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Before I stifled the sneeze, snot shrapnel sprayed my drawing, speckling the page with translucent blotches, smothering some strokes with globs. What did it matter? My trembling hand had sketched shaky curves. The scene I’d created was hazy, mirroring my mental fog, as if I were glimpsing a landscape through greased paper.

I crumpled the sheet into a ball. When I dropped it beside me, it rolled over the portfolio and lodged between chunks of bark. I blew my nose as if I were filled with liters of mucus, but ten seconds later, a trickle slid from one nostril. The wings of my nose were raw. My mouth tasted of phlegm. I should—and wanted—to lie in bed, but why stay under that roof when I could escape for a few hours?

I twisted my nose with the handkerchief, which muffled my voice.

“Can I ask you something?”

“Whatever you like,” said the man. “We’ll see what I answer.”

“Do you like me?”

The air thickened near the blackened circle, charged like static.

“You think I don’t?”

“Would you betray me?”

“Have you given me reason?”

“I don’t know. You might think I have, even if I didn’t mean to.”

“Is that cold of yours messing with your head? Why worry?”

“It is messing with me. I can’t think straight. But maybe you’re pretending to like me as a distraction.”

“A distraction from what?”

“From planning to hurt me.”

The man sighed, his breath prickling my face.

“I’m not planning to. Though if I were, I imagine I’d hide it.”

“If someone I thought cared for me switched sides, I assumed I would know.”

“It’s been years since anyone entertained me like you. Though, to be fair, I’ve never delved deeper into a relationship than telling someone to leave and watching them flee.”

I blew my nose until I needed a fresh handkerchief. The sight of the charred grass circle wavered, and the taste of my saliva sickened me. I set the cloth-covered tureen on my thigh, loosened the elastic, and lifted a corner of the fabric. If I could smell, maybe the aroma of marmitako inside would’ve stirred my hunger.

“Will it taste like anything to you?” said the man.

“Maybe it’ll taste like something to you.”

“Want me to try it?”

“I brought it to offer you. Even an invisible man needs to eat. What kind of person would let you starve?”

At the edge of my hearing floated the murmur of clashing thoughts, mingled with wind whistling, birds trilling, and the creek’s whisper.

“I should refuse.”

I crawled forward, but stopped a meter and a half from the circle to avoid the pins stabbing me. Bowing, I placed the open tureen on the grass. I jerked backward, then leaned on my hands, damp leaves and grass beneath my palms.

“If I ate, it’d be wasted. It’d taste like phlegm.”

“Charming word to hear while I consider eating.”

I opened my mouth to speak, but the image of the circle, the beeches, the tangle of branches beyond, slid toward the tureen as if painted on a stretching rubber band. The distortion coiled around the tureen like a claw, contracted, and swallowed it into a mirrored lake. The rustle of crumpled fabric. Chewing. A gulp.

A cough exploded, convulsing the beeches and the circle, the shockwave knocking me onto my back. The tureen flew past my head. My legs folded against my chest—firecracker-like coughs jolted me as if trying to make me roll. Needles stabbed my face and hands like a swarm of bees, their stings piercing my sweater and pants.

When the man stopped coughing, I lay supine. Above the quivering lattice of branches, a mass of gray-blue clouds slid south. I sat up. Snot bubbled in one nostril, and my exposed skin burned.

Before the circle of withered grass, a black, mercurial vomit had flattened the blades and buried the debris. I couldn’t smell, but the fumes attacked my nose like smoke-itch. The view of the blackened circle had stilled.

Had I poisoned the invisible man?

“Please, tell me you’re still there.”

“I’d forgotten how vomiting feels.”

I covered my mouth. I wanted to kneel and weep.

“I didn’t mean to. I swear. If I’d known it’d affect you like this, I’d have eaten it myself, even if it tasted like phlegm.”

“Relax. Years ago, I tried your food and it ended in another puddle. I thought this time might be different.”

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Author’s note: I wrote this novella in English about ten years ago. It’s contained in the collection titled Los dominios del emperador búho.