by Ovidiu D.
Chapter 1
I
– How are you feeling, she asks me before I can get used to the powerful light… She looks at me as trying to find a shipwreck on the bottom of the ocean… She either likes rotten matter or lost causes… I’m both… so she can’t get wrong with me… I haven’t been looked in such manner for quite a long… It’s an honest form of pity masked as detached curiosity…
– Are we already in hell or it’s another bloody sunny day? I burst into an intense laughter and I take the hands off my eyes, contrary to all my beliefs…I feel the urge to visit again the museum of reality… the paintings should be all there, in the same places… The only things that have changed are the new layers of dust that now cover the paintings… experiences, regrets, self pity, weaknesses, false hopes… Pulling down the curtain is the best thing you can do when you are part of the show… Watching too many plays, I have always wanted to innovate in theater, as it needs a bold push into another dimension… All performances should be played behind the curtain… Seeing the actors just shows too few of the emotions… These are my options, to be the greatest actor or to become a painter… I don’t feel the need to say “greatest painter”, because I already know I can paint sins like no other… It is the emptiness in me that screams its right to get out of my locked chest and color their world in black and white… That’s exactly what I will do… I will paint their world with non colors…
– Even the feelings feel the need to hide behind cloths… or behind curtains… I say staring into her eyes, I smile and my face shapes in an intense frown… because I just realized how empty of creativity all my ideas are… It seems that I already started painting, and the first work is an auto-portrait… Human nature already patented everything long ago… Life itself plays behind curtains… We all hide ourselves behind walls, especially when there is nothing to show to the world… It’s pure pettiness… It is the delight we find in fooling others… Let them fight for the truth, let them squeeze their life in the glass of our critic eye… until they have nothing left, but their own shape… and then we can crush them easily under the weight of our ego, as you do with a paper cube… I know what you all would say… “Why crushing the paper cube, when it is so easily to burn it? There are so naïve, that they will think it’s the warm sun of Greece touching their delicate skin…” I have an answer to that question, as I have for everything… I already have all answers, you just have to shape the questions, so they can mold perfectly… Burning the hollow paper cubes would be a waste of time, as they are too used to being burnt… Where is the novelty in that? Where is the delight of the sorrow? Will they remember the experience when looking back into their past? Crushing them takes less time too, so you can move quickly to the next shallow form of life… and give it a meaning by ceasing its existence…
– Isn’t that what we are all doing, I ask her as gently as I am capable of… I tried too much not to be intimidating, so I got the opposite result…
She goes by the window and lights a cigarette… I watch her moving elegantly, in contrast with my brutal manners… I take in a deep breath but I let it all out quickly… It is too clean for my tastes… I always disliked purity in any form, but especially in a form… Purity should not take any form… It should remain an abstraction, so I can understand it… and maybe someday paint it…
– What do you mean, she asks me while looking away through the window?
