to heartless capitalism reminded me that I had lunch
today with my father and my sister.
Im sorry, I dont quite follow.
You see, at some point - I cant quite remember how old I was, maybe twelve
or fourteen - my Chinese sister started referring to my penis as the penis with a
heart.

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This time, the first to burst out laughing was the presenter himself, and the
audience enthusiastically followed suit. For his part, Damin remained blank and
slightly perplexed, looking around him as if wondering what was going on with the
technicians behind the cameras.
So your penis, said OKane, still breathless with laughter, is a penis with a
heart. As opposed to what?
Damin Lobo hesitated. Then he said:
My fathers I suppose. Or perhaps other mens penises in general.
The dramatic way in which he said this plunged the audience into a silence as
intense as their laughter had been loud.
Im not asking you to get it out and show it to us, OKane said at last, trying
to bring a little humour to the matter, but there must be something special about your
penis for your sister to say it has a heart.
Its a question of character.
What, your sisters?
No, my peniss. It just looks like a nice person.
This time, the audience again guffawed, and to judge by OKanes expression,
he was clearly relieved to be back on familiar territory.
Forgive the laughter, said OKane, once the audience had recovered, but
weve never heard of penises that have or dont have a heart.
The interview, Damin reckoned, was turning out to be a success, but it had
reached a climax that was difficult to top, which is why he added a new dose of
theatricality to release the tension.
If my father was watching this programme, hed die of shame, he said.
Why? asked OKane.

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He loathes rubbish television. He only watches Canal+, which hes subscribed
to for as long as I can remember.
And would he consider what you and I are doing to be rubbish?
Absolutely, because of the things we talk about and our frivolous treatment of
them.
Tell us more about your father.
Hes a university professor and a respected film critic. An intellectual. His
house is full of books, which, when I was little, used to frighten me.
Whys that?
Because every time I walked past them, they would plead with me to read
them.
Youre speaking metaphorically, arent you?
No, no. I could hear them whispering: Read me, please, read me. Thats
because my father used to hide behind the shelves and put on a different voice,
saying: Read me, please, read me, and the words became so fixed in my brain that
they resurface every time I go near a book.
Were some books more frightening than others?
I always tried to avoid the section devoted to nineteenth-century Russian
literature. They would say Read me, please, read me in such hoarse, yearning
tones.
And did you read them?
Never. I only read user manuals and instruction leaflets.
What kind of instructions?
Oh, anything, how to use household appliances, for example, or machines in
general. I have a particular liking for the rules of board games.

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At this point, pleased with the success of Damins answer, Sergio OKane
announced a commercial break, and Damin Lobo returned to the bar in the caf,
where his tea was now cool enough for him to drink. He imagined what the TV critics
would have to say tomorrow in newspapers around the world. Perhaps, as had
happened in the past, they would overflow from the entertainment section onto the
front pages. Please, read me would make an eye-catching headline.
While he was finishing his tea, the adverts gave way once more to the
programme, to which Damin mentally transported himself so as to continue talking
about himself. He said that after that days family lunch, his father had fallen asleep
watching Canal+, which featured Iaki Gabilondo interviewing a well-known film
director.
My father adores Iaki Gabilondo, he said, because
Hm, right, OKane broke in, as if he were jealous of the celebrated journalist,
but you havent told us anything about your mother.
My mother was a mere appendage of my father, an extension of him, at least
thats how I saw her. My father was to her what Iaki Gabilondo was to him. Before
she died, about ten or so years ago, she was teaching chemistry in a secondary school,
and I think she was a good teacher too, but at home, she would just copy my father in
everything and was completely indistinguishable from him. I think she died because
my father wanted her to, so that he would be left alone with my Chinese sister.
Are you saying that your father wanted to be left alone with your sister?
Yes, but Id rather not talk about that.
To alleviate the look of disappointment on the interviewers face and on the
faces of the audience, Damin Lobo described how, while his father was dozing in
front of the television, he and his Chinese sister had sneaked off to her bedroom.

10
To play with the penis with a heart? asked OKane ironically.
Exactly, said Damin, who, to the audiences delight, went on to explain at
length the sexual practices the two siblings had indulged in after the family lunch.
When he began to describe in some detail his Chinese sisters vulva and vagina,
OKane must have received orders through his earpiece to change the subject, because
he suddenly asked:
And what exactly did it make, the company that made you redundant?
Manufacturing equipment, and I was in charge of maintenance, answered
Damin.
You mean you took care of the plugs and the plumbing and so on?
You have a very narrow view of my job, Seor OKane. Being in charge of
maintenance, especially nowadays, requires a high degree of skill.
So what training did you have, Damin?
I joined the company when I was very young, as an apprentice, because, much
to my fathers dismay, I trained as an electrician, and I was very good with my hands.
I learned how to carry out practical, day-to-day tasks, and I had a lot of young
engineers under me, all of whom were great when it came to theory, but incapable of
solving problems requiring immediate answers. Anyway, when I started work, you
didnt need the kind of academic qualifications employers demand now.
At this point, Damin abandoned the interview with OKane (for some reason,
he was finding it hard to concentrate on his usual daydreams) and returned to reality.
The other customers in the caf, who had grown in number, were crowded around the
other end of bar, nearest the door. He again imagined himself as an eel hiding among
the coral reefs, waiting for his prey, or perhaps hiding from some predator.

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So what did your job involve? he heard OKane asking from the other
dimension.
I planned out what the other staff should be doing, I assigned tasks, oversaw
the machinery, ordered materials and spare parts, and estimated the cost of repairs, he
responded, returning abruptly to the set.
So a multidisciplinary role, then.
Yes, I needed a basic knowledge of all the different branches of industry:
bricklaying, decorating, electrical work, plumbing And IT stuff too. Im an Internet
whizzkid.
Meaning?
Well, thanks partly to Asian porn, Damin said. I spend all my time looking
for nice little Chinese cunts on the Net.
The studio audience, whose attention had somewhat waned while he was
discussing work matters, applauded Damin Lobos latest remark, and he, in turn,
noticed a flicker of joy in the presenters yellow eyes. He sometimes found it quite
exhausting to keep the audience at the level of interest to which OKane was
accustomed.
Nice little Chinese cunts, repeated the showman.
That comes from my fixation on my Chinese sister. And yet we hardly see
each other now. Its almost a year since I last went to my fathers house. My father
hates the way my clothes stink of tobacco. He always pulls a face when I go over to
give him a hug. He also hates the fact that I resemble him physically.
Do you smoke a lot?
Not that much, but I smoke Camel cigarettes, which have a particularly strong
smell. Im going to give them up.

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When?
One day. Ill just say right, thats enough, and Ill stop. I find it easy to stick to
any decisions I make.
You said you were an Internet whizzkid.
Yes, partly because of what I said earlier, and partly because Ive given
courses in programming and recovering files. Partly, too, because Im a very curious
fellow and I soon picked up how best to remove any trace of my searches, a lot of
which I did on the companys computers.
A rush of steam from the coffee machine wrenched Damin Lobo out of his
televisual daydream, and he couldnt be bothered to go back. Success always made
him feel rather depressed.
He summoned the waiter, paid for his tea and left the bar so that he could
smoke a cigarette. He moved along the streets like a fish in the ocean depths,
following an erratic, undulating path, so as to avoid contact with the other species he
met.
He passed a shopping mall advertising an antiques sale to raise money for
homeless children. He went in, simply to kill time, just as an eel might have slipped
into an attractive grotto he happened to pass, and he discovered that the stalls took up
most of the free space in the centre of the mall. If he had been in charge of
maintenance there, he thought, he wouldnt have allowed all those stalls to block the
emergency exits.
On the improvised counters, which were all covered with expensive linen - also
for sale - were antique clocks, chains, cigarette cases, chokers, lockets, bracelets,
rings A lot of gold and a lot of silver too, and all kinds of objects from earlier
centuries, the sight of which calmed Damins troubled mind.

