Miguel The Servant, and His Magic Fish

Miguel is a poor ex matador who lives in Andalucia.

Chapter 1 

 The sun was a golden egg yolk in a bright azure sky overlooking the pueblos blancos of Andalucia. In one of these entanglements of  white washed buildings with red and brown terracotta roofs, lived a young man who had once been a famous Matador.  His name was Miguel, or Miguelito, as he had  been known on the town´s bullfighting posters. He was tall and thin, with large  dark eyes, a long nose and a sad countenance. A goring, that never healed correctly was his undoing, and he never returned to the bullring again afterwards, due to severe injuries in his right hip and spine. It wasn´t long after that Miguel fell into beggary, condemned to meander through the winding streets of Andalucia, supporting his aching body on a cane, asking passers by for alms, and on occassion, food and shelter. 

Miguel was sometimes allowed to sleep in the barns of the country people outside the pueblo, or in the patios belonging to the cozy cottages, typical of Andalucia with their stark white washed walls, black wrought iron grilles covering the windows, and beautifully arranged flowers in every color, contained in the blue, white and yellow ceramic pots known as azulejos. A bubbling fountain, with its water playfully cascading over tiered basins, or spraying from a a spigot, often offered Miguel a place to wash his grimey hands and face, and even take a cool swig with his hands cupped. 

This worked out well for Miguel durring Spain´s scorching summers, but when winter set in, Miguel found his life on the streets that much harder. 

One such winter, Miguel, roamed to every house that he knew, begging for a place to sleep that was warm. Each and every person in the pueblo turned him away, only giving him a peseta here, or a centavo there, and if he was lucky, a loaf of bread and some water. Miguel soon became weakened by the cold, and wrapping himself in the remnants of his tattered cloak, he limped on towards the church, where, from the extreme cold and exhaustion, he fainted on the doorstep of the house attached to the parish, belonging to the local Priest. 

It just so happened that the Priest needed to go out, and flurries of snow began to float down from a heavy gray sky. As soon as the Priest opened his front door he encountered  on the step Miguel, wrapped in a heap of rags, his cane on the cobblestones near him. 

The Priest crossed himself, and stooping down, turned Miguel over, and regonized the weathered countenance of the former matador Miguel Delgado. 

"Santo Padre de Dios." The Priest said to himself, as he lifted Miguel in his arms, and carried him through to the kitchen. He seated him in a chair, and on pushing his mass of grown out black curls from his face, which was smudged with dirt, found that he was suffering from a high fever. Miguel was in the first stages of pneunomia. The Priest lit a fire in the kitchen´s fireplace, and stripped his wet, filthy, thread-bare cloak off of him, and also his broken boots. He covered Miguel in a warm quilt, and lifted a glass of wine to his lips to see if he might take some. 

Miguel woke out of his feverish state for a brief moment, and on seeing that he was being taken care of, in a breathy, labored voice, whispered a ´gracias´ to the Priest, and fell into silence drifting in and out of feverish consciouness. The Priest left Miguel there in his house, and went to seek out the local doctor. The doctor and Priest arrived back at the parish, and found Miguel on the floor, sleeping as close to the fireplace as he could get. 

The doctor knelt down on the floor, and lifting one of Miguel´s wrists felt his pulse. The doctor looked up at the Priest, and said in a serious tone:

" He´ll die very soon if we don´t take care of him now. His immune system is weak, and the fever is too high. We must break his fever."

The Priest crossed himself, and Miguel was carried to a hot bath immediately. The doctor himself undressed Miguel, casting his filthy rags into a heap to be burnt. 

He then was put into a very hot steaming bath, and the doctor washed him and allowed him to soak. Miguel´s wretched body was covered in bites from fleas, and his backbone protruded terribly. 

After his bath, Miguel was taken out, and dried off. The Priest slipped a woolen nightshirt over Miguel´s head, pulling his long thin arms through the sleeves, and then wrapped him two blankets, and helped him into the bed. 

The doctor suggested to feed him, that was if Miguel could  keep any food down, or if he even had an appetite. 

Before the doctor took leave of the Priest, he told him that he would be back in a day or so to see how Miguel was doing. 

A few hours later, the Priest brought up a tray of hot soup for Miguel, and a glass of sherry. Miguel was sweating from the heat of the blankets and warm clothes, but his eyes were open, and he tried to sit up on seeing the Priest. 

He tried to speak, but the good kind father hushed him, and told him that he wished him to eat rather than speak at this point. 

Author's Note

This story is turning out longer than I had anticipated, but I wanted it to make sense, as much as it can for this type of story. I live in Spain so I understand Spanish culture, and that it lends itself to the surreal. This is a work in progress.

Reviews

[Djacqueline175]

It needs to be shorter, its a folktale, well, its supposed to be a folktale, its turning into a saga, lol, The idea was that Miguel finds a Magic Fish and by helping her, she in turn helps him.