“Tell me about you when I was away. Tell me about me.”

The typing on the laptop stops.

“Tell me.”

“Shall I get a doctor to explain it all to you?” Daniël tries, helplessness shining from his eyes.

“Tell me your story.” Steve insists.

“I will tell the wrong things in the wrong way. I will hurt you. And you’ve been hurt enough.”

“Please, Danny?”

“The doctors and the nurses have been working so hard. You are doing so well.” Daniël sighs.

“You have no idea.”

“Then tell me.”

“You’re exhausted.”

“Tell me.”

Steve’s voice is hardly a whisper, but Daniël bows his head to it.

“Go to sleep. When you wake up and still want me to tell what I have seen, I will.” Daniël

gently touches Steve’s face. “I love you so much.”

Steve stares defiantly at the monster with the many voices, which are somehow one voice,

lurking behind his beloved. This will hurt no less than learning to breathe on his own again, swallow

again, talk again, and move his fingers again. He accepts it. Knowing that it will be hard for Daniël to

tell what he knows is less easy to be complacent about. But hadn’t he already learned that love is a

harsh ruler at times?

Chapter 9

Daniël sits next to the bed. He talks. His voice is soft, falters every few words, but he talks.

Steve listens, not asking questions, not commenting on anything Daniël says.

“The gaffer called me. I had such a nice dream about you. Then the dream changed and the

gaffer called and mum told me I couldn’t drive so I called a taxi. I think I did.

“When we were having dinner I couldn’t stop thinking about you and about what we had done

the night before. Mum and dad even asked me where my thoughts were hiding. I wanted to tell them

so much about you, but I didn’t want to spoil your chances with other clubs if Kinbridge Town had

told you they would have to let you go after the season.

“I was afraid it would destroy my career. Us being together. Us being found out. That’s the

truth of it, isn’t it? Is to keep totally silent about something, someone, really all that different from

telling a lie?

“I kept seeing your face, like it was right after we had made love, while we were having dinner

and mum talked about family and dad asked about the upcoming match.

“And then I couldn’t remember your lovely face, I could only see that other face.

“I didn’t know you kept that passport photo of me in your wallet. A bit hidden away, I bet. You

sometimes looked at it? When we couldn’t be together? They’re always a bit stupid, those kinds of

photos, huh? It’s how Degaré guessed about us. The police found that photograph. They asked him if

he had any idea what it meant and he called me. Never asked me one wrong question.

“They knew who you were. They didn’t recognise you. Not even when they found your I.D.

“I was faster than any of them. Smarter too. They couldn’t keep an eye on me all the time. I

stood in the corner, not moving, not making a sound because I was afraid they would send me away.

They were too busy working on you to notice me. I wasn’t supposed to see you like that.

“Why didn’t they notice me and send me away?

“I couldn’t find you at first. You were hidden behind all those doctors and nurses doing things

to you that were meant to keep you alive but looked so much like violence. They fought like an army

and your body served as their battleground.

“I can’t say how you looked when I finally saw you. I try to say it, but I don’t have the words.

Not in English. Not even in Dutch. I can talk about broken bones and bruised skin and blood, blood,

blood and more bruises, bruises and more broken bones and your legs twisted and your hands like

claws and your beautiful face that was no longer your face or even a face and the sound you made and

the silence that was even worse than that sound ...

“But they’re not the right words. There are no right words.

“I had never smelled blood before and still I recognised it.

“I remember how bitter the bile in my mouth tasted. How my own blood tasted because I had

bitten my tongue.

“I didn’t make a sound. Not even to say your name.

“I forgot you. I tried so hard to remember you, but I couldn’t. You had been inside my body so

many times. I had been in yours for the first time only hours before. I had touched you with my hands,

with my whole body, kissed you. I had looked at you while you were eating, reading the paper,

watching TV, sleeping, running with the ball at your feet. I couldn’t remember how you looked. I

couldn’t remember anything about us.

“There was nothing left.

“I saw death. Not seeing it like it was a real person. But I still saw it. I knew death was there,

trying to touch you, to lure you away from me. It had been sent to liberate you, because your body was

too damaged. I couldn’t let that happen.

“I claimed you as mine.

“You remember the first time we kissed? When we both thought the other wanted ‘Cesco? I

was so sure no one and nothing in the whole world could have separated us. Don’t laugh; I was even

thinking up ways to stay together when one of us, or perhaps both, would be sold off to another club. I

was selfish enough to hope you would perhaps end your career as a professional player a few years

early, so you could find a job near where I would be playing. Start your own business. Do a bit of

coaching. Something like that.

“You see, I’m not such a perfect guy. I wanted it all, playing football and having you. Keeping

it all out of the press, so we wouldn’t be bothered.

“Did your hands itch too, like when we were training and I just had to touch you?

“If I had been a braver person, I would have told mum and dad and you would have been with

us and not in that park. You belonged with us, having dinner. Mum and dad. You and me. The four of

us.

“I told myself it was all for the better to keep quiet about you. It’s private they all say. But it’s

fucking not private. It never is.

“I saw them, trying to get tubes and needles in you, trying to get your heart to beat again.

Trying over and over again. But there was nothing left to put needles in, to put tubes in.

“And I stood there. Death would have been kinder to you than I was, but I fought it off. I

couldn’t let you go. Not even when I saw you lying there.

“You were blood and bruises and broken bones and I stood there and watched. Not once I

looked away. My eyes were wide open.

“Strange, isn’t it, all that time I knew I wasn’t dreaming, I wasn’t having a nightmare. It was

you lying there, it was me standing there.

“They were hurting you. You were dying and they wouldn’t stop with their needles and

instruments, like you weren’t even there. Like you didn’t matter. But they were the only ones who

could do anything for you. They made sure your heart kept beating long enough so your body could

start fighting for itself. They kept you alive long enough to get you into the operation room to repair

the most dangerous damage that would have killed you for sure.

“So strange, such a tiny woman, she didn’t even reach my shoulders and she was wearing shoes

with high heels, telling me what they had found when they admitted you to the hospital. I couldn’t

believe hearing someone so small and fragile using those words.

“I saw them leaving with you. I didn’t stop them to say goodbye. I was stupid enough to

believe, to know, I would see you again and you would see me again.

“I couldn’t stand mum’s touch, or dad’s. I didn’t want to be touched if it wasn’t by you. Not

my family, not the gaffer, not any of the boys. Just you. But they wouldn’t leave me alone. Not until