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Then, on one of the stalls, something caught his eye: a gold tie pin with,
engraved in the middle, the initials S.O.
Sergio OKane, thought Damin with a smile. Attached to this object, so
elegant in its simplicity, was a tiny oval label, bearing what appeared to be a reference
number. Perhaps, thought Damin, still not daring to touch the pin, the price was on
the other side.
After this curious discovery, he continued zigzagging his way through the
market which somewhat resembled an expensive souk but took little notice of
what else he saw. His mind was still occupied with the image of that tie pin.
What made you think you could steal it? asked Sergio OKane.
I suppose I felt that my dismissal had somehow placed me beyond the pale,
said Damin.
Were you in financial difficulties, Seor Lobo?
Not then, no. Id negotiated a decent enough redundancy package and was still
elegible for two years unemployment benefit, plus I had some savings. But being
dismissed at the age of forty-three was almost tantamount to being left with nothing.
Would we be right in saying that the theft was a kind of revenge on the
system?
Possibly. Besides, I fancied giving you a little present, and you happen to be
one of the few people I know who still wears a tie pin. It was perfect and, like I said,
it had your initials on it.
At this point, Damin suspended the imaginary meeting with OKane and
returned to reality, prepared, somehow or other, to make off with the tie pin. His
chosen method in the end was simply to take it, because when he returned to the stall,
there was no one standing near the counter, and the ladies in charge two elderly

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predators with backcombed hair were looking the other way, busily discussing
where best to place a cut-glass decanter with a silver spout. When questioned by
Sergio OKane, Damin Lobo declared that it had all happened very quickly and very
slowly.
My hand emerged from my trouser pocket empty and returned to it holding the
tie pin, the way a chameleons tongue shoots out to catch a butterfly.
After the theft, he continued walking, face expressionless. If, up until then,
everything had occurred in a dimension in which time had lost its accustomed
proportions, he had barely gone a few yards when the seconds recovered their usual
duration, although his heart was pounding like someone who has just received a
terrible shock. He now rather regretted the theft, but any remorse he felt was lessened
by a wave of vanity. Walk slowly, he told himself, slow down, dont look suspicious.
It was then that his peripheral vision alerted him to a danger. Turning his head
slightly, he spotted a security guard, who had doubtless witnessed the theft and was
now discreetly following him with the intention, Damin thought, of approaching him
when they were in a less crowded area. They dont like scenes, he told himself. Time
again began to resemble a bubble in which he was trapped, and in which the highly
ductile seconds were filled not so much with his natural moral squeamishness as with
his terror of being arrested.
Imagine if I was caught stealing, he said to Sergio OKane. I thought of the
people I used to work with, and my father, my neighbours, my Chinese sister
Damin went over to one of the lifts, where he thought there would be too much
of a throng for the guard to approach him, and he tried to melt in among the other
bodies. However, it was not long before the guard was standing next to him.

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Lets not make a scene, eh? said the uniformed guard, smiling. Just follow
me.
Where?
To the office. Its purely a formality.
But I havent done anything, said Damin.
Fine, then well have it sorted out in no time.
The security guard detached himself from the group of people waiting for the
lift, making sure that Damin was meekly following him. They walked past a perfume
counter, a toyshop, a Japanese restaurant and a boutique selling womens clothes,
with Damin always slightly behind the guard, briefly observing, as if he were
underwater, the scenes taking place on the other side of the shop windows. Then, as
they passed the stairwell, he impulsively ran down the steps, thus gaining a few
decisive seconds on the guard, who had not expected such a reaction.
He took the steps four at a time and reached a landing where he found a heavy
metal door, which he pushed open, violently, silently. On the other side was a car
park, which had also been transformed into a market, except that here most of the
antiques were large items of furniture.
Trying not to attract anyones attention, he managed to hide behind a vast
wardrobe, and from there he watched the heavy door opening again to reveal the
guard, whose tense movements were still subject to the protocol he was doubtless
under orders to follow in such situations. The guard scanned the area with his eyes,
meanwhile talking to someone on the small microphone pinned to his shoulder. When
he headed off to his left, Lobo stepped out from behind the wardrobe so as to stay out
of the guards line of sight, and found himself standing in front of the wardrobe. He

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opened the central door and slipped inside, having first fleetingly checked to see that
no one had noticed his presence.

