PART 1
“If you’re late tonight, my mom’s going to think you’re not good enough for this family.”
That was the last thing Andrés said to me before I saw the old man collapse next to the Metrobús stop on Paseo de la Reforma.
I was already late. Ten minutes, maybe fifteen. It was the first time I was going to meet his parents at their mansion in Las Lomas, and Andrés had been telling me for weeks that his family was “very special,” “very demanding,” “very particular about appearances.”
But the man collapsed as if someone had just extinguished his life force.
Cars kept passing by.
A woman covered her mouth, but didn’t approach.
A young man recorded it with his cell phone.
I braked as best I could, left my hazard lights on, and ran toward him. I knelt on the cold sidewalk, not caring that my black dress would get dirty or that my heels would get scraped.
The man was barely breathing. His face was pale, one hand closed over a leather glove, and his jacket open, as if he’d been wandering aimlessly for hours.
I called 911, my voice trembling.
“Help is on the way, sir,” I said, though I wasn’t sure if he could hear me. “You’re not alone.”
Then my cell phone started vibrating.
Andrés.
I ignored it once.
Twice.
On the third ring, I answered.
“There’s a man lying in the street. I already called for an ambulance.”
There was a tense silence on the other end.
“Mariana, I’m having dinner with my parents tonight.”
I looked at the unconscious man.
“I know.”
“My mom’s already asking about you.”
“Well, tell her the truth.”
Andrés sighed, annoyed.
“Don’t make a moral scene out of this. If the ambulance is on its way, stay until they arrive and then come quickly.”
I felt a chill in my chest.
“I’m not going to leave him alone.”
“You’re always the same,” he said. “You turn everything into a test of who’s a good person.”
Before I could reply, the ambulance arrived. The paramedics checked the man, put him on the stretcher, and asked me if I was a relative.
“No,” I said. “I just found him.”
One of them pulled a small leather wallet from his jacket. It had no ID, no phone number, no address. Just some initials engraved in gold-plated metal:
H.V.