– Hiding…
– Haha… she starts laughing… She is so charming that you could use the sounds to create the greatest symphony of all time… It would have no intrinsic value, but the package would be bright enough to make it a sellout… But why is she wearing that pearl necklace when the necklace should wear her? Why is she willing to share the pedestal of beauty with someone else, when it is enough to open her eyes… and the night comes down slowly to let her shine as a bright star … when it is enough to say a word and the wind starts whispering the right chords to accompany it… If we were in a concert room, I swear that the whole world would form endless queues just to get the chance to hear her silence… That’s the power of beauty, doubled by the highest form of shallowness… It’s the same principle as in music… Her shallowness creates the perfect context to reverb her beauty… Beauty never truly exists in absence of shallowness… You need that detachment, the ignorance, that lack of empathy, the lack of depth… Actually not… There is depth… depth of shallowness… She is a form of raw art and I am a connoisseur… one that has read all her unwritten stories and watched her taste the poisoned dessert of happiness…
II
The carriage is moving slowly, as if some magnetic force is stopping it from taking speed… The fields of gold that melt into this mellow motion paint the delight of boredom… There are so many colors out there, but the obstinacy of my emptiness displays them in the same image… endless boredom… The lowest form… I should make sometime an effort and change at least the frame… Endless boredom in fear? Endless boredom in sufferance? Endless boredom in hope? Endless boredom in love? No… I need a lot more than illusions… I already lived them all…
But there is no reason to complain… Why should all the trivial details happen fast, when we can sink in boredom and swim in it? They all say swimming is the best exercise after all… There should be enough time to touch the deformed curves of boredom, as a blind man making its journey through life… To feel all the tumors, all the edges, all the missing parts we are caring inside us… The only reason boredom is so unpleasant is that we have the remaining parts… That’s quite an idea… I am a thief and I have never realized that… Strangely, I feel again the delight… this time the delight of wickedness…
I take a quick look at my pocket watch and nod, as I try to understand how the hours flew away so fast… I feel the need to say something shocking… as shocking as a gun fire…
– I swear that if I get alive out of this, I will devote all my time to inventing a fly machine… I will create a fly machine and it will run as fast as time…
– Or as slowly… and her eyes go down… thinking about all the happiness she lost and could have had in this very own moment… It is so reckless to play your own happiness at the roulette… I know it best… After you lose… all you are left with is the scrap others throw away out of boredom…
– Just image how all these fields look seen from above… It must be… beautiful…
– That’s so strange to hear “beautiful” said by you… You never seem to enjoy anything… Nothing is too good for you…
– Or I’m not good enough for anything…
– Don’t ever say that again, Eric! Her face frowns and her eyes suddenly lose their shine… Perfect overlap with the clouds that covered the sun…
– Eric? I mumble slowly having the expression of a kid that it’s faced with an equation without a straight forward solution… Eric? I mumble again trying harder to give a meaning to the four letters…
– Eric, is this one of your silly games… why are you looking like that at me? I see genuine concern on her face… the kind of concern one has when a well studies plan faces the first challenge… and might fall apart at the blow of the wind…
– Yes… It is one of my silly games… That’s all I’m good at… playing games… Coachman, how many more miles are till Gretz? I suddenly feel out of breath and I untie my shirt…
– 60 miles, sir… I hear the harsh sound of his voice through the thirsty whips… Even the horses understand the delight of pain… maybe better than many of us… Their pace is sluggish, an open invitation to be punished… It is a studied role they play every single moment… “If you took our freedom and you made a living out of our sweat, you should at least feel the bitter taste of a permanent dissatisfaction… Let him suffer as we do… let him melt his true self in anger… and feel deep down that he lost his freedom too, once he took ours”… You see… it’s the same patterns of reasoning that repeats over and over again… Everything is a big contraption game and there are no breaks between tests… a beam of light that goes directly to your chest… and squeezes the drops of life out of your heart… if there is a heart left… unless someone covered it with a sweet shirt of beautiful dreams, just to enjoy crushing it, when moving on without even looking back… in search of something fresh, innocent and… better…
I can’t stop the poisonous leak of thoughts from my mind to my own heart… which is still there… I feel it crawling when my eyes see this “dans macabre” … act by act… I stopped laughing long ago… Now it is just contempt and a delight of self awareness… I enjoy seeing them move robotically… Humanoid dogs without a superior purpose, caged in a meaningless life… waiting to be unleashed… so they can devour each other and then suffer… Sufferance is their ultimate illusion… but also their nectar… It’s the life buoy they grab desperately, to remind them they still exist… Their soul is amputated but the ill ego pushes them to the edge of the abyss… whispering to their ears that they can fly… and they jump… one by one… and then they fall… as drops of blood that leak from the unhealed wound of our modern society… SHALLOWNESS…
I begin whistling just to feel the delight of being grotesque… I am a chameleon, so I can change my bright colors to gray and fit it in this painting… I look at her and see an expression of intense disgust… The contrast between my status and my manners is blinding… I received the best education one could have dreamed of, my name is on the lips of all people from our capital… more like a myth than a certainty… but I still act as an outcast from distinct society…
– Hiiiaaaaa… fasteeeer! I hear the old coachman whipping the horses with the delight of the man who feel in control… And he has every reason to feel that… Our destinies are in his hands… the ones burnt by the harsh sun and mild winds…
What fate and what stories lie behind the walls this man has built… More interesting probably than those of the woman standing in front of me… More interesting because he is genuine… no false pretenses… More genuine because he knows who he is… for who he is… and not for who others shaped him to be… More genuine because he is free… More genuine because no ghost haunt him… More genuine because there are no burdens that he has to live with for all of his life… More genuine because he doesn’t think everything gravitates around him… More genuine because he is not SHALLOW…
III
– Eric! Look… the old church where we used to go every Sunday with our grandparents…
– Yes… and I smile politely… In half an hour we will get there… But why does she keep calling me Eric?