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2

In the darkness, Damin held his breath so that nothing would prevent him
hearing what was happening beyond the walls of the wardrobe. He thought it highly
unlikely that his manoeuvre would have gone entirely unnoticed, and so he was
waiting, hopelessly, for the moment when someone outside would order him to leave
the wardrobe. However, time passed, first seconds, then minutes, and his fears proved
groundless. Gradually, his breathing recovered its normal rhythm, and his eyes, grown
accustomed to the dark, and thanks to the light filtering in through the cracks on either
side of the doors, began to take in the considerable dimensions of that wooden cave. It
was, as he had been able to ascertain before taking refuge inside, an antique wardrobe,
the three-doored variety with a large mirror affixed to the middle door, but all the
internal partition walls had been removed. Since there were no drawers either, the
whole area was as clear as day, if one could use such a term in the midst of all that
darkness.
The first thing I did, Damin said to Sergio OKane, was to sit down and
think. Thats what I used to do at work when they came to me with some urgent
problem: I would simply sit still for a moment. If you take immediate action, youll
make mistakes. Any leakage of water tends not to come from the place where the leak
appears. Water, like noise, always seeks out the easiest route, but not necessarily the
most logical one. Just because the water appears in one place doesnt mean thats
where you should start looking, the origin might well be on the other side of the
building.
So what was your first thought? asked OKane.

18
That I should put my mobile on silent. I hardly ever get any calls, but in those
circumstances, it would have been catastrophic if someone had happened to call me.
And then?
Then, although I was a mass of nerves, I decided I would stay in the wardrobe
for as long as necessary, like an eel in a crevice in a rock, until I was certain they had
stopped looking for me. It was six oclock. I reckoned that, worst-case scenario, the
market would close at nine.
Still speaking to OKane, Damin took his mobile from his jacket pocket and
put it on silent. Then he used the light from the screen, which wasnt bright enough to
be seen from outside, and examined his surroundings. He calculated that the
wardrobe, given how beautifully it had been put together (using what are known as
dovetail joints), could well be 100 years old or more. It was very solid, made of oak,
and there was a blend of smells he tried to unpick.
On the one hand, he told OKane, I could smell the chemicals that had
doubtless been applied to combat woodworm. When I held the screen of my mobile to
one of the walls, I saw that the surface of the wood had tiny, shallow marks caused by
the larvae. When oak is properly cured, its almost as impenetrable as steel. They had
probably removed the partition walls and the drawers because the original material
was of very poor quality, and the woodworm would have made short work of it.
Meaning what? asked the showman.
Well, in those days, it was quite common to use oak for the main body of the
wardrobe and cheap pine for any accessories. And pinewood is as soft as butter.
What other smells did you detect?
Damp and saltpetre. The wardrobe had probably come from somewhere on the
coast, which is where the woodworm would have come from too.

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What else did it smell of?
Old clothes?
Wasnt that just your imagination?
Believe me, OKane, I have an exceptionally keen sense of smell. Generations
of suits and shirts and underwear had passed through that wardrobe, and not always
when they were at their cleanest either. You know what they say about stables, dont
you?
No.
Stables apparently stink of manure for decades after theyve been emptied. As
people who have made houses out of old stables know to their cost.
Still maintaining this dialogue with the presenter (addressing the camera,
OKane announced that the interview had already become a trending topic
worldwide), Damin was now checking his watch. He had been in there for an hour. It
was clear that no one had seen him go in, but how could he be sure no one would see
him come out.
He waited another ten minutes in silence (a commercial break OKane had
said), and taking infinite precautions, he decided to open one of the side doors, just a
crack. The first thing he saw was a security guards cap. He closed the door and sat
down.
Were you afraid, Seor Lobo? asked OKane after the commercial break.
Very, answered Damin. It was an extremely embarrassing situation. I would
rather have died than suffer the shame of being found out.
And what about the tie pin?
I had put it here, in my right-hand jacket pocket. Every now and then, I would
take it out and play with it while listening to the conversations of the people passing

