The Vatican Games by Alejandra Guibert

Author:Alejandra Guibert [Alejandra Guibert]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9781913136314
Publisher: Clink Street Publishing
Published: 2019-07-14T16:00:00+00:00

Vera set off early on her bicycle with the urn in her backpack. It was Saturday. Not surprisingly, the streets were empty. She really wished she could see people on their way somewhere. She would have preferred it to have been a dull day, but the sun shone making stark the desolation of a land unnoticed, deprived of desire. She felt the warning of the cameras as she passed them. The only sound seemed to come from the oiled bicycle chain as it turned and the CCTV cameras which followed her one after the other as in a relay race. As if Vera were the only living thing defying the day. The only moving body. On a morning of special games on the national network around her there was nothing but diaphanous souls, thought Vera. She was not worried about the cameras. Neither did she approve of them recording her grief. She had jumped the perimeter fence. What an irony that Galo should jump with her, on her back. At least he would not have to answer if she were asked to explain herself. Once on the other side she lifted her arms in front of the cameras. What would they do to her: execute her for having chosen a place that was meaningful? For wanting to muddy her feet? Of course not. Those were words from the past. They existed solely in relation to the avatars who preferred historical games. The only executions were commercial or political ones. The only bullets, economic or public bans.

There she was, with an urn full of ashes, facing the unacceptable. Galo’s living flesh had been transformed. His look and his skin, the external proof of his presence were simply impossible to hold on to except through memory. Vera’s humanity felt more frail than ever, with her knees firmly planted on the ground she so loved.

She said goodbye to Galo in the same place where they had sensed each other for the first time. Lark’s Wood, they had called it. Where Vera had predicted he would be and had gone to find him. There was not much left of the wood where Galo had become lost. The perimeter had advanced more and more until it almost reached the space surrounding the lake. As if the wood were an island, surrounded by turbines scaring off the birds. Galo and Vera had returned again and again, even though it saddened them. Even if it were reduced to a single tree where they could sit and be themselves. It was the only place they felt belonged to them. If Vera left his ashes there at the foot of the tree on which they had carved their names, a lark would fly to it. To find him, so that Galo would no longer fear the woods. She sat down where they used to sit with the urn on the ground between her feet. She unscrewed the top and leant against the trunk, resting her head on her knees. Her mind was emptied of all thought.

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