I was fooled by grief.

When Santiago came back wearing his brother’s name, he did not have to imitate a stranger; he only had to be quieter, gentler, more patient than he had been, and grief and time did the rest, because people do change after a tragedy, and everyone around us expected the survivor to be a changed man.

The very fact that he was less like the Santiago I remembered was taken by all of us as proof that he was Sebastian.

His performance did not have to be perfect.