Three

I called you from the hospital hallway
because I didn’t know where to put the phone or my hands.
You said “tell me” in that older-sister voice of yours,
the one you used when we were little
and someone had to decide who was in charge of what.

And it wouldn’t come out.
I said “are you sitting down?”
and you said “Marta, just say it.”
So I said it badly, fast, with no padding:
Nico took his own life.

There was a sound on the other end,
like when something slips out of your hand
and you don’t look to see what it was.
You said nothing for a long time.
I could hear you breathing
and, far away, your kitchen, the TV on,
an ordinary life still going on
for one more minute.

Then you asked “when?”,
and then “does Mum know?”,
because you always ask the practical thing first.
I answered everything.
And we went quiet,
each in our own city,
with the same brother
and the same sentence.

You said “I’m coming right now.”
I said “drive slowly.”
You said “don’t tell me how to drive”
and you laughed, or cried, I don’t know,
it sounded the same.

Now I’ll tell you what I didn’t say on the phone.
That Mum hasn’t let go of her jacket.
That she’s put it in her lap
and strokes it as if it were him
at thirteen, with a fever,
begging her not to turn off the hallway light.

That Dad keeps saying he has to fix
Nico’s bike, the one in the garage,
the one with the puncture from two summers ago.
He says he’ll fix it tomorrow.
Nobody dares to say anything to him.

That they asked me
if I wanted to see his room
and I said no, and then yes,
and then I stayed at the door
looking at the unmade bed,
the tangled headphones,
a hoodie on the floor
with the exact shape of his back.

I was the middle one.
I was always the bridge between you two,
you who gave the orders, him who hid,
and me in between, translating:
“he says he’s not hungry,”
“he says he’s coming,”
“he says he’s fine.”

He said he was fine
and I translated it for everyone.

I think that’s what I won’t be able to tell you
when you arrive and we hug:
that I was the one who repeated his words,
who believed him because it was easier,
who looked at my phone on Sunday
when he lingered a while longer
at the door, hand on the frame,
as if he were about to tell me something.

He said “nothing.”
I said “okay.”

You’ll tell me it wasn’t my fault.
I know.
And I also know you carry your own,
the one about not coming at Christmas,
the calls that kept getting shorter,
the “we’ll talk properly soon.”
The three guilts are different
and weigh exactly the same.

His messages are still in the group chat.
“Who’s bringing the bread?”
“Almost there.”
A pizza emoji.
Nobody has written underneath.
Nobody knows how to continue a conversation
that was left with a pizza as its last word.

You’ll arrive at night.
I’ll open the door
and we won’t know whether to hug or scream,
and Mum will lift her head
and look at you the way you look at someone who’s about to confirm everything,
because until you arrive,
it still seems like it could be a lie.

And then the three of us will be
in the living room, the TV off,
and Nico’s chair empty,
where he always sat last,
where he always arrived late
saying “sorry, sorry,”
and we all made room for him.

Before hanging up, you said quietly
what I didn’t dare say:
“There were three of us.”

And I, not knowing what to answer,
said only:
“Yes.”

And then, because I couldn’t keep quiet,
because the silence already had a shape
and it was his:
“There were three of us.
There were three of us, and I didn’t see it.”