The silence of hands
- Marcel Courteau
- Feb 8
- 14 min read
Updated: Feb 8
The last circle.
In the La Trinidad neighborhood of Málaga, near the Parish of Fatima and along the banks of the Guadalmedina River, Ayla’s kitchen carried the rich scent of finely ground coffee brewed in a cezve, just as tradition dictated, and the earthy aroma of dried herbs. Ayla, a Turkish grandmother, had turned her home into a sanctuary where, for years, people from all walks of life sought her wisdom and healing touch. She read fortunes in coffee grounds and cured skin ailments, anything from severe acne to stubborn warts.
Apples and Thorns – Our Lady of Fatima in La Trinidad, Málaga – The Grounds of Turkish Coffee
On the wooden table, a red apple rested waiting for its fate. Beside it, a small bowl of rose thorns, brought to her every morning by the local florist. Camila, her granddaughter, sat across from her, idly stirring her coffee, eyes heavy with exhaustion. She had seen this ritual countless times as a child.
Born in Argentina, Camila, now 36, had arrived in this world under troubled stars. Her mother died giving birth to her, and her father, a Spanish embassy official with an older son, Ariel, decided to return to Málaga. There, Ayla took on the task of raising the siblings.
Camila had built her life in the city. A journalist for the Diario Sur of Málaga, she had spent years telling the stories of others, until her own life shattered. Fate struck twice: a five-year relationship was shattered by infidelity, and shortly after, her father died of pneumonia. Something inside her broke, and she found herself trapped in a dark spiral. She lost 40 pounds in mere months, stopped eating, and became consumed by cruel thoughts, believing no one would ever love her, that no man would accept her, that she was worthless. Anguish became a constant presence, and her body an enemy she punished relentlessly.
It was Ariel, her brother, who saw her collapse in time. He convinced her to seek medical help. The diagnosis was clear: major depression. What followed was a long, winding road, psychiatric appointments, the trial and error of medications with brutal side effects, ravenous hunger, uncontrolled weight gain, insulin imbalances and family therapy. Two years of struggle, but at last, she stabilized with the right treatment and the unwavering support of her grandmother.
She had to leave her job, depend on unemployment benefits, and relearn life in small steps. Now, four years later, she was facing the final stage of her recovery: a mental health rehabilitation program focused on working with her hands.
Camila chose cooking. The Hospital Regional Universitario de Málaga offered a program for patients like her, and she had been assigned a position in the hospital’s kitchen. That afternoon would be her first day.
Ayla murmured a prayer in Turkish as she carefully pierced the apple’s smooth skin with each thorn, whispering under her breath:
"One for each scar. One for every mark the body carries."
She then took a marker and traced small circles around each thorn.
"Does this really work?" Camila asked.
Ayla turned the apple in her hands before replying:
"If you want to get rid of something, don’t confront it. Enclose its strength in circles, keep it from growing. And it will disappear."
Camila ran her fingers over the apple’s surface.
"Is that what you do for those who come to you for healing?"
Ayla smiled gently.
"Look, no one has ever left without healing, and I don’t do it just for them. For you too, Milaş. The same applies to love, to life, to everything.
If you cling too tightly, you suffocate it. If you isolate it, you destroy it."
Ayla set the apple aside and picked up Camila’s coffee cup.
She placed a saucer over it, gave it three slow turns, and whispered a blessing before setting it down. She asked her granddaughter to make a wish and waited for the grounds to settle and cool.
When she finally turned the cup over, she saw clear, open shapes,signs of opportunities and good news:
"Today, something ends for you". Said Ayla.
Camila felt the weight of her words.
Ayla traced her fingers over the darker shapes left in the cup.
She paused, then smiled:
"Some things burn until they turn to ash. And fire leaves scars that last forever. But even in scorched earth, life will always find a crack to break through."
Camila took a deep breath, and in that moment, she knew, her past could no longer haunt her, and the future could no longer overwhelm her with fear.
Only this moment existed and that evening, the road to the hospital.
The path of silence
Frère Lucien Chapel was a man of few words and deliberate movements. A Frenchman, 45 years old, tall, with an athletic build, with a neatly trimmed beard and kind eyes—the kind that understood everything without needing to be told.
The title Frère—Brother—was a relic of his past in the Capuchin order.
He walked without hurry, but with purpose, as if every step landed exactly where it was meant to be. His silence was not distance but presence. He observed, he understood, he accepted human nature, but he also guided, he led, and when necessary, he made decisions with the certainty of a man who knew that to act was to leap into the unknown, trusting in faith.