The woman in front of me is called Liza… We have known each other since childhood and we are the same age, which delicately I refuse to disclose… Let’s say we are old enough to feel fed up by everything, but young enough to still want to get another chance… I remember so well when I took her hand and passionately whispered a few drops of the affection I felt as words… She considered everything a joke and soon after I left the region and went to the university, she married count Versilov… She lived ever since surrendered to senses and firmly locked the metaphysics in her emptiness…
I open my notebook and grab the golden pen with the studied movements of a scholar. It’s the delight of wickedness again… when what you will write down has the value of honor in modern era, you can at least focus on the unimportant details… the way you open the notebook, the way you frame the message with the date and an elegant signature…
Effort… the same amount of effort I could use to actually write down something meaningful… This is a witty observation that I could use latter on for the book I promised everyone I would write and never have… and never will… I will just pretend that I have already written it in my mind… and let it there imprisoned and forgotten, out of delight… The delight of wickedness doubled… On one hand fooling everyone with the wisdom that resides in my mind (there it is enough room for a library, as I have removed anything useless)… And on the other hand, fooling myself that I am capable of putting words together in a rational form… I still need that for the self confidence painting requires… Painting is a self-confidence intensive activity… But the words in my head are so reckless… They refuse to line up and march well-behaved as sentences… So all I’m left with is the reflection of their emptiness in me…
21 April1877
I’ve thrown myself into so many worlds… but I seem to always get up in the same place… in meaningless supporting roles… But if this is my destiny, I will give all my strength so that the world reminds me as the most obedient lackey…
The world is too bright today… everyone wears light colors and the sun stubborns to whip my cheeks with its optimism… It’s the sarcasm of life leaving reddish march on my pale skin…
But why is there so much happiness in the world? What are they all celebrating? The death of me and the birth of this painfully insignificant Eric? Why they all want me to be something I’m not, never was and never will be? It’s irrelevant… because the odds have already decided… from now on I will be Eric…
Ovidiu
Chapter 2
I
Gretz Castle was the blessed place where Liza made her first steps into life. It has been built by her grandfather, General Ipolit Dimitrov, as wedding dowry for his daughter, Katarina. General Dimitrov came from a modest family so his ultimate goal in life was, as it usually happens in these circumstances, to gather wealth… to impress other and to humble them under the weight of his authority. And the Gretz Castle was exactly the place to feel humble and meaningless… just as you pass the iron gates and enter the English park you can see the generous size of the brick building… Liza’s parents died when she was a toddler so she grew up under the protective eye of her grandfather… Our estates were one next to each other, but her domain was incomparably more exquisite and opulent… so I naturally gravitated to her garden whenever I wasn’t hunting with my father, God rest his soul in peace, or engineering something in the workshop…
I remember everything so well, the Victorian greenhouse that shelters the rarest and finest flowers, the outdoor pavilion where we sat and talked for hours about everything… That everything is still in the air… her innocent fragrance, now lost in the ashes of time… my dreams of making a difference in the world… our childish games… and the crystalline laughter that breathed life into the solitary pines surrounding the property…
The carriage stops in front of the large entering stairs. The old coachman comes down and touches gently the snouts of the horses…
– You never let me down… he spits the words though the missing teeth…
The first selfless gesture I have seen in a while… The magic of this place still exists, even if there are more than 10 years since I have been here… I open the door of the carriage and run to the white pavilion that thrones in the middle of the garden… I then spin fast in circles to take in the panoramic images of this place… Tears of happiness come down my cheeks as I breathe in savagely the air I have missed more than I was aware of…
