Cancer. He wishes God could have more imagination. At least she made it to eighty this time. He still remembers visiting his young physiotherapist in the same ward, the crack it made in his old, tired heart.

He catches a bus to the hospital. As it crawls across the river, he twitches in his seat, wishing he’d walked. He gets off a stop early and runs, the spring wind tugging at his jacket. At reception, he gives his name and takes a seat. After an eternity in a plastic chair, a harried-looking woman approaches him. “Mr. López?”

He stands. “Yes?”

“I’m Andromeda. Jane’s daughter. Will you come with me, please?”

Andromeda looks nothing like Estela, nothing like any of the Thoras he remembers. He follows, wondering for the first time if this is all a mistake: if he is about to impose on a dying woman who happens to look like his imaginary friend. She told you to come, he reminds himself, as he enters a corridor full of staring family.

The daughter turns. She’s upset, but hiding it well; now he sees Thora in her. “She asked to speak to you alone. We want to respect her wishes, but she doesn’t have much time left. We’d all appreciate it if you kept it short.”

He considers telling her that Thora, like him, has nothing but time. “I’ll do my best,” he says, and goes in, closing the door behind him.

Thora lies in bed, gnarled hands gripping the coverlet. Her hair is the ice-cream blue of old women, permed into unnatural curls. He’s never seen her so old. She must have had a good life, this time around. A safe life. He thinks of his scrabbling childhood that ended in two years of jail and feels a sick resentment. He won’t live to see her age in this lifetime.

“You’re late.” The old woman’s voice is barely more than breath. Still, it’s Thora’s. She is real, and she’s right in front of him, just in time for him to lose her again.

He sits down in the chair by her bedside. “Looks like you’re the one who’s about to be late.”

He’s relieved he can still make her smile. He runs a hand through his hair, and the way she watches him do it, with half-annoyed recognition, breaks his heart.

“I’m sorry,” he says. “I would have come sooner. But you did a good job hiding. I was starting to think you were right about being a figment of my imagination.”

She snorts, unimpressed. “Really. You think you could imagine me?”

“You’re right.” He meets her eyes—Thora’s same blue eyes, looking at him out of the ruin of an old woman’s face. “I couldn’t have imagined you thinking Andromeda was a reasonable name for a child.”