Everyday
was the same thing, she wakes up, drinks a glass of water, dresses herself in a
white dress that matches perfectly her strawberry-blonde hair and blue eyes
and, barefooted, goes for a walk.
She walks
two and a half miles until she reaches the river. She kneels on the margin,
picks some wild flowers from the grass and one by one lay them down in the
current. The last one, she puts behind her ear, in the middle of her hair.
She stares
at the water until the last flower is gone and then walks back home and starts
her day as just any other person.
If I weren’t
her only and first neighbor in the last two months I wouldn’t have even guessed
that such a girl could have that weird kind of habit, she looked so normal.
I once
wondered if she belonged to some kind of faction, but what would that be if she
were always lonely in her rituals?
Then I
thought that she might have lost someone on that river. Her mother, maybe, a
brother, even a lover. It must have been that, she was such a lonely girl.
I never got
an actual talk with her. Ever since I moved in, not a single “Hello, neighbor,
how are you?”.
I only got
to know about her existence because of the light she turns on every night in
her room and her strange morning routine.
This girl
is starting to puzzle me. Who is she? Does she have friends? And most important
of all: Why she has that morning ritual?
This last
question is picking me on my nerves. I decided to ask her.
I got home
from work and I walk to her door, to wait for her.
I wait for
almost two hours until I give up and go back to the safety of my living room.
But I keep
my curtains opened, looking straight to her house, waiting for the time she
would arrive.
Maybe she
was stuck in her work?
My own work
was quite stressful that morning. I am so tired...
I close my
eyes, enjoying the darkness.
I feel like
I only have slept for a few seconds, but when I wake up I see that the clock’s
hands have moved a good amount of inches and my neighbor’s house has already a
small hint of light in it’s second floor.
“It’s probably
her room.” I thought.
I pictured
how it must look like, what secrets it may hide. Maybe if I find a way to get
in...
No! That
would be property invasion. And it is a crime as long as I remember. “No, Ian,
you are just too tired. Go to sleep and tomorrow you will see that all this
obsession of yours is just pure non-sense.” I reasoned with myself.
Without
much thinking I get to my bedroom and sink into my bed, falling into a dreamless
but strangely white sleep.
My alarm clock
wakes me up at 6:30 a.m with the locator on the radio calling the latest news.
“The body of a young man was found completely
deteriorated in the margins of a river near...”
“Bad news already?”
I think, automatically going to the window and opening the curtains.
The house
is still there, just on the other side of the street, and from the kitchen
window I could see my neighbor drinking her regular glass of water, already
dressed in white.
I accompany
her journey from outside the house until the river. I see her collecting the
flowers, white ones, umbrella shaped. She lays them on the river and saves the
last one for her hair, then, comes back home.
That’s it!
Now I’ll talk to her.
I go
downstairs, jumping a few steps, running to get to her in time.
She is
passing in the front of my house just when I open the door.
“Hey! You!”
I shout, without much thinking.
She turns
her head to me, a little bothered, probably because I am an interruption to her
morning ritual.
“Sorry, can
I ask you something?”
The girl
nodded.
“What...
Why do you go everyday to that river?”
She
frowned.
“Why do you
look at me everyday while I do it?”
It was my
time to frown. Couldn’t she see how curious she was making me?
“Well,
because...”
“If you
don’t mind, sir, I would like to go back home and change for work. Have a good
day.”
And she
left. Not even a warning or a “stop stalking me” advice. No answer to my
question, as well.
I bite my
nails. Now I ‘ll have to find another way to figure it out.
Do I have
to figure that out? After all, is her life we are talking about, not mine.
I think
about that idea while I observe her mounting her bicycle and getting off to
work.
Her house
was enticingly empty. Does she leaves the door unlocked?
“No, Ian,
go to work!”
I obeyed
the still-reasonable part of myself and entered home, looking for my suit and
car keys.
The whole
day in the office I thought about her. Where did she work? Does she have
family? Did her family died in that river and now she takes flowers for them
every morning?
No... I
don’t think so. She would’ve looked at least a bit sad when I asked her this
morning if that was the case.
Did she let
the door unlocked? It would make my life so easy.
I checked
the clock. The time seemed to walk as slow as a slug, I couldn’t see the time
to go home. Maybe I could tell the boss I am feeling sick.
“And then
what?” asked my subconscious.
And then I
can see if she have let the door opened, and if she did, I can slip in to her
room and see if I can find any more information about her.
My reason
tries one last attempt to talk me out of it, but I shut it down.
I stand up
from my chair and walk to the boss’ room.
“Excuse-me.”
“Yes, Ian.”
“I am
feeling a bit of a headache, do you mind if I go home?”
“As sure as
you can work from there I can see no problem.”
“Sure.” I
said, already leaving the boss’ office. I will have plenty of time to work
after I sneak into her house.
I drive
back desperately, without even bothering with speed limit or other small
traffic rules.
I arrive a
to our small street with relief. I park my car in my side of the sidewalk and
go straight to her house. The front door is close. Of course! How can I have
been so stupid? After our talk this morning she would be an idiot if she didn’t
locked the door.
But there’s
always the backdoor. I go to the backyard, jumping the useless white stakes
that were supposed to stop me. I find that only an insect net closes the door.
That’s easy
to handle. I take my car keys from my pocket and use them as a knife to cut through
the net. A few strokes are enough.
