I met your father when I was in my fourth year at university. I was doing an internship at the company where he worked in a senior position. To be honest, our first meeting was not pleasant for him. On my first day I wanted to prove how hardworking I was, so when lunch break was announced I decided not to sit with everyone else. I thought I would just run to the kitchen, grab a coffee and return to work. I rushed out of the office, turned the corner – and ran straight into your father. The coffee spilled all over him. He exploded with anger, called me stupid, and stormed off.

  Six months later we were married.

  But you were born only five years after that. We waited a long time for you, and when you finally arrived we were unbelievably happy. You were such a beautiful child – always smiling, always laughing, always full of life. Your father could hardly put you down. You were his boy, his heir. He constantly talked about your future – what you would become, what you might achieve. We planned everything together.

  By the time you were two you were already walking and starting to speak, but that was when we began to notice something strange. You didn’t look at us. In fact, you didn’t really look at people at all. Your gaze was always fixed somewhere above them, as if something there interested you more than the people themselves. You simply didn’t focus on living beings. As you grew older the problem became more serious. You didn’t just avoid eye contact – you began talking, but not to us. You spoke to someone… or something. You laughed, responded, played. And when we managed to catch your attention for a moment, you told us about beings that existed above every living thing. You said they were all different and interesting, and that you had great fun with them.

  We started visiting specialists. Many specialists. Every one of them heard the same story from you, but none of them seemed particularly interested. Almost all of them said the same thing – that it might be autism, or possibly early schizophrenia, but it was too early to draw conclusions. We had to wait until you turned five. They said that age was critical. Until then it might simply be a defense mechanism. Perhaps some emotional trauma had pushed you to invent these beings in order to hide from reality. Perhaps you were simply living in a world of imagination.

  For your father that waiting was extremely difficult. All the dreams he had built around you collapsed. He broke under the pressure. He began distancing himself from you, and eventually he started to feel ashamed of you.

  It was hard for me too. I was beginning to lose strength.

  One day we were at a playground. You were playing among the other children, but at the same time you seemed completely alone among them. They were running around you, laughing and shouting, and you looked as if you were in a different world. I was sitting on a bench watching you when suddenly I burst into tears.

  An elderly woman who was passing by noticed me. She sat down beside me and politely asked if she could speak with me. I wiped my eyes and looked at her. At that moment I really didn’t want to talk to anyone, but because of her age I agreed. She looked at me kindly and asked why I was crying, whether something had happened.

  I broke down again. At that very moment you ran over, saw me crying, and immediately hugged me.

  The woman smiled and greeted you gently. She asked what your name was.

  And then something incredible happened. For the first time in your life you started having a real conversation with someone. You answered her questions, asked questions of your own, looked directly at her, and at the same time hugged me. I don’t even remember what exactly you talked about. I was too shocked to understand what I was seeing. I simply watched you and felt as if I might scream with happiness.

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  After you ran back to play I finally came to my senses and told her everything. The whole story. She listened very carefully. When I finished, she remained silent for a moment and then said that she believed me. She admitted that she did not know how she herself could help, but she knew someone who might.

  Of course I immediately asked who it was.

  She smiled slightly and said that her husband was a psychiatrist at a psychiatric hospital. She warned me that he was a rather grumpy man and that his thinking was far from standard, but precisely because of that he would not rush to conclusions. Then she gave me his phone number and said she would tell him that I would call.

  We spoke with him that very evening, and the next day we went to see him. At the gates a member of the staff met us and led us through a large lawn where patients were wandering. You couldn’t take your eyes off them. Something about them attracted you very strongly.

  They brought us to his office. The staff member knocked on the door, and from inside someone shouted sharply not to disturb him. The employee looked at us, smiled, opened the door slightly and leaned his head inside, telling the professor that he had visitors.

  We entered the room and saw an elderly man, about seventy years old, pleasant in appearance. I immediately thought he must be some kind of professor – he wore a jacket, had neatly combed grey hair pushed back, and a beard and mustache. It turned out that he really was a professor, a very eccentric one, rejected by the academic community because of his ideas about parallel worlds.

  Just like with the professor’s wife, you found common ground with him very quickly. He was the first specialist who, already during the second meeting, thought to ask my permission to speak with your… being. After that, whenever I was able to observe your conversations even a little, I always had the feeling that there were three people in the room, not just you and the professor. He greeted you and said goodbye to you – and separately greeted and said goodbye to your being.

  We began visiting him regularly. Those conversations were helping you. You were changing, becoming different – if I can say it like that, more normal. There was clear progress. You began communicating with people, because the professor managed to explain through you to your being that this was necessary for your own good. He also asked your father and me to accept your view of the world and your world of imagination. At first it felt strange, almost unnatural, but over time we both became used to it and things slowly began to improve. In public you tried to behave like everyone else, and at home we allowed you to live in your own world.

  The treatment ended very suddenly, and under very strange circumstances. I remember that day very clearly. We came for another consultation on a Tuesday at eleven in the morning. A staff member asked us to wait near the office. Something had happened in the hospital – all the patients were locked in their rooms, and the staff were rushing through the corridors. I overheard one employee telling another that one of the patients had attacked a member of staff and bitten off a finger.

  You were sitting next to me, playing with the Rubik’s cube the professor had once given you to develop your thinking. I didn’t know whether we should leave or keep waiting. No one was telling us anything. Then suddenly I saw the professor walking down the corridor toward us. Behind him was a tall, thin man in a straitjacket, held by two staff members.

  When they reached us, the professor raised his hand and stopped the three people behind him. He stepped forward and approached us. He greeted me politely, greeted you, and then added another greeting addressed to your friend – although it sounded as if he were speaking to you again. He explained that something serious had happened and that he would not be able to see us that day.

  I was just about to agree and ask when we should come back when suddenly we heard a sharp crack and pieces of the Rubik’s cube scattered across the floor. The professor and I both turned toward you. You were frozen, staring at the patient. The patient was staring back at you, grinning with blood on his teeth. A moment later you began screaming in absolute terror.

  The professor immediately ordered the patient to be taken away. After that he spent about two hours with you behind a closed door. When the door finally opened, the professor came out first, and you followed him. You were different. If I can say it like that – you looked hollow. The professor handed me a prescription for medication and said with visible regret that now everything would be fine.

  Those words surprised me. They sounded good, but the way he said them was full of sadness. Without thinking I asked what exactly would be fine.

  He replied that after the therapy Gobby would become an ordinary child.