Ferran street with the Rambla

Since the hip prosthesis operation, Mercè has a new wheelchair, and it has changed her life. Hers and Ricard's, her son's. Now she walks too, but with the wheelchair a new dimension has opened up. After many years, Mercè will be able to travel down all those streets she hasn't been down for years, because they are pedestrian-only and she couldn't go there walking or by car.

They left Gran Via from Urgell to Plaça de la Universitat, and went down Tallers.

Mercè talks and Ricard has trouble hearing her, because when he's behind her, her voice doesn't reach him. Sometimes, when the street goes downhill, he stops pushing the wheelchair and gets level with his mother, so he can hear the stories she tells him. Mercè doesn't realize, she doesn't know she's moving forward uncontrollably. Ricard loves to make the most of it until the slope is too steep and the wheelchair runs away; then he regains control of the wheelchair while Mercè talks to herself, moving forward at full speed.

—Let's go to "Fernandu" street —says Mercè.

—You mean Ferran street?

—It has beautiful streetlights, it's very stately.

A McDonald's on the left, a Kentucky Fried Chicken on the right. Three blonde girls dressed the same, with long white fingernails, are scraping chicken wings. A gentleman shows a protruding belly that peeks out from under a T-shirt that is too small, while the stracciatella ice cream melts down his fingers. A large group of Japanese people with personal portable fans walk by, very interested. An Amazon van on the sidewalk emits black smoke from its exhaust pipe. Young people, men and women, with a lost gaze, very beaten by life, lie down with their scrawny dogs. Rags for clothes, dirt ingrained in their hair and tattoos. It smells strange, a little sweet, a mixture of grease, beer, and pee. A taxi stops on La Rambla and a couple gets out, wearing swim trunks, a bikini, and a towel. They are barefoot. Mercè and Ricard move forward slowly, but it's difficult for them: the cobblestones are slippery, everything seems greasy: the ground, the walls, the signs, the people. It's as if all the chicken skin, the fried potatoes and hamburgers, the sweat, the humidity, and the pollution had been seeping into this corner for years, resisting the efforts of the cleaning crews. A kind of installed patina. The greasy atmosphere accompanies them for a good while, as they walk up Ferran towards Plaça Sant Jaume. The wheels continue to slip and it takes them a good while to get a good grip on the pavement again, as does the sole of Ricard's shoes.

—How is it possible? —says Mercè—. How is it possible 200 meters from the city and Catalan government? Let's go home, please. How did they allow this?

As they turn left at Carrer Raurich, on their way home, Ricard thinks that, in this case, it's lucky that his mother has the beginnings of senility: she forgets the most recent things and thus will keep in her memory the best street "Fernandu".

—Look, Schilling's cutlery store, it's the same.

—It's a Taco Bell now.

—Paco Adell has been dead for years.