20
by on the other side, always alert to the possibility that someone might open one of
the doors and look inside.
What would you have done?
I would have moved as far away as possible from that door. I tried out a few
moves in case that should happen.
And did it?
Yes, it did. Id been in the wardrobe for what must have been a couple of hours
when the door at the opposite end from where I was sitting suddenly opened. The
light flooded in like water through a hole in a dam, but it stopped halfway along the
wardrobe, as if there were an invisible containing wall there. Then I saw the head of a
child of about eight and ten, Im not sure, possibly twelve, I dont have any children
myself and Im not good at guessing their ages. Since he was brilliantly lit, I could
make out all his features. He, on the other hand, would have seen only my hunched
figure at the opposite end. This clearly interested him, though, for he allowed his eyes
the tenths of a second necessary for them to become accustomed to the dark. Then,
when I saw from the look of alarm on his face that he had seen my face, I raised one
finger to my lips. The child withdrew, and I heard his mother telling him to stop
touching things.
And then what happened?
Nothing. Luckily, the boy said nothing, but he left the door open, and I spent a
couple of minutes in blind panic until someone closed it again.
Have you ever thought about that child since? asked OKane.
Yes, often, said Damin. I wonder how that incident would have affected his
life.
How do you mean?

21
I dont know, but inexplicable things do happen to us as children, and we never
tell anyone. Then, when we grow up, we forget about them.
Can you remember one such incident?
Yes, once, when I was about six or seven, I opened the oven door in the
kitchen of my house and found the head of a camel, its eyes wide open, staring at me.
OKane and the audience laughed.
Why did you open the oven door?
Well, the oven was broken and so wasnt used for cooking, but Id been using
it to squirrel away pieces of turrn and marzipan Id stolen from the pantry, so that I
would have my own provisions once Christmas was over.
So you were into stealing things even as a child, said OKane.
No, stammered Damin. I mean I didnt think of it as stealing, I was just a
child after all.
Did you ever open the oven door again to get your sweets?
Never. The sweets went all maggoty, and for weeks or even months afterwards
they were the subject of an ongoing family debate, because no one could understand
how they had got there or why they had been left there.

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3

It was nearly time for the market to close when Damin, who had decided to
wait until then before attempting his escape, suddenly felt the wardrobe moving
violently, as if it were being lifted up. And it was. After the first few jolts, he began to
hear, coming from outside, the voices of a group of workmen, who, from their
different positions, were exchanging ideas on how best to shift the wardrobe.
Let me tape up the doors first, said one, they dont lock, and if we dont tape
them up, theyre going to keep smashing into our faces.
Why dont we just take it to pieces and transport it properly, said another.
Because its over a hundred years old, said a third man, and if you dismantle
it, youll ruin the joints. We have to transport it as it is.
It weighs as much as a dead body.
Thats because its made of high-quality wood, the real old-fashioned stuff.
Damin heard the sticky tape being unrolled, then lay down on the floor so as to
distribute his weight more evenly and avoid any suspicions that there might be
something or someone inside. Fortunately, he was very thin and of only medium
height, and, or so he reckoned, his poundage would get confused with that of the
heavy piece of furniture. From that position, he felt the wardrobe being lifted up,
carried along and deposited in what he assumed was the back of a van. All of this took
place accompanied by a confused series of complaints, warnings and orders from the
workmen.
After a period of time, which he assumed was how long it took them to secure
the wardrobe, the van set off. That would perhaps have been the best moment to
emerge from the wardrobe and then jump out of the van and escape when the van

