Page 58 of Meet Me in Another Life

“Thora?” Lily waves a hand in front of her face. She follows Thora’s gaze. “Ooh, Spanish. Hot name.” She frowns. “Is it weird to say that about a baby?”

“Yes,” Thora says and turns the page, already thinking about how she can meet him.

She tries the hospital first, but Santi and his mother have already gone home. She redirects her attention to finding out where that home is. In the worlds where they live in Cologne, Santi’s mother usually works in a shop in the city center. On her lunch breaks, Thora begins an irregular circuit of likely candidates. She’s two months into her search when she walks into a mini-market near the church where she and Santi once got married and sees his mother standing behind the counter.

Thora stares, stricken by something like fear. She ducks into the magazine section, pretending to browse. Maria Romero: her mother-in-law, her best friend’s mum, the other end of an overheard phone conversation coming through as static and noise. Thora’s knowledge of her is partial, one-sided, but it will have to be enough. She picks up a magazine about crochet and brings it to the till. “I’m a beginner,” she announces.

Maria makes a noncommittal noise.

Thora fumbles for change. “Not sure how much I can learn from a magazine, but...”

Maria takes Thora’s money and smiles. “Good luck,” she says in friendly dismissal.

Thora leaves, temporarily defeated. She scans back through her memories of Maria: slow to trust, especially in a foreign place. There is no way to get through this but patience.

She buys the magazine every week. Sometimes, she just gives Maria a friendly smile. Sometimes, she drops in a remark about a project she’s excited to try, or laments a technique she hasn’t been able to master. Six weeks later, Maria says, “We have a circle that meets at my house on Mondays. You should come.”

Thora feels like she has solved a fiendishly hard puzzle. She moderates her grin to what she hopes is normal. “That would be amazing. Thank you.”

Maria scribbles an address on a torn scrap of paper. “See you Monday.”

Thora leaves the shop with a spring in her step. “That was easy,” she congratulates herself, until she realizes she has two days to teach herself to crochet.

She spends a grumpy, tangled weekend in her flat. She hated crochet back when Santi tried to teach her as her long-suffering father, and the hatred has endured across lifetimes. Still, by Monday, she has enough of the basics to pass herself off as an enthusiastic amateur. She keeps her head down as she approaches the third in a series of identical tower blocks. At Maria’s door, she knocks and hangs back, crochet basket in hand, tempted by the urge to run. Santi is a baby. What is she expecting, to pick up where they left off?

Maria opens the door. “Thora, isn’t it? Welcome.” A small figure clings to her leg. “This is my daughter Aurelia.”

“Nice to meet you.” Thora looks down at the dark-eyed toddler. Aurelia, killed aged nine in a car crash. Aurelia, who moved to Cologne to help raise Estela after Santi died.

Aurelia gives her a mistrustful look and runs away.

Maria laughs. “Ignore her, she’s in a bad mood. Come in.” She ushers Thora through a hall carpeted with children’s toys into a kitchen where four other women already sit chatting over coffee.

Thora didn’t expect to meet Santi right away. But she didn’t expect to spend an hour actually attempting to crochet. As she fumbles with her needles, she tunes out Maria and the others, listening intently for a baby’s cry. She hears nothing. Of course Santi would be quiet, even at three months old. She imagines him serenely contemplating the universe from his crib, and her anger with him builds until she stabs herself in the finger.

The others leave one by one. Thora can tell Maria wants her to go. “Would you like another coffee?” she asks pointedly.

Thora has had three. Her hands are already shaking. “No, thank you.” She looks up, feeling nauseous. “I was wondering, do—do you have any other children?”

Maria gives her an odd look. “Why do you ask?”

“I thought I heard a baby.” She follows it up with an unconvincing grin. “I just love babies.”

She’s barely even fooling herself. She waits to be thrown out. Unexpectedly, Maria laughs. “I’m sorry. You just really didn’t seem like the type.” She stands up. “Yes, I have a new baby. Come through and meet him.”

They enter a dark room. As they move toward the cot by the curtained window, the absurd suspense makes Thora want to laugh. Maria picks up a swaddled shape, impossibly small. “This is Santi,” she says. “Would you like to hold him?”

Thora fights the urge to run away screaming. She holds out her arms.

She has held babies before: Estela, and Oskar, and Andromeda. But this is different. Thora knows a moment of pure panic, as she feels the warm weight and knows she is the only thing between him and falling.

The doorbell rings. Maria turns. “I’m sorry, I have to get that—do you mind—”

“Oh—no, it’s fine,” Thora says, while her mind screams,No,don’t leave!

Maria hurries off, leaving Thora with the baby.

He looks up at her with wide brown eyes. For a moment it’s Santi as she has known him, trapped in this helpless form like a fly in amber. Then it’s just a baby, cooing and wriggling in her arms. She tightens her grip to stop him escaping. “Now, now,” she says quietly. “I only just found you. You’re not getting away from me that easily.” She starts humming, the song she doesn’t know if she learned from him or he from her. By the time Maria comes back, Santi is smiling.

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