He was the head chef of the Hospital Regional Universitario de Málaga, where fire and water dictated the rhythm of service, and where each meal was as much about sustaining life as it was about accompanying those in their final moments.
His last name carried weight. A distant nephew of Alain Chapel, he had grown up in a family where cooking was not just a profession but a legacy. From a young age, he immersed himself in the principles of French gastronomy, absorbing the philosophy his uncle had outlined in La cuisine, c’est beaucoup plus que des recettes (Cooking is much more than recipes), a space where silence converses with movement, where the rhythm between action and pause shapes the most difficult thing to achieve: the simple.
While others sought perfection worthy of Michelin stars, Lucien sought transcendence in monastic silence. Convinced that prayer and manual labor were paths to the divine, he became a Capuchin monk.
But everything changed when, in the stillness of the monastery, he had a revelation.
He saw himself cooking for those about to leave this world—preparing the last meal for those who would never again sit at a table.
He realized his place was neither in high-end restaurants nor in monastic life, but in kitchens where every meal was an act of farewell and solace.
His order, recognizing the strength of his calling, allowed him to keep his title as Brother (Frère), but freed him from monastic ties.
He then came to Málaga, to the hospital, where he ran the kitchen with the same devotion with which he had once recited psalms.
It was he who introduced the rehabilitation program through manual work. He believed in cooking as a form of healing, where the rhythm of movement could restore purpose to those who had lost it.
He had seen many like Camila walk into his kitchen—trembling, empty, lost within themselves. But he knew that when the mind breaks, it is the body that must remember the way back.
The silence of doing
Dressed in her kitchen uniform, Camila stepped into the hospital's main hall.
Frère Lucien was waiting for her.
"Camila, welcome. Today, you'll work with me." He pointed to a basket full of peeled onions.
Camila glanced around, nervously.
"This place feels... different. I expected the usual noise of a kitchen, the chaos, the chatter. But here..."
Frère Lucien kept chopping vegetables with precision, never looking up.
"A kitchen is a silence of absence of words, only inhabited by the sound of work: the precise cut of a knife, the patient simmering, the bread yielding to the heat.
No one speaks because everything has already been said through movement".
He paused and handed her a knife.
"Take this cutting board and this knife. It’s yours alone. No one else will use it.
Take care of it. It will be your inseparable tool."
Then, he gestured toward the basket:
"Let’s begin. Julienne cut".
Camila hesitated, gripping the knife uncertainly. She glanced at the other cooks. No one spoke. Only the rhythmic sound of knives against wood, the bubbling of water, the crisp snap of vegetables as they were sliced.
As she took in the scene, her eyes landed on a phrase written on the kitchen’s task board:
"If you are doing, there is never silence, not inside, not outside. It is the silence of action."
Frère Lucien observed her clumsy movements but did not correct her.
"Silence is a meeting place, Camila. Every meeting begins and is celebrated from emptiness.We can only hold hands when they are empty.
We can only embrace when we are unburdened.
Connection is born from emptiness."
Camila frowned and set the knife down.
"I don’t agree. Void hurts.The void is what trapped me in bed for months.I don’t see anything to celebrate in it".
Frère Lucien nodded, still slicing with steady hands.
"We move from silence to connection, and from connection back to silence.
That is the rhythm of life.
Nothing holds meaning unless we understand that everything must come to an end."
Camila swallowed hard.Her mind drifted to the past, her father, her broken relationship, the feeling of being suspended in a void she couldn’t escape.
"Maybe… it wasn’t just emptiness". She murmured, almost to herself. "Maybe I just never saw a way out".
Frère Lucien continued.
"We inhale, we exhale. Day and night. Heat and cold. Winter and summer. Silence matters because there is connection, and connection is precious because we allow ourselves to return to silence."
The Artisan's Soul
When they finished chopping onions, Frère Lucien set down his knife and showed her two loaves of bread—one factory-made, flawless, and another handmade, uneven, with cracks in its crust.
"Which one do you prefer?" Asked Frère Lucien
Camila ran her fingers over the artisanal loaf.
"This one".
"Why?".
"It has texture. It’s unique".
Frère Lucien allowed a small smile.
"Exactly. Industrialized work is functional. It is perfect, precise.
Because of that, it can be compared to others. But its perfection makes it impersonal".
He paused and placed a hand over the raw dough, yet to be baked:
"Artisan work is slow. It has moments of patience, of uncertainty. It falls into the abyss and rises again when least expected. It is imperfect.
But hands have the power to turn imperfection into something personal.
The imprint of an artisan is their signature.
What is personal becomes incomparable, elevating it to a higher plane".