– Lizaaaa… Lizaaa… come here quickly…
I am too eager to wait for her and I run back to the carriage… I take her arm and lead her to the pavilion… I am overwrought because of the flow of memories that pour in my heart, as sand in the hourglass… Steady but with so many shades…
– Look… there is the birdhouse we built with your grandfather… There is the glade where we learnt how to ride horses… Over there is the spring with clean water that separated our domains, where we threw rocks trying to catch fish… And the garden, the flowers, the trees… Everything breaths at the same pace with us… everything reminds us our main duty… We are here to live… We can find healing and beauty in so many things… I start laughing as If I was caught doing a prank… But is a pure laughter… It is the piano sound you can tune your heart to…
– I don’t remember it well… It has been too long since then… But I do remember the river and our games… calm down and come inside… You need to rest and eat something… tomorrow it will be a long day…
– Tomorrow… Tomorrow… Always tomorrow!!! How about today? How about now? Do I have the right to be present?
I walk away from the pavilion… as she walked away from our childhood with an eraser in her hands… No marks left… No traces… Nothing but Count Versilov… I wonder who this sorcerer, with the power of taking the will from people and replace it with his own ego, really is… I throw my coat into the grass and redeem my freedom of movement I had as a kid… I run to the river and go on my knees so I can wash my face with the cold water… I shiver as the drops flow to my beating chest… I then sink my head in the river trying to water my thoughts… I was never fond of my reasoning so the water should make them more fluid… Even if there won’t be a tomorrow for me, I have no regrets in accepting to be her humble lackey… The baptize in the cold water made everything worth the boredom…
The sunlight is slowly swallowed by the approaching darkness… I shiver but I don’t know if it the coldness of death or the coldness of air… Either way, the dogs barking in the night have a prophetic air… I get closer to the animal and I recognize Griva… the loyal guardian that filled our days with energy… Finally a familiar face, I smile and I touch its fur lightly with the tips of my fingers… Griva comes near me as quickly as the new memories stab my heart…
– At least you understand everything… I say to myself and head to the pavilion… She was waiting for me there…
– Eric, the guest room is ready if you want to rest…
– Thank you… I whisper while my body shivers at the thought of entering that tomb… A grave that trapped old Liza in shallowness… All I can do is light a candle and pray…
– And… Eric… I want to say that my happiness is in your hands… I cannot thank you enough for the sacrifice you make for my happiness…
– I’m not doing this for you, Liza… Don’t flatter yourself… your happiness has no value for me… I cut the silence with my bitter words and then I walk away into the night…
– Remember to dress with the cloths I’ll send you tomorrow… her cynical whispers resonate in the darkness as hammers hitting iron…
II
I spent all night in the wooden pavilion, gazing at the stars… such a divine coffin for my memories… The idealist in me gets lost in the eyes of the universe trying to find the ultimate reality… God… my parents… an identity… It is a road I walk every night but I have still haven’t found the right path… The star dust is too thick to see through…
– Good morning, Sir Eric! I hear a distant sound coming from the alley… The carriage is ready… I will be your witness… We should go now if you want to get there in time…
I recognized the old coachman behind the military uniform of inferior rank… He must be a reservist, I say to myself while playing with a golden apple… throwing it back and forth into the air… at the same pace as my heart beats… or maybe I try to slow down the heart rate by playing with the apple…
– Good morning, I speak annoyingly loud… so I can break the silence that governs over Gretz domain… My steps take my inert body to the carriage… Different horses today… black as coal… I always thought the details carry hidden prophetic messages…
I jump into the carriage with the enthusiasm of a dying man… I hold the handle so tightly, as if I was trying to save my own life from the abyss…
– Hurry up! We need to make someone happy… I smile bitterly…
