Daniel Sempere—Fermin Romero de Torres

Daniel Sempere and Fermín Romero de Torres form a friendship that becomes a sustaining bond across danger, illness, and family life. Fermín’s loyalty is practical rather than ceremonial: he protects Daniel when he is vulnerable, gives blood that saves his life, and remains close to the household Daniel builds with Bea.

The Friendship Under Threat

Their bond is tested when Daniel is seized and carried away in a car. In his confusion, he expects to see Fumero and fears what will happen next; instead, he recognizes Fermín’s welcoming smile. The reversal makes Fermín’s role clear: where Daniel anticipates the return of danger, his friend has come to rescue him. Fermín takes him to a safe apartment belonging to friends of Don Federico Flavia, and stays beside him as he begins to recover.

Daniel is still unwell when he wakes in the small apartment, and Don Federico is there as well. Fermín responds to the situation with characteristic irreverence, asking for a sandwich while Don Federico prepares broth. The humor does not diminish his concern; it gives the frightened, uncertain scene a measure of steadiness. When Daniel tries to rise, Fermín physically stops him. Daniel insists that he must find Bea, but Fermín tells him he is in no state to go and offers to find her himself. His care is both protective and responsive: he restrains Daniel’s attempt to act before he is able, while taking seriously the person Daniel is desperate to reach.

Care That Becomes a Lifeline

The friendship reaches its starkest expression after Daniel is shot during the confrontation at the Aldaya mansion. He loses nearly all his blood, and his heart stops for sixty-four seconds. When he wakes eight days later, he learns that the blood in his veins is Fermín’s. Fermín has spent days eating meat sandwiches in the hospital canteen in the hope of producing more red blood cells in case Daniel needs them. The account links Fermín’s bodily effort directly to Daniel’s survival: friendship here is not simply sympathy but a concrete act that helps return Daniel to life.

Fermín’s presence continues throughout Daniel’s recovery. He sleeps in the hospital corridor, while Bea holds his head on her lap. Daniel remembers Fermín looking pale and thin, a visible sign of the strain the episode has placed on him. The family and friends who visit bring flowers and congratulations, but Fermín’s contribution is more intimate and consequential: he has given Daniel the blood that sustains him. Daniel reflects that he may have returned from the crisis wiser and less like his former self, making Fermín’s gift part of a larger change in how he understands his life.

Fermín as Friend and Advocate

After Daniel recovers, Fermín’s loyalty expands from emergency care into active support for his future with Bea. He takes charge of the wedding arrangements, including the ceremony and banquet, while Daniel is too weak to manage them. When the parish priest refuses to marry the pregnant bride, Fermín confronts him and insists that the wedding must proceed. He then finds another officiant at San Gabriel’s School, Father Fernando Ramos, persuading him to perform the ceremony by presenting Daniel as too fragile to endure another setback.

Fermín’s methods are comic, forceful, and unmistakably devoted. He does not wait for Daniel to organize his own recovery or wedding; he assumes responsibility when his friend cannot. The contrast between Daniel’s physical weakness and Fermín’s energetic intervention gives the friendship a reciprocal quality without making the help symmetrical: at different moments, Fermín protects, steadies, and speaks for Daniel, while Daniel’s narrative preserves the meaning of those acts.

A Friendship Within Family Life

The wedding ushers Daniel and Bea into a shared household, but Fermín remains a close presence in the life that follows. In the later account, he and Bernarda marry in 1958 and have four sons. Daniel and Fermín see one another less often than before, yet sometimes repeat their walk to the breakwater at dawn, where they talk through the world’s problems. Their friendship changes with time and responsibility, but its old habits endure in these renewed walks.

Fermín eventually leaves his position at the bookshop. After Isaac Monfort dies, he becomes keeper of the Cemetery of Forgotten Books, taking on a role connected to the hidden books Nuria has placed there. Daniel hopes that someone may one day discover the copies of Julian’s books she concealed. Fermín’s new work thus keeps him within the same community of books and memory that has shaped Daniel’s life, even as their daily companionship becomes less frequent. Daniel also visits Isaac and Nuria’s graves on Montjuic, while the account places Fermín’s later vocation alongside this continuing remembrance.

The Relationship’s Meaning

The relationship is defined by repeated acts of presence rather than by declarations. Fermín appears when Daniel is in danger, prevents him from pushing himself too soon, gives blood after the shooting, remains near his hospital bed, and takes responsibility for the wedding when its completion is threatened. These episodes trace a progression from rescue to recovery and then to the practical work of building a family life.

The later separation in their routines does not undo that history. Fermín has his own marriage, children, and work; Daniel has a household with Bea and a bookshop that provides a modest living. They meet less often, but the dawn walks remain a ritual of shared conversation. Across these changes, Fermín is both Daniel’s friend and a durable part of the family and social world around him: a companion whose care is measured in what he does, and whose connection with Daniel survives the end of their daily work together.