“Another psychiatrist told me hallucinations can be common after a trauma.”

“That’s what we’re going to evaluate. Go on, tell me about it. It must have been atrocious for him, being there when his friend disappeared. Does Gaspar talk about death?”

“He says that if he’s crazy there’s no point in living.”

“You just told me you found a knife under his mattress and that he talked about suicide.”

“He’s thirteen years old—I don’t know whether to take it seriously.”

“Teenagers often commit suicide.”

They also talked about how to initiate treatment and break with the other psychiatrist. Let me take care of it, I know him, we all know each other in this profession. It’s best for Gaspar if his doctor is near his home and he doesn’t have to go into Buenos Aires several times a week. A bad relationship with his doctor could bring on unnecessary crises. I’ll take care of it. There won’t be legal problems, I know the system, too. I used to work in institutions.

“What about the medication? Gaspar says it doesn’t help, just makes him feels worse.”

The psychiatrist hesitated.

“We’re going to lower the dosage,” she said. “I can’t make a diagnosis in the first meeting, but I can try a different approach. Also, I don’t want you to force him to come to the sessions. He needs to come, but you should act as though you weren’t forcing him. Keep talking about it. Let him feel you’re worried. Talk about it every day.”

Luis talked about it so much he was left exhausted: by Gaspar’s sobbing, by the violence of his screams. But that wasn’t the worst part, and neither was Gaspar’s horrible thinness, which, Luis thought, if not for the fact that the country was a hellscape of power outages, protests, hyperinflation, and early elections, and that no one from the juvenile court ever visited them (maybe they were on strike?), would have merited urgent intervention from a social worker. The worst had been one day when they’d had a strange, nearly silent argument, and afterward Gaspar had started to go back to his room—as he did every day; he spent too much time lying down, in bed or on the living-room sofa—but then stopped in the doorway, motionless. From the hallway, Luis saw that the boy’s knees were giving out, and he ran to catch him before he collapsed to the floor. He didn’t faint but he was drenched in sweat, even though the autumn afternoon was pretty cold. Luis, as he embraced him, felt how his body was shaking.

“Dad is in my room, don’t go in,” Gaspar told him.

Luis picked him up. He weighs less than a chair, he thought, and he carried Gaspar out to the yard because he couldn’t think what else to do. Still, he couldn’t help but steal a quick glance through the open door into the bedroom, and he swore he saw the intimidating, unmistakable figure of his younger brother, a flash of blond hair and his broad shoulders, long fingers, arms hanging down by his side. Unnerved, he sat on the garden bench and cradled the boy. You’re going to be okay, you’re going to be okay, until the boy interrupted him, unexpectedly: