Wednesday
. If only I knew.
For the next two hours, whenever I closed my eyes, I immediately saw those bodies, unconsciously carried by the water, bumping against the bars of the cells.
At first, I blamed the jailers, but when I came across one and almost tripped over him, I completely forgave them.
The most important thing is that it's been Wednesday for two hours and I'm still alive and in pretty good health. The weather is going crazy, no one knows why. One moment it's snowing and I have to shovel the crap out of the car, and the next it all turns into omnipresent water, with so many bodies floating in it that they bump into my knees.
I just wonder what God is thinking. He looks at the three of us and laughs in our faces? Maybe he does, or maybe he doesn't.
We crash straight through the middle of the street, where the water hasn't reached yet. Not a soul here. Around us, deserted apartment buildings and clothes strewn across the sidewalks. The glass in the display windows is missing, shattered on the cobblestones. I glance back and see a pile of cars piled up behind us. The incoming water is carrying this ominous pile of scrap metal on the front of the wave. I turn around again. Fortunately, it stops a few blocks behind us.
"Princess, look!" Chudy shouted, "we're saved."
He grimaced, probably trying to gain my trust, but he doesn't even know how much I loathe him.
I really want to punch him, but I'll wait a moment; I won't be provoked so quickly. Since Monday, I've been internally calmed, as if shoveling snow from my car were absolution enough.
I looked at him and the old man who was trudging along beside me.
"We have to get to the shelter," I said, "it's almost a thousand meters above sea level. We'll be safe there for a while."
They both nodded without replying.
We set off, trying not to push the pace. The old man stopped every few moments, but with each passing hour he seemed to gain strength, and the stops occurred every two hours.
As I walked, I kept wondering what was happening. I still couldn't grasp the scale of the entire cataclysm. No news reached us, and the last person we encountered on our journey was a little boy crying over his father's body. He was so distraught that he didn't want to come with us, even though I tried hard to persuade him. He didn't. I don't blame him, but I can only blame myself for not taking him with us. The skinny guy said it would be unnecessary ballast. We listened to him, and we were absolved of our sins by the fact that the little boy didn't even scream after us. After twelve hours and probably a hundred kilometers, I couldn't even remember what he looked like.
I only remember one person: her.
I'm a scoundrel – I know that. She's experienced so much misery because of me, and I'm still walking around this world that's slowly falling into ruin. It wasn't meant to be, because she had the right to live longer than me, not me.
"What are you thinking about, my friend?" the old man interrupted my thoughts.
I stopped and looked at him. "Well, what can I tell you?" I thought. I have no intention of confessing to you.
"About someone... About someone I left behind," I replied, "and about what a scoundrel I am.
" "You don't happen to want to tell me about it?" The old man frowned and grabbed my arm.
I felt like I was at confession, but I didn't have the feeling I had when I was eleven. That was when an abbot shouted at me in the confessional so furiously that I ran out, cursing the whole world of white collars as best I could. Now I'm calm, though I can guess who he is.
"Are you a priest?" "Isn't that right?"
He looked at me, unable to hide his astonishment.
"How did you? I mean..." he choked, "I didn't tell anyone."
"A hunch," I replied. "Skinny! We need to rest!"
A man walking about fifty meters ahead of us stopped and waved his hand in response, indicating his understanding. He sat down by the road and leaned his arms back, staring at the sky.
"I had a hunch," I said, "I sat down next to the Old Man.
"Nobody's noticed this for twenty years, and you," he began, "you did it straight away. How?
" "I have a strange gift. The gift of getting to know other people. Thanks to that, I've come so far in life, although I admit it's also my curse. That guy over there," I pointed at Skinny, "isn't a serious criminal. He stole all the money from the company when he read Friday's article.
" "How do you know that?" The Old Man couldn't hide his astonishment.
"Honestly?" I looked him straight in the eye. "I look into other people's eyes. I've been reading theirs my whole life." I see everything, even though I don't really want to see it. It's as if the god up there—I pointed with my finger—was holding my eyelids shut when I wanted to close them. Do you understand? Right in my eyes.
He quickly closed them and turned his head away. I heard him, in a hushed voice, begin to speak from memory:
"In those days, people will seek death, but they won't find it," he whispered. "They will long to die, but death flees them.
" "I rather flee from death," I said
. The old man turned his head and opened his eyes. They hadn't changed a bit since I'd seen them and read about the cleric's life.
"It only seems that way to you," he said, "because it seems to me that we should flee from you. I once knew a man who received such a gift from..." He pointed to the sky.
He stood up and was about to leave when I grabbed his hand.
"What are you talking about?" I asked.
"Everything is slowly coming to pass," he looked at me. "On Monday, frost and hail killed half the population of both Americas and northern Asia.
I knew nothing. I swore to myself that I would never pick up a newspaper again, that I wouldn't watch any news unless it was the following Monday.
" "Yesterday, a massive flood inundated all the Pacific islands, including Japan," he continued, not taking his eyes off me.
I looked into his eyes and knew what he was saying was true. I can't explain it, but I simply knew. Just like when she said she loved me.
I had to ask him something
. "Isn't this just... you know?
" "The apocalypse?" He closed his eyes and turned his head. "I think so."
He didn't want to tell me the truth, even though I've been expecting the worst for four days now, and I'm sure death is getting closer to my knees with each passing moment.
"Then let's run from her, not me," I smiled at him and picked up the thick stick lying nearby.
I stood up and held it out to him. The old man patted my shoulder and took the gift, smiling back.
"Do you trust me?" I asked
. "And what do I have left?"
