Rafito el Varado and the Filigree Egg

More about Rafito el Varado and the Filigree Egg

Rafito el Varado was out early on Cala de las Presuntas Sombras, that little scalloped cove hidden between the rust-colored cliffs and the turquoise bowl of the sea. The sun had only just begun its quiet rehearsals, and the fishermen were still asleep in their shuttered stone houses, dreaming of nets that repaired themselves.

Rafito liked this hour. It was when the beach revealed things. Not shells, not driftwood—those were for tourists. Rafito specialized in arrivals, the objects the sea coughed up reluctantly, as if returning contraband.

That morning he found it half-buried beneath a slab of pumice the color of old peaches: a filigree egg no bigger than his hand, delicate as someone’s forgotten crown. One side was broken open, like something had pecked its way out or forced its way in. The metal wasn’t metal, exactly—it felt warm, almost shy, like it had been dreaming.

Rafito crouched, held it up to the rising light, and saw that the inner surface shimmered as if it were lined with miniature oceans. Being Rafito—and not someone sensible—he peered inside.

And that’s when he saw it:
a world.

A complete one. A whole continent curved softly like the inside of a whisper. Mountains no higher than eyelashes, rivers thinner than lines on a palm, and tiny drifting clouds that looked suspiciously philosophical. Rafito turned the egg slightly and saw movement—a procession of specks, thousands of them, crossing a minute bridge. When he squinted, the specks became figures: people the size of dust motes, carrying tiny lanterns that glowed like a fever dream of fireflies.

The world inside the egg had a recursive flavor to it. Every time Rafito squinted, he saw another layer inside the previous one—smaller mountains inside mountains, smaller oceans inside the littler oceans, and in the heart of that second world, yet another egg, broken open, containing another world, spiraling inward like a polite cosmic joke.

Rafito felt something tug at him.
A breeze? Gravity? A suggestion?

The tiny world seemed to lean toward him, as though it wanted to whisper something only Rafito could hear. He placed the egg carefully on his knee, and the little figures inside shifted, rearranged themselves into new constellations of movement—almost like they were spelling something out.

He waited.
The tiny lanterns flickered.
A pattern formed.

At first it looked like randomness.
Then like a map.
Then like the outline of Rafito himself, unmistakable in his slouch and his eternal beach-rummager posture.

Rafito swallowed.
“Ah,” he said softly. “So you’ve noticed me.”

A wave lapped against the cove.
A gull screamed an opinion.
Somewhere in the recursive depths of the egg, another Rafito—smaller, anxious, barefoot—seemed to look back out at him.

He wasn’t sure whether he’d found the egg
or whether the egg had finally found him.