23
stopped at the lights or slowed down. However, he soon realised that at least two of
the workmen were travelling in the back with him, either because there wasnt room
for all of them in the cab, or to make sure that the wardrobe, however well secured,
did not shift about.
They were talking about tranquillisers, Damin told OKane.
Tranquillisers? Are you sure?
The audience laughed. There was also a brief burst of applause that OKane
silenced with a gesture of his hands, so that the interview wouldnt lose its impetus.
Damin then said that he had to press his ear first to one wall of the wardrobe and
then to the opposite wall in order to hear the two halves of the conversation. This
image again made the audience laugh.
Since Damins real adventure and his presence on the imaginary show were
happening simultaneously, he had to move with dizzying speed between one moment
and the next, a difficulty exacerbated by the vibration of the vehicle and the noise of
the traffic, for although the back of the van appeared to be closed, some external noise
still crept in through the boards.
The van must have been covered by canvas, he explained to OKane, because
the wind was making the kind of noise you get beneath an awning.
But what were the workmen saying about tranquillisers?
One of them claimed that since hed been taking tranquillisers, the world was
carrying on inside him, but that he was no longer in the world. The other man said
that if he ever managed to escape from the world, he wouldnt go back to it, and
certainly not as a removal man.
A silence ensued, which, OKane, a master of timing, allowed to last for a few
seconds, thus injecting a little tension into the interview. Finally, he asked:

24
Did anything else happen?
Well, said a reluctant Damin, one of them made a joke about vocal cords.
OKane had recently had some harmless polyps removed from his vocal cords,
and so he asked Damin to repeat the joke.
Its in really bad taste, Damin protested.
Far from discouraging the presenter and the audience, this information only
aroused their curiosity.
Im sorry I even mentioned it, said Damin. Its really not the kind of joke
you can tell on TV.
Come on now, dont play hard to get, insisted OKane, backed up by applause
from the audience.
Well, a man goes to his doctor and says hes having problems with his faecal
cords. You mean your vocal cords, says the doctor. No, says the man, my bowels are
fine, but everything I say is utter crap.
Sergio OKane let out a guffaw which was echoed by applause and laughter
from the audience. A commercial break gave Damin time to concentrate on the real
world, where things had definitely not improved. The van had been travelling for
about half an hour. After leaving the shopping mall, it had driven along what appeared
to be a motorway, possibly one of the citys ring roads. Then it had entered a very
busy area, before returning to what seemed to be a main road. Damin was afraid the
journey would go on indefinitely, and he had for some time felt a great need to smoke
and to urinate.
He began calculating: he had entered the shopping mall at around six oclock
and, according to his mobile phone, it was now a quarter to nine. He had spent almost

25
three hours trapped in that ridiculous situation, for which he kept finding solutions
that alternated between grim and happy.
And did it not occur to you to get rid of the tie pin, which was, after all, the
corpus delicti? asked OKane after the commercial break.
Oh, often, answered Damin, but it was a present for you. Besides, I had
conferred on it certain magical properties. I thought that as long as I had it, nothing
bad would happen to me.
But something bad was already happening to you, objected OKane.
I mean nothing worse.
At that moment, the van stopped. Judging by the movements and the voices
outside, he concluded that they had reached their destination, and so he broke off the
interview and focused all his attention on any possibilities he might have of escaping.
He heard the van doors open and close, the men walking over the metal floor and their
voices once again trying to reach agreement on how best to position themselves in
order to unload the wardrobe.
I had to lie down on the floor again, he told OKane, returning to the studio,
to even out the weight.
Was it rather an abrupt descent? asked OKane.
No, fortunately not, because another voice appeared, this time a female voice,
urging the workmen to be careful not to damage the wardrobe. I assumed she was the
new owner and that we were outside her house.
Youre telling me you ended up inside someones private house?
Not yet. The wardrobe was so big they had to remove the front door frame. It
was dark by then, but I could see through a crack that it was a detached house. They
also had to remove the feet of the wardrobe and an ornamental moulding on the top.