Camila exhaled with irony.
"I’m not sure I agree. You say imperfections are beyond comparison, but people judge them all the time. They measure them, label them. How can something be superior if it’s used to point out flaws?"
Frère Lucien smiled again.
"Because we have forgotten the difference between creating and producing.
We are the work of God, the great artisan. That is why we bear His mark".
He turned the handmade bread over in his hands, treating it with reverence.
"You chose this loaf.
Am I imperfect?
That depends on who you ask. Every person is different.
But I would say I am original. Incomparable.
To the right person, you can be everything".
A flicker crossed Camila’s eyes, brief, like the blink of an idea yet to take shape.
Frère Lucien continued:
"Today’s world values only what is profitable, fast, and efficient.
An artisan, on the other hand, values presence.
Their being is their creativity".
He paused, looking at Camila with quiet kindness.
"The difference between creating and producing is that one transforms the world with meaning. The other just fills it with more of the same".
The lightness of Giving
Then, Frère Lucien placed a piece of dough in her hands.
"Knead".
Camila did, awkwardly at first. Minutes passed before she finally spoke:
"Do you ever get tired?"
Frère Lucien paused, surprised by the question.
"Of work? Of course. But you know… I don’t get tired of doing it".
Camila looked at him, waiting for more.
He gave a faint smile before continuing:
"Fatigue comes from doing something for a reward.
It doesn’t come from doing something for its own sake".
Camila tilted her head, letting the words settle.
He gestured toward the other cooks, each absorbed in their task, no signs of exhaustion.
"Look at their faces. There’s no rush, no anxiety.
They work because they love what they do. Because with each dish, they accompany someone, whether recovering, seeking comfort, or saying goodbye.
They leave a part of themselves in each gesture and in that, exhaustion fades.
Camila watched, understanding for the first time.
Her mind drifted back to her grandmother’s kitchen, Ayla, hunched over the table, piercing apples, listening to people, kneading dough, stirring coffee with endless patience.
She never spoke of fatigue.
She simply did.
"Ayla used to cook for hours without complaint". Camila murmured, more to herself than to him. "She never said she was tired".
Frère Lucien nodded:
"The purest silence is found in giving, not expecting".
Like art, prayer or life itself.
The hands that heal.
Camila kept kneading, this time with ease, almost playfully.
"We knead bread, shape clay, weave threads, caress skin". Frère Lucien said, his voice slow, steady.
"Hands always do the same: they build, they care, they connect".
A shiver ran down Camila’s spine.
Frère Lucien looked at her gently.
"What have your hands been used for until now?
To hold onto pain.
When you move your hands, you train them for work.
But also for caressing. In the end, even if it seems strange to you, you are training them to love".
Camila stopped.
She had never thought of it that way.
"Kneading, cutting, sewing, weaving, planting"… Frère Lucien continued.
"It is all the same act. All ways of loving.
It doesn’t matter whether it’s bread, clay, or skin.
Hands anchor us to life".
Silence.
The warmth of the dough beneath her fingers, yielding with every press.
Her movements were no longer stiff.
For the first time, Camila let herself flow.
Room 212
A nurse burst into the kitchen, breathless.
"Frère Lucien, the patient in Room 212 refuses to eat! He says he doesn’t want to keep going…"
Frère Lucien calmly set down his knife and wiped his hands on his apron.
"How long has he been like this?"
"Since he arrived. Two days ago".
A brief silence.
Before stepping out, Frère Lucien turned to Camila.
"Will you come?"
Camila felt a knot tighten in her stomach.
She wasn’t ready. She didn’t know what to do.
But her feet had already begun to move.
Without thinking too much, she followed him.
The hospital corridors carried a different kind of weight.
Everything here was white, still, contained.
Too much like the weeks she had spent in that same state—unable to eat, unwilling to exist.
When they entered the room, the young man was sitting on the bed.
Andrés. Thirty-six years old. Severely thin.
He didn’t move. His gaze was fixed on the window, lost somewhere no daylight could reach.
On his tray, the plate sat untouched.
Frère Lucien approached with the same quiet ease he had in the kitchen.
"How are you feeling today, Andrés?"
Andrés blinked, as if the question had reached him from a great distance.
But he didn’t answer.
Frère Lucien didn’t push.
He simply sat down in the chair beside the bed, elbows resting on his knees.
Ready to stay as long as necessary.
"You know, Andrés… Sometimes, when the mind doesn’t know how to release pain, it lets it fall onto the body instead".
Silence.
Andrés didn’t react.
But Camila did.
