ID, Please

Through the gap in the zip came a grey light and a little slice of green trouser leg.

“Morning. Anyone in there?”

Axel got out however he could, barefoot, with his hair squashed to one side. At the entrance to the clearing there was a Guardia Civil car with the engine off. And two officers. An older one with a moustache, who’d stayed by the car looking at the river with his hands behind his back, like he was on holiday. And a young one with the face of someone doing this for the first time in his life.

“Morning,” said Axel.

“Morning.” The young one nodded at the sign, almost apologising. “It says you can’t, there.”

“Yeah. We saw.”

“Yeah.”

The two of them stood looking at the sign for a while, like two blokes watching roadworks.

“Right then,” said the officer. “You pack up and we’ll say no more about it. But I need to see some ID, it’s procedure.”

Hortensia was already out, combing her hair with her fingers and in a wonderful mood.

“Morning, love! Shall I make you a coffee? I’ve got a pot.”

“No, madam, thank you.”

“It’s the good stuff, you know.”

“No, madam, really.”

Hortensia handed him her ID card between two fingers. Axel got his out. The officer wrote the numbers down in a little notebook, in tiny, very careful handwriting. And he looked up at the tent.

“Anyone else in there?”

Eva came out slowly. Barefoot on the grass, the blue rucksack hanging from one hand.

“Can I see your ID?”

“Haven’t got it on me.”

“You haven’t got it on you, or you haven’t got one?”

“Haven’t got one.”

The officer blinked.

“Okay. That’s fine. Just tell me your full name and we’re done.”

“Eva.”

He waited.

“Eva… and?”

Eva didn’t answer. She was very still. Too still.

“I do need your surname, miss.”

“Well, no.”

The young one turned towards the car, looking for his partner. The one with the moustache was still looking at the river.

“Look,” he said, lowering his voice, and he meant it kindly. “This is nothing. It’s a formality. I identify you, we close the form and you go off and have your breakfast in peace.”

He took a little device off his belt and started typing.

And Axel saw the exact second the lad’s face changed. He looked up from the screen. He looked at Eva. He looked down. He looked back up.

“Sorry. Are you Eva Moreno?”

The surname meant nothing to Axel, there are two of them in every class. The odd thing was that she had one.

“You’re listed as a missing person,” said the officer. “Report filed a year and four months ago. By a direct family member.” He looked at the screen. “Irene Moreno.”

Eva put her hand to her chest, over her T-shirt, and closed her fist round something she was wearing underneath. One second. Then she dropped it.

She bent down, swung the rucksack onto her shoulder and started walking towards the road. Without looking at anyone.

“Hey! Miss!”

“Eva.” Axel went after her. “Eva, stop.”

She didn’t stop. She walked out of the clearing and carried on along the hard shoulder, barefoot, at a normal pace, like someone popping out for bread.

Axel got ahead of her and stood in front of her.

She wasn’t crying. She had a face Axel had never seen on her. Nothing in it. Like a house with the lights off.

“Don’t you lot ring her.”

“Eva…”

“Don’t you lot ring her.” She said it loud this time, in a very flat voice. “I haven’t done anything. I haven’t nicked anything, I don’t owe anyone money. I can be wherever I want.”

“Nobody’s saying…”

“A year and four months.” She laughed, and it was horrible. “That’s not missing me, Axel. That’s keeping count.”

The officer came up behind, not running, with his hands held away from his body.

“Miss, you’re an adult. You can be wherever you want with whoever you want. Nobody’s going to make you do anything, all right?” You could tell he’d read it somewhere and this was the first time he’d said it out loud. “It’s just there’s an open report, and if I’ve found you, it gets closed. And if it gets closed, we have to let whoever filed it know you’re safe. That’s all. So they stop looking.”

“And are you going to tell her where I’m heading?”

“No. Not if you don’t want us to, no.”

Eva stood looking at the road. Then she pointed her chin at the little notebook.

“What you’re writing down there. Where does it go?”

“This?” The lad looked at his own handwriting. “Into a report.”

“And who reads the report?”

“Well… whoever needs to read it.”

“Yeah.”

She stayed still a moment longer.

“Go on, then, ring,” she said. “But I’m not taking that call.”

They went back to the clearing. The officer moved off and stood with his back to them for a while, talking to the control room. He was spelling things out. Axel heard him say “Rebollo, two Ls”, and then his own name, letter by letter, read off the notebook, and something cold settled on the back of his neck.

Eva sat on the stone table, looking at the river, her hands between her knees. Axel sat down next to her and kept quiet.

Hortensia didn’t sit down.

Hortensia stood next to the officer with her arms folded. The lad finished with the control room, dialled another number and stood to attention without realising.

“Irene Moreno? I’m calling from the Guardia Civil, about your report. Your sister was located this morning, safe and well, in the company of two…”

Hortensia held out her hand.

“Give it here.”

“Madam, I can’t…”

“Give it here, love, I’m not going to break it.”

And the lad, who couldn’t have been more than twenty-three, gave it to her.

Hortensia walked three steps away.

“Irene? No, love, I’m not from the Guardia Civil. I’m a lady who’s travelling with her.”

Long pause. From the table you could hear the voice on the other end. Not the words. The tone. Fast, loud, without stopping for breath.

“Yes. Yes, love, I can hear you. No. I’m not telling you that. Or that.”

The voice on the other end went up so high that one word came through on its own: years.

“Listen, sweetheart,” said Hortensia, without batting an eyelid. “Your sister’s fine. She’s living. Let her live.”

She hung up and gave the phone back to the officer, who took it like it was a hand grenade.

“There.”

The one with the moustache, who hadn’t opened his mouth all morning, opened the car door and turned round.

“Over the bridge there’s a picnic area with a fountain,” he said. “That one hasn’t got a sign.”

And he got in.

The young one was last to go, scratching the back of his neck.

“Julián,” he said, out of nowhere.

Axel looked at him.

“My name’s Julián.” He went red. “Nothing. Have a good trip.”

And off they went.

They packed up. Hortensia got the coffee pot out, filled it on the stone table, put it on Axel’s stove and didn’t ask anyone if they wanted one.

The coffee was dreadful.

“This tastes of tin, Hortensia.”

“Well, you’ll drink it anyway. It’s the pot’s first go.”

The three of them drank it standing up, burning their mouths, looking at the river.

Eva drank all of hers.

And didn’t say thank you.