26
And in all that time, there wasnt a single opportunity to escape?
None. There were always people around and the doors were sealed with tape. I
was afraid Id make too much noise if I tried to unstick it. While they were working,
one of the men asked the woman why she had bought an old thing like that for such a
modern house, which was, besides, full of fitted wardrobes. She said it had been part
of the furniture in her grandparents house, where she had spent her childhood. She
had recognised it because of some marks on the right side, which she showed to the
man, and which, as I found out later, were the marks people make to measure the
height of their children as they grow up.
Look, said the woman, here it says Luca, thats me, and those lines indicate
my height from when I was five until I was ten, which is when I lived with my
grandparents.
What about the others? It says Jorge, doesnt it?
Yes, Jorge was my brother. We were the same age because we were twins, but
he died two years after we were sent to live with my grandparents. Of tetanus. Thats
why the marks stop so abruptly.
How awful.
When I saw the wardrobe at the market, I could hardly believe my eyes, I
thought I might faint. Who knows what its been through before ending up here.
The same sort of thing weve all been though, I suppose, said the workman.

27
4

Not without some difficulty and not without a few choice words being uttered,
they finally managed to get the wardrobe into the house, only to have an even more
stressful time manoeuvring it into the right bedroom. Once in situ, some of the men,
as far as Damin could deduce, replaced the frame of the bedroom door - which they
had also had to remove as well as the feet and the moulding, while the others helped
repair the damage done to the front door. Then they placed the wardrobe against the
wall indicated by the woman, and their voices moved away.
At that moment, Damin told OKane, I gingerly pushed open one of the
doors, and the tape, which was only a few inches wide, came off really easily. When I
saw that no one was there, I staggered out, feeling slightly dizzy, the way you do
when you get off a fairground ride.
Where was everyone? asked OKane.
Down by the front door with the woman, who had offered the men a few beers
and perhaps a bit of money for their labours.
I see, but I assume you looked around to orient yourself a little. What did you
see?
I was in the master bedroom, which was very spacious and even had an ensuite bathroom, where I immediately, instinctively headed in order to empty my
bladder, which was full to bursting. I didnt pee into the toilet though, which would
have involved using the flush and making a noise, instead I peed into the washbasin,
then turned on the tap to eliminate any trace of urine. I took these decisions quickly,
on the run. My brain had never worked so fast, not even in the most awkward of
situations at work, of which there were many during my twenty-five-year career.

28
The audience broke into laughter and applause at OKanes amused expression
and at Damins look of incomprehension.
I suppose, in the circumstances, speed was of the essence, said OKane once
the audience had calmed down.
Well, you can imagine. But the curious thing is that in extreme situations like
that, you dont stop thinking for a moment.
And what were you thinking?
About what possible excuses I could give if I was found out. I could say that
Id been visiting the market when I felt ill and, not knowing what else to do, because I
was close to fainting, I happened upon that wardrobe, climbed inside and fell asleep. I
assumed that, by then, no one would link the theft of a tie pin with my presence in that
house. Probably no one had even reported the theft. I mean, the pin wasnt
particularly valuable. The worst that could happen would be for the woman to notify
the police, and then I would give them the same excuse. Thats what I was doing
while I was peeing: rehearsing, word for word, the explanation I would give to the
woman, and, if necessary, to the police.
But it wasnt necessary.
No, because when I finished peeing, the woman was still sorting things out
with the workmen in the hall. This, however, meant that I couldnt leave the house
without being seen. I did look out into the corridor, but saw that all exit routes were
blocked. I could only go further into the house, which didnt seem like a good idea.
And so, after a few moments hesitation, and when he heard the woman coming
up to the bedroom after saying goodbye to the workmen, he again hid, this time under
the bed, because he imagined she would immediately open the wardrobe in order to
admire its sheer size.