I am in.
Inside a small clean and white laundry. I go through the door and I am in a
wide and also white kitchen. On the counter is an empty glass, the one she uses
to drink water to her ritual. Next to it is a green bottle, filled with water.
I keep
walking and I get to her living room, a simple one, just a small table full of
papers and bills and an armchair.
No
portraits, no paintings, nothing that could give me a slightest clue of who my neighbor
is.
I climb up
the stairs and I get to a small hall with two doors. I open the first one and I
find one bathroom with a white towel hanging in the wall and a blue soap inside
the box, near the shower. On the sink, lay a blue toothbrush and a just-bought
toothpaste. That was all.
I got even
more stressed as I close the door. It seems that she was doing this just to
provoke me, to hide herself from me, to stop me from getting more information
about her. That was not fair!
I opened
the last door, feeling my hopes open with it. The last door was her room.
A perfectly
tied bedroom, all in shades of cream and rose. She has a single bed, covered
with soft pink sheets. Next to it was a bedside table with a lamp. On the wall
in the opposite side of the white curtains that closed the window was a closet,
not a large one. I opened it and I found three dresses of different colors and
the white dress. No shoes were there to be seen, she probably had only one pair
of them.
I mumbled
incoherently, looking around to see if I find something else. A small desk hits
my eyes. It is organized like it was an altar, with a blue vase with a single
white rose.
Underneath
it was a pink music box. I open it and a sweet classical song I don’t recognize
enter my ears. Inside, the music box smells like wildflowers and the origin of
this scent are the dried flowers that are saved in there.
“It must be
the flowers she puts in her head.”
I close the
box and put it in its original place, and when I do so, my fingers brush a few
polaroid pictures.
I count
them, twelve. All of them were shoot in the margins of the river the girl goes
every morning, all of them showing young men.
I turn the
pictures in my hands. Behind them are the dates they were taken, written in her
handwrite, the most recent was taken only two months before my arrival.
I put the
pictures back below the music box and make my way to the backdoor.
That was
something. A small clue, at least. But who were those men? Relatives? But they
didn’t look like my neighbor, with a single exception of one, the man that
appears in the oldest picture.
I go back
to my house. To the living room, the curtains from the window are open and I
wait for her to arrive.
The clock
strikes six when I finally see her bicycle entering the street.
“I wonder what
she will think about the hole I opened in her backdoor.”
I stare at
her house, waiting for her reaction, but she enters by the front door and I
have to sit down and wait half an hour until the regular light appears in her
bedroom.
“Maybe she
hasn’t been in the laundry yet.”
The light
stays on for fifteen minutes and then suddenly is turned off. A break in the
routine, that’s weird.
The kitchen
light is turned on and I can see her drinking her glass of water dressed in
white.
She is
repeating her morning ritual, but at night. I stand up as she opens her front
door and walks out. She seems to be carrying something in her hand but it’s too
dark for me to be sure.
And is also
too dark for me to see from home what she is going to do at the river. I have
to follow her.
Without
even remembering to grab a flashlight I walk out the door and, from a safe
distance, follow her to the river.
The moon is
crescent but its light is still strong enough to guide my steps. When I arrive
I find her kneeled in the margin, with fourteen white umbrella shaped flowers
in her right hand and a Polaroid camera in the other.
“You’ve
followed me.” She said, starring at the waters.
“Yes, I did.”
“Why?”
“I was
curious, I wanted to know what you are doing here tonight.”
“Well, I
guess tonight you have the right to know. Come near.”
I go,
completely hypnotized by that mysterious girl. I kneel beside her, eager to get
my answers.
“How many
flowers do I have in my hands?”
“Fourteen.”
“You are a
good mathematician. And how many pictures did you see in my room today?”
She knows I
invaded her house. Shouldn’t she be bothered with that?
“Twelve.”
“Good. You
know, the man in the oldest photo is my brother. He used to live in your house
sharing it with a roommate. They were very good friends, until he killed my
brother.”
I inhale
deeply.
“Oh, no,
don’t worry about that. I always have avenged him properly. Eleven times until
this night, actually. And all of them lived in my brother’s house once.”
She smiles.
She takes one white flower by one and put twelve of them in the water. She
hands me the thirteenth while gets her Polaroid.
“Smile.”
She invites.
I look at
the camera with a confused face, one hand holding the white flower. The Polaroid
flashes and an instant picture of me exits from the proper hole.
She takes
my hand that holds the flower and gently lifts it to my mouth.
“This
flower is so tasty.” She lifts her own flower to her nose. “And smells so good.
Why don’t you try it?”
Slowly, I
began to realize what she is meaning to, and panic hits me. The news at the
radio this morning, the date behind the last man’s photograph… At almost the
same time, she pushes my right hand strongly against my mouth and a few white
petals slide inside it. Immediately my hole body tremble, making my mouth open
wider and more petals go inside. My throat closes and, as I struggle for air, I
swallow all the rest of the flower.
“Don’t
worry.” She said, softly. “I will always remember you, I will bring you new
flowers every morning. I can weep for you if you desire.”
“Wh...
wh...y... Why...?” I manage to mumble before my whole body starts to convulsion.
“Because
this what I have to do, for him, my brother.”
She kisses
my forehead and gently rolls me to the river.
“Farewell.”
Her voice is the last thing I listen before my
eyes are shut forever.