The skinny man was snoring when we approached him. I waved my hand in front of him, but he didn't move. He lay there with his jacket under his head, snoring.
"He stole the money, you say?" The old man nudged me.
"At least that's what he looks like." I smiled and kicked the skinny man in the thigh. I couldn't tell the old man the whole truth.
"What the hell?" He quickly jumped to his feet and looked at us as if seeing us for the first time.
"Did you have a good dream?" I asked.
The man frowned a bit and picked up the jacket he'd been using as a pillow. I looked into his eyes for a moment. They say eyes are the mirror of the soul. A beautiful island. A girl.
"Have you thought about what you're going to spend all that money on?" I asked, knowing what he was dreaming about.
"I wanted to send them there." He stepped closer and looked down. He didn't want to hurt me. Tears welled in his eyes.
The old man stood to the side, observing the whole situation (as he later told me), unlike anything he'd ever encountered in his entire life. A tall man in designer clothes stood and cried, leaning on the shoulder of another man he didn't really know. Through his tears, he said that he loved his wife and daughter and always wanted the best for them, and that with that money he'd bought a flight to one of the Pacific islands—the only one he'd heard from a friend—that would survive this cataclysm. "
The last two tickets!" he said through his tears. He looked from me to the old man. Blood was pouring from his eyes.
The old man looked at me, and I at him. We knew they were both dead. The door opens, and I see a woman sitting on the bed, hugging a little girl. She's screaming, though it's inaudible—this film is silent. I look deeper and see him raise his hand and brandish the knife at them. They're both trembling, clinging to each other, but they stop screaming because neither of them is moving their lips. The hand with the knife stops for a moment, and he begins to look around the room. There are tons of photos around him. Majorca, Egypt, Tunisia. Vacation photos together. When his gaze returns to the bed, his wife is alone, and he begins to look around the room again, faster this time. The girl is gone. He seems to give up, because he slowly moves toward the bed, where his wife sits, her head pressed against her knees. He raises his hand, and the blade of the knife reflects the shape of the girl fleeing from the bedroom. He doesn't stop, moving toward the woman, who starts screaming again, but not at him. He's screaming for his daughter. From the movement of her lips, I can tell she's shouting a single word. Only one word can escape her trembling lips—run. Her eyes close as drops of blood hit her face. Her hand plunges the knife into the woman's neck. Once, twice. Deeper, harder, and as the blade slides down her neck, she stops. At the same moment, the woman slumps limply onto the red sheet.
Her eyes now focus on the hand from which the knife slowly slides.
She comes closer and sits on the bed. She strokes the woman's hair and moves closer, lying down next to her. She hugs her. She closes her eyes.
"Why?" I asked.
The thin man pushed me away and wiped his tears. He sniffed and adjusted his shirt inside his pants. Our eyes met again.
Two bodies. Lots of blood and hands. Both of them lie on the bed. He looks again at the hands, from which blood is slowly dripping. He releases the gun on his right and moves closer. The daughter lies next to her mother on a large red sheet. They lie together in a room filled with photos. Majorca, Egypt, Tunisia. Vacation photos together. He opens the wardrobe and takes out a clean white sheet, soaking it in blood. He cleans his hands. A moment later, he covers the bodies. The ones that accompanied him in joys and sorrows every day.
In his eyes, his hands covered in blood. His hands.
"I didn't do anything wrong," he said.
He began scratching his back strangely and arching to one side. He was trembling all over, even though it was definitely over twenty degrees. With one hand, he scratched his back, and with the other, I noticed, he was reaching for something he couldn't quite grasp.
"He has a gun!" the Old Man shouted at me
. "Easy!" I extended my hand to him, not wanting him to approach us now.
"Skinny!" I said, "Don't be silly.
" "No Skinny," he shouted at me, aiming a gun, probably taken from a prison guard. "I'm not 'Skinny,' I'm Łukasz!" And you," he pointed at me, "I really don't like you! How did you know I was the one...?"
The old man stood still, I noticed from the corner of my eye.
"I don't blame you for this," I looked at Łukasz. "It's not up to me to judge!"
Łukasz was trembling. His hand and trigger finger were trembling as well. Oh, how I wanted him to pull it. I closed my eyes and saw her again. For a moment, I didn't open my eyes, waiting for the metallic sound of the trigger. But nothing happened.
"I really didn't want to," Łukasz sobbed.
I opened my eyes. The old man stood frozen, leaning on the stick I'd recently given him. I looked at Łukasz. He put the barrel to his temple.
"You can wait!" I shouted, but I didn't move.
"Suicide is a sin!" the Old Man suddenly said. "Suicide is cowardice!"
Łukasz lowered his pistol. For a moment, a ray of sunlight, emerging from behind the nearby mountains, reflected off it. I closed my eyes and saw her again.
The green meadow she was running across was soaked in dew. The sun that illuminated her also warmed her, releasing the mist that enveloped the trees around her.
I didn't move, and she ran toward me. Her hair was blowing in the wind, and the white dress she wore bounced along with her.
I reached out to touch her.
A sudden boom rent the air. I opened my eyes. Łukasz was falling unconscious to the ground, a hole in his head. I looked at the Old Man, who was also falling. I immediately ran to him. When I knelt before him, he opened his eyes.
"He shot himself," he said, "and I wanted to stop him."
The old man's eyes tried to summon tears, but I saw they had dried from the past.
"He wanted to do it," I picked him up and brushed the grass off him. He was afraid, but he wanted to do it. Loneliness kills faster than we expect.
I looked around. The lush green grass didn't fit this whole messed-up situation at all. A pool of blood was spreading around Łukasz, leaking from the still-smoking hole