She recognized that weight in his chest. That emptiness, drowning him in a way no one else could see, and before she could stop herself, she spoke:
"I know what that feels like.
I know what it’s like to be in that hell".
For the first time, Andrés turned his head.
He looked at her.
His expression was hard, like someone refusing to let anything in.
"No, you don’t".
But Camila didn’t back down.
Her voice was quiet but firm.
"Yes, I know. I was there. I know what it feels like to sense that something inside you has broken, and there’s no way to fix it. I know what it’s like to hate your own body because you believe it failed you, because you believe it’s to blame. But it isn’t."
Andrés stared at her, unblinking. Something in his eyes shifted.
"It’s not your fault, Andrés.
Whatever happened, whatever brought you here…It’s not your body’s fault.
And punishing it won’t make the pain go away. It’ll only make it worse".
The air in the room grew heavier.
Andrés lowered his gaze.
Camila felt like she had said too much.
But it was the truth, and she couldn’t take it back.
"Even if you can’t see it yet, believe me…You just have to hold on.
And when the pain fades—because it will—you’ll have to make peace with your body.
It’s not against you. It’s still here.
Waiting for you".
As she spoke, she realized something.
Her grandmother, Ayla, had never asked anything of her.
She had simply shown her the way and waited.
So she did the same.
She picked up the fork and set it down on Andrés’s plate.
"It’s not your fault.Just do it for yourself".
She said nothing more.
Camila stepped out of the room, her eyes damp, carrying a weight she had yet to find words for.
Frère Lucien watched her in silence.
He had witnessed the moment with the kind of presence only faith could provide.
Camila took a deep breath. Her chest still felt tight.
"That was pointless". She muttered, biting her lip, suddenly embarrassed.
Frère Lucien walked beside her, unshaken:
"Water doesn’t break stone with force, but with patience.
Camila felt a lump in her throat.
She didn’t understand. She felt ridiculous.
"Why did you make me go in there?"
Still with quiet amazement in his gaze, Frère Lucien finally replied:
"Because it was possible for you to see the path from emptiness to connection".
Peace in Simplicity
That night, when Camila returned home, she didn’t feel the usual weight on her shoulders.
She had worked harder than she had in a long time.She had felt emotions she wasn’t sure she could handle, and yet, as she stepped through the door, she didn’t feel exhaustion.
Only a strange, unexpected sense of peace.
Ayla greeted her in her usual way—no questions, no speeches.
A strong embrace, a warm plate on the table, and a small nod toward the chair.
Camila sat down.
At another time, the silence would have felt heavy.
But now, in the steam rising from the stew and the comforting scent of spices, there was something different.
Ayla watched her granddaughter out of the corner of her eye as she tore off a piece of bread.
Camila’s expression had changed. It wasn’t quite joy.
But it wasn’t the shadow she had lived with for years, either.
She said nothing. There would be time to talk when the moment was right.
Camila lifted her spoon to her lips.
The stew was hot, fragrant, comforting.
And in her body, an unfamiliar feeling stirred.
A small, quiet longing.
One she hadn’t expected to find there.
Tomorrow, she would go back.
The invisible mark
The kitchen breathed in its own language: the crackling of the flames, the rhythmic tapping of knives, the muffled murmur of flour yielding under the weight of hands.
Camila had begun to understand that language.
She never saw Andrés again. She didn’t ask about him. But suddenly, as she was picking up a tray, a phrase floated through the air, spoken with the natural ease of the everyday:
"The boy from 212 ate today," said a nurse.
Camila froze.
Just for a second, just long enough to feel the words brush against her skin before continuing on, like a breeze that comes and goes without asking permission.
She didn’t know what to think. She had no way of knowing if she had changed anything at all.
Something held her in place.A thread pulling at her, invisible but real.
It was imperceptible—like a seed just beginning to crack open, unseen by the world.
She lifted her gaze.
Across the kitchen, Frère Lucien was working.
His sleeves rolled up, his forearms firm, his brow slightly furrowed in quiet concentration.
His knife glided in precise movements; the wooden cutting board marked by the damp imprint of fresh ingredients.
There was something in the way he moved.
Not just in the confidence of his hands, but in the way each gesture seemed to carry a purpose beyond the task itself.
For just a moment, a different kind of warmth flickered inside her.
A fleeting thought, shapeless and weightless, leaving only a trace behind.
Frère Lucien.
But just how much of a frère was he?
A hint of a smile touched her lips, light as a feather.
She shook her head and looked down at her own hands.
The warm dough beneath her fingers, giving way beneath her touch.
Kneading and loving.
In silence.
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