I sit by the coachman this time… I’m not very fond of comfort… I want to feel the cold morning air into my lungs… I want to feel exposed and vulnerable… This should awaken my numbed instincts and give me more chances in front of an already written obituary… With every breath of fresh air I take, one letter is erased… Isn’t everything just a random irony that has so many faces… each one different according to the angle you look at it…? I am going to lose my life for an already dead woman… who promised to be so much more than the pile mixed feeling she is now… despair, shallowness, cynisism, love, hate… I shake my head violently trying to erase her sarcastic smile from my mind… but her now sharp edges hit my inner walls creating a deafening sound… the same noise I made as a kid, when I used to play soccer with cans… It’s the echo of emptiness…
– Faster!! Faster!! I yell at the coachman…
I am the verge of losing my mind, but I stopped caring so long ago… My heart pounds so hard that the whole carriage starts to shake in the same rhythm with all the unsaid questions… The carriage wants to find a meaning into the curtain of dust it paints behind… It wants to find a meaning but it still runs away from the crime scene… We all do the same…
I take my eyes to the sky… but there is so little I can see… the light of the sun is sifted through the sieve of the leaves… The nature builds walls too… to hide its core from our vulgar eyes… But I understand… I understand everything… I understand more than I want to… I can now wander freely through the small chambers of her heart… It is still there, but the spider of superficiality wove a dense web… her light is trapped inside her own sins and it cannot get out… He is just a beautiful sculpture that I have always been too afraid to touch… because when I would run my hands over her delicate skin… the smooth pressure would melt her hollow contour into… into… into void…
– If she cannot light herself from inside… I will do it from outside… I whisper as I get off the carriage…
III
We were the first that got there… the place of the duel… I probably look ridiculous dressed in these Parisian cloths… such a clattering contrast with my true self… I always refused to adopt anything foreign… I am too fond of my own origins and I have always felt the pressure of my status… The severe voice of my ancestors drags me through life… tied up, but still standing on my feet…
– Young Eric… you don’t have to do this… I hear the coachman saying with a begging voice… Count Versilov should defend his honor by himself… Noblesse is all about dignity and courage… not about inheritance…
– Interesting… I whisper to my own ears…
This uneducated man has a philosophic and moral reasoning… while Liza, with all the efforts of her grandfather, lacks even the shadows of these abstract values… I have always loved simplicity and despised false pretenses… because simplicity sifts all the thoughts through the right sieve… The sieve of morality that never fails… On contrast, her sieve is drilled with the bullets of egoism… I approach to the wrinkled old man… I can read kindness in his large blue eyes… I lay my hand to his shoulder and suddenly remember him…
– Arkadi… I’m not doing this for Liza… Much less for Count Versilov… I’m doing this for ME…
Our dialog is interrupting by tumult… A carriage is approaching… The luxurious carriage is pulled by four white horses… Every detail betrays the importance of this man… Questions regarding his personality germinate inside my mind, while my eyes are set to the windows… The carriage that carries my executioner stops and three men get down… I investigate each one diligently…
The doctor is a short bearded man… The perfectly shaped beard makes up for the lack of hair on his head… He must be around 40… He has an irritating smile on his face… The message is clear… “I have seen this scene too many times to trigger any emotion in me… Get it done quickly so I won’t be late for my breakfast”… and his disgusting tongue goes over the lips with the treacherous motions of a snake trying to taste the death that floats in the air…
His witness is a young officer that has the same severe look on his eyes as his superior… He is too young to understand the grand scheme of life so his innocent smile denotes enthusiasm… I can see into his mind as into an open book… He doesn’t have any soft features, which makes him look like a brutal watch dog… He secretly dreams to live the intensity of the duel someday… The sweat of his forehead flows down, exactly as my fears… transforming into weightless vapors…
