A VISIT FROM THE CHIEF

Lidia often went to the third floor of the Graziano Institute and sat down on the wooden bench there, right across from her mother's room.

- SAMANTA SCHWEBLIN

If she arrived after lunch had been distributed, most of the old people would be asleep, and then she could sit and read in silence for a long time with her back to the sun. Sometimes she dozed off, too. She almost never went in to see her mother, who in any case no longer recognized her. But Lidia thought it was important to spend some time at the home every week, just to keep an eye on things. If she stayed long enough, a nurse would come by and Lidia could say hello, ask about any changes in her mother's medications, and let the nurse know when she'd be back next.

Lidia had got married and divorced, and, in between, she'd had a daughter who had used her very first paycheck to leave Buenos Aires and move to another continent. When Lidia realized that her daughter wasn't coming back, she bought a new apartment that she wasn't entirely sure about and took out a mortgage, which would insure that she fulfilled the vital responsibility of working until the last day of her life. Because, she thought, without something like this, how do people cling to their lives and keep going? She wished that she knew people who were in the same situation as her so that she could ask them how they coped, but she wasn't close enough to anyone to ask such a question.