29
The woman did indeed tear off the tape and open all three doors to air the
wardrobe, then she peered inside, taking a deep breath, like someone peering into the
abyss.
Then, Damin went on, she started hanging up the clothes that were lying on
the bed.
And there you were, watching her from underneath that same bed.
Yes, I could see her bare feet, because she had taken off her shoes, and part of
her legs, because she was wearing a very full skirt. While she came and went, she was
singing gaily to herself. Ill tell you something that might surprise you though.
Whats that?
After the hours Id spent stuck in the wardrobe, the space under the bed
seemed, by comparison, really roomy.
The audience enthusiastically laughed and applauded Damin the Unflappable.
OKane gave the camera a look that was half-knowing, half-ironic.
Really roomy, you say? he said.
Yes, I mean it. If I could have lit a cigarette, my happiness would have been
complete. The floor was covered with a really thick carpet, and so it wasnt cold at all.
The base of the bed, made of wooden slats, wasnt so close to my body as to be
claustrophobic nor so far away that the gap under the bed was clearly visible. Besides,
the gap was concealed by the bedspread. Only paranoid people look under the bed,
unless of course its to vacuum up the dust.
Are you paranoid enough to look under the bed before going to sleep? asked
OKane.
Well, yes, said Damin with a faint smile. But I think Im the exception.
People are used to falling asleep with that metaphysical void beneath their body.

30
Sergio OKane turned to the audience, whom he had constantly to keep under
control so that they were not continually interrupting the interview, and he asked
anyone who regularly looked under the bed before going to sleep to raise a hand.
Slightly less than a third did so. Some only half-raised a hand, as if ashamed to admit
it, or as if they could not decide between telling the truth and missing the chance to
appear on camera.
Anyway, OKane went on, there you were in that, what did you call it, that
metaphysical void.
Its just a way of indicating its complexity. My father often used the
expression. According to him, Hitchcocks films produced the same kind of terror.
in the space that you, at home, used to inspect every night
Its odd, isnt it? Just like someone falling into the very abyss hes staring
into.
At that moment, someone else entered the house, shouting out a loud Hi! that
reached the bedroom. Damin Lobo left the stage and put all his senses on full alert.
The woman shouted in turn:
Come here, Fede, quickly, Ive got a surprise for you.
A man entered the room immediately afterwards.
Look, said the woman, my grandparents wardrobe has finally arrived.
The man came further into the room, kissed the woman who was clearly his
wife and pretended to feel an enthusiasm that was immediately qualified by the
various objections he made as the conversation proceeded. The first of these was that
the wardrobe had been placed directly in front of the fitted wardrobe, thus rendering
the latter useless. The woman said there was nowhere else to put it and that they had
already discussed this earlier.

31
But that leaves a space behind it, he protested, like some kind of village jail.
But weve got loads of storage space in this house, she said.
The man also complained about the wardrobes lack of drawers.
Where will we put our underwear? he asked.
She said they had discussed this too, and that they would put it all in the fitted
wardrobe in the guest room. Damin noticed that the dialogue was becoming
increasingly, subtly tenser, despite the best efforts of the woman called Luca. At one
point, she accused her husband of spoiling her pleasure.
Dont you understand? she said. My brother and I used to hide in this
wardrobe when we were little, it was our refuge. Its the only memory I have left of
him.
A rather grim memory, said the man called Fede.
Then a third presence entered the room, an adolescent, thought Damin, their
daughter, who had either just come home or had stayed in one of the other bedrooms
while the workmen were installing the wardrobe. She expressed amazement when she
saw the wardrobe.
Cool! she said. Its like something out of the movies!
A horror movie, added her father.
It seems that here everyone is entitled to indulge their little whims except me!
exclaimed the woman angrily.
The husband, said Damin to OKane, must have realised he had gone too
far, because he modified his ironic tone.
And the daughter?
She wasnt being ironic at all. I got the impression she was taking her mothers
side, but without directly opposing her father.

32
What happened next?
The three of them disappeared. It was supper time.
And what did you do?
I stayed there, utterly alone, under the bed.