And finally… my eyes wander on the face of Colonel Stepanov… All his features denote a quick temper and raw force… He is in his mid thirties but his athletic body seems a page torn from an anatomy book… I notice that he clenches his white teeth repetitively… Even the best shooters feel the cold handshake of death when facing a gambler… Because gamblers are unpredictable…
– Gentlemen… there is still time to solve this diplomatically… the doctor cleaves the flesh of silence with his determined voice…
It is just a necessary part of the procedure… Even the most coward men succumb before the beauty of death… It requires too much courage to declare forfeit, once you are standing side by side with it…
– Let me introduce myself… Sergent Arkadi Vladimirovici… and the now metamorphosed coachman heads to the Colonel’s witness… Everything is transforming… the old man now redeemed the vigor he once had… while his modest coach will transform into my funeral carriage… I have the power to smile while I think about these insignificant details…
– Captain Alexei Iovanovici… and they shake hands…
The witnesses measure each 30 steps in opposite directions, and then decide who will shoot first…
– Count Versilov, you have won… You will shoot first… Arkadi shouts with hidden satisfaction and open pride in his voice…
The doctor hands me the loaded gun… I take it slowly, waiting and studying the expression on colonel’s face as I aim to his head… then to his heart… I smile foolishly as I continue torturing his tensed nerves… I’m looking for something… for the holes he already has in his body… the holes that were made by his sins and by his depraved life… Lust, wasted nights, shallow entourage, fake feelings, selfishness… and above all regrets… He is the mirrored image of Liza… I take down my arm and shout loudly and arrogantly to him… Suddenly death has a comic face…
– You shoot first!! I’m Count Versilov… The Gambler…
The combatants have the right to give their luck away… as throwing pearls into the sea… where they truly belong… Colonel Stepanov grabs the gun and aims to my heart… He is known as the best shooter of his regiment… so my chances are limited… This is so cynical… he wants to destroy the last thing that is pure in me… my heart… why can’t he just shoot me in the head? Better chances to meet the target… but I can read contempt and power in his smile… I close my eyes and the image of my mother appears to me, as a sweat dream… Salty tears fall down my cheeks while I hear him pushing the trigger…
– Eri… Count Versilov!!! I hear the fading voice of Arkadi…
I open my eyes and notice my left shoulder is shaking… the bullet went though the flesh with the ease a sharp ax cuts wood… The beautiful white shirt is now covered with my blood…
– At least I know there are miracles… I think out loud… The wind has diverted the bullet to my shoulder… My eyes shape a cross on the sky… Now I can leave her shadow behind and start a new life… A life based on my beliefs… I will listen to my heart and climb the walls of her shallowness… cutting all ropes that pulled me to the bottom of her hollow self…
The doctor approaches quickly, amazed by my sheer luck… and bewildered that I am still standing on my feet says respectfully…
– Count Versilov… Let me bandage your wound…
– Don’t come near me… I yell at the stout man…
– But you are bleeding… You will lose your consciousness…
– Irrelevant… I point the gun to his chest and he finally stops… It’s my turn now…
I study the face of Colonel Stepanov one last time and I violently press the trigger… The bullet goes directly into the sky… I get closer to Colonel Stepanov…
– I hope this satisfied your thirst of revenge… and I walk away from him…
IV
Getting back to the castle I see Liza waiting for me in the wooden pavilion… He runs to the carriage shocked to see that I am still alive…
– Eric… you are alive… and her face lightens… but wounded… She comes closer trying to see the severity of the injury…
– There is no need to touch me… Your “happiness” is safe now… and I throw the gun covered in my blood to her feet… The gun is humbled, as was The Count each time he sat in knees in front of her… What a grotesque picture… But I’m not him…
I know that the reader probably strives to find a meaning in this story… I will explain everything… I have already said I have all answers… Except for why everybody calls me “Eric”… But do you have patience to listen?
