Basic HTML Version
JUNE 2012 -
SEXY X2
MAGAZINE -
41
e forced his cap
down almost to his ears, not want-
ing his memories to escape.
So many things he had to carry in
his mental baggage that he was
afraid they could overflow it and
fall, one by one, with the clatter of
the road and the winds of years.
His baggage was not of shirts and
trousers, at least not the important
one. His baggage was made up
of the faces of those he was about
to leave behind, the soft smell of
his mother’s hair that was holding
him tightly as if preventing him to
go away, the flavors of homemade
food, the music that accompanied
each national holiday --which, hav-
ing been born in the countryside,
had settled in the cities for the
people to remember their origins.
In this special and virtual suitcase,
he had saved the kiss of that bride
that could not be, but that some-
times he could still see, and the
color of the sky that he was sure
would be different where he was
going.
The more things he remembered,
the fuller his suitcase became-- so
heavy that he feared it would be
impossible for him to leave his
town because no human power
would be able to carry it.
He wanted to plunge into that
cap that he felt held all the memo-
ries; and, completely hidden in it,
he wanted to shut himself in with
his memories while his life slipped
out of his chest.
The whistle of the train that was
about to depart mingled with
the piercing cry of the heart that
denied its destiny.
From the train window, he saw
the platform disappear where his
whole life stayed behind, made
one with the soil that saw him be
born but that, probably, would not
see him die.
No turning back. He was in
search of another sky.
THE END
It was always the same; she sat on
a bench in the park, in the middle
of a beautiful afternoon, crying like
a fool after completing another
tear-jerking book.
If it had been for her, she would
have thrown herself to the ground
right there to cry and kick like
crazy. She was a kind of literary
masochist. The most tragic books
with the most painful ending stuck
to her hands like magnets.
She truly believed that bookstores
lacked a section: “Books to cry
and suffer”
Such a section would include
books of the style of “Tales to
Read Without Mascara” by Poldy
Bird, “Rhymes” by Gustavo Adolfo
Becquer, “Platero and I” by Juan
Ramón Jimenez; without forget-
ting “PS: I Love You” and “Where
Rainbows End” by Cecelia Ah-
ern, “Noha’s Book” by Nicholas
Sparks, “My Plant of Orange-Lime”
by Mauro de Vasconcelos, among
a thousand of literary attacks
against smiling.
No one could deny that these
books were good, some of them
were true literature classics, and
had the complacency of many
men and women devoted to
reading. However, these readers
tried to temper the effects of those
books with others less tragic.
That was not Ethel’s case, she was
a consummated literary sufferer.
She had a job that she liked and
where she also earned a very
good salary. She rented an apart-
ment that she shared with a friend
in a discreet but elegant area of
the city. Although she lived away
from her parents and brother, she
kept a close bond of love with
them, and a fluid contact via tel-
ephone and Internet. Three months
ago, she had begun a relationship
H