[ Doppler ]

To my soul mate who is passing through such a hard time.
Never forget you’re part of my destiny, and many others’.
Lov

D e s t i n y

A miracle. That’s what it was.
***
She woke up. Just like she used to do. The alarm clock rang and she felt like she could stay five more minutes in bed. But she couldn’t.
‘Life is all about it: waking up’, she thought. And that’s what she did. Just like many other people would do that same morning. Just like she decided to do.
***
‘The bridge’, he thought while looking at the same bridge he did for exactly twenty-five years. That would finally be the day. He had finally found the courage to do it.
He was a guard that worked at the night shift. No one knew he existed.
Not the kind for friends. Not the kind for drinks, for walks.
Nothing… that’s what he meant to the world.
***
Five a.m. and she was already stuck in a traffic jam. ‘Why does everybody have to leave at the same time for work?’ she wondered.
***
The sunrise kept trying to show itself through the closed windows of the living room. She kept looking at the closed curtains while having breakfast, thinking whether she should open them or not.
A plate for one. Only one loaf of bread. A single loaf of bread kept showing her how lonely she was. She felt like it was mocking at her. No desire of finishing the meal.
That night, by the time she got home, this left bread would be resting at the same place.
Alone. No one to take that fuckin' loaf of bread away. The same place… it would be there at the same place… but she left it there, over the table, asking God it could be anywhere else when she got home later. Anywhere else…
It was time to leave. That was what the kitchen clock said. And she obeyed as usual.
***
‘By myself’, the guard thought. ‘By myself’.
‘At least I’m going to be noticed. Great choice: a Monday morning, one of the most famous avenues in the city. The traffic was already there, he would only help it to get worse. He would appear on the news. The journalists would say:
‘Ordinary man suicides for no apparently reason, making the traffic worse this morning. No relatives were found. People who worked with him said he was a ‘quiet sort of fellow’ – once one of his coworkers had called him like that in a cards game. That’s how people would know him… not by the name… but by another nobody’s definition.
‘Quiet sort of fellow’, he kept repeating to himself. ‘Who had no apparently reason to commit suicide’. He did nor good or bad to people. He didn’t come here to make much of a difference. That’s what a reflection about his life had revealed him. That’s what his fifty-year-old birthday had proved him.
He wanted to mean something. Anything.
But… could he?
***
She turned the radio on. Nothing interesting was playing, nothing to make those cars go any faster.
She should control herself. She knew she wasn’t supposed to be nervous. The baby could feel it. By now he could feel anything… it was a boy.
She shouldn’t be driving as well but she had no way else to go to work instead of by herself. No parents, the father of the baby was gone. Nothing remained. But she stood there. Firmly. The baby knew it. He felt her pain and knew she loved him more than herself.
He was her only hope and, though she didn’t know it, that was too much of a responsibility for a baby who hadn’t even been born yet.
***
After taking her purse she left wondering if she would take the bus or go on foot.
‘I’m not wearing high-heels today, maybe that’s a sign’.
She should go on foot. But that would take her longer. She felt like getting late to work for the first time. Just by the simple pleasure of going walking, feeling the cold air of the morning, and the sun shining above her head.
‘Yeah, let’s give the day a chance’.
***
He opened the door of the building for her and said what he thought would be his last "good morning".
She had answered it just automatically, just as he thought she would do.
‘People, so predictable’, he thought.
She was just too much worried about the choice she had made. Who could blame her?
She was thinking what excuse giving at work: too much traffic, waking up late… but everything sounded so unnatural to her. ‘How could people give this kind of excuse and not feel ashamed for themselves?’
But what both of them didn’t know was how life could be unpredictable.
***
‘Help’, a, what seemed crazy, pregnant woman said entering the building holding her belly. ‘I need someone to take me to the hospital’.
The man thought ‘Great! That’s exactly what I needed right now…’ and he said harshly ‘I can’t drive’ thinking why do babies have to be born when they want, actually, why do we need to be born so much?
‘I can’, said the other lady, ‘but I’ll need your help mister…’
‘Smith’, he said. ‘And what can a fifty-old man do to help a pregnant woman if I, myself, had never seen a baby borning.’
‘Shut up you both, can’t you see how in pain I am?’
‘This woman is crazy to talk to me like that?’ The lady thought. Couldn’t she see how impossible it would be to get in any hospital with that Monday traffic?
‘And then, Mr. Smith, can I count on you?’
He pondered for a second and said ‘ok’, showing nothing but a forced nervous smile.
***
She had a convincing excuse for work.
He would have to wait another courageous impulse to try suicide.
She had finally felt the most amazing feeling ever when seeing her baby in her arms.
And he… well… he was just a little boy…
No one would think he was a person already… responsible for other’s destiny… just like we all are.

by Tatiana Machado

(O texto foi mantido no original por opção da autora.Interessados em uma tradução podem solicitar via email)