The deliveryman, healed now himself, came to see him and put it plainly, in the way that had always been his way.

“Teach,” he said, “if you stay home out of fear, after everything — then your aunt is still the one deciding your life.

She doesn’t get to do that anymore.

Nobody does but you.

So go.” Santiago smiled at the man who carried a piece of him now.

“You’re right,” he said.

Chapter 39 — The Airport

At the airport, Magdalena checked his medications three times, and then a fourth.