Liza was a high maintenance woman… she liked to experience novelty… to spend her nights with her friends in fancy parties organized at the old castle… to travel in the most luxuriant resorts… she loved jewelry… You know… the kind of person that has nothing to offer… When all your existence focuses only on this shallow side of life you start spending more than you have… Soon the Countess gathered debts, more than her husband could win at the roulette… So he decided to use unorthodox means when gambling… Everybody was too afraid to reveal the cheating gambler, because he had a well know authority in this region… Everything went smoothly until Colonel Stepanov, recently arrived in the regiment, damasked the crook… Count Versilov refused to pay the loss and to apologize… so there was no solution left, other than a duel…
Liza felt the burden of guilt and loved her depraved husband too much to sit with her arms folded… The ties between them went too deep in the shallowness they indulged into, to take any risks… So she made up the following plan… Colonel Stepanov didn’t know Count Versilov too well and there was a certain physique resemblance between me and him… Therefore, she asked me to accept this request, in the name of the friendship we once shared, to duel the Colonel pretending I was the Count… Friendship… Such a beautiful word… The kind of relationship where she demanded everything, but didn’t give anything in return… except for fake smiles… and useless stories about the lost “happiness”…
Her selfishness and lack of substance stroke me so hard… that I had to say yes… you can’t refuse a woman that thinks everything gravitates around her… and she does others a favor just sharing the same air with them… This is how I have become a lackey… the most humble that ever existed… The delight of degradation… The delight of watching a dead corps walking through life in search for a meaning…
V
22 April 1877
If you still have any dignity left, you will erase me entirely from your memories… I don’t want to wander through your thoughts… It would be a terrifying experience… A lonely march in the land of nothingness…
I won’t go in further details, but I can assure you the reputation of your husband was rehabilitated and you will both benefit from the same respect you have always had…
P.S. You have no power over me… The only reason I chose to humiliate myself was to see old Liza decomposed by her now emptiness…
Ovidiu
I fold the letter and put it in the inner pocket of my coat… I head to the servants house to ask a maid to deliver the envelope for me, once I have left… I go out and take one last tour of the castle… I still feel pain in my left shoulder… But it is a sweet pain smothered by the joy of seeing young me playing behind the tall pines… I have been lost and I have been found… The mellow music of my innocence stops when I hear light footsteps behind me…
– Eric, I want you to meet someone… she says while her green eyes are sparkling with happiness… Happiness… She can now continue the depraved life she has sunk into… I look at her trying for one last time to find old Liza… But there is nothing… Just a woman that wastes her life frivolously… taking care of her body but never of her soul… Life, death, afterlife, spirituality, karma, break-ups, obstacles… she never asked herself questions about what they really are and why they happen… She is building her own illusory castle so she can cage the ghost of her pasts and live together as she has always dreamed… superficially and defying the real values… The cold contempt I had for her shallowness melts into warm compassion… I understand now… Her soul suffers… The superficiality has rusted her soul irremediably… and this lifestyle is the morphine she needs to numb the pain and to create a walking human hologram… instead of the nothing she has become…
One last favor instead of one last goodbye… I always loved good metaphors so my steps carry me to the castle… I enter the living room and see a tall man admiring the new paintings on the wall… I can’t see his face yet, but I can notice the athletic and soft features he carries with pride… He is dressed after the latest fashion trends from Paris… he wears a light blue coat that make it as if a slice of the sky has joined us in the old room… His energy is heavy but somehow bright… It is something in his delicate movements that seems too familiar… He turns around and my face gets pale…
– Eric… this is my husband… Count Ovidiu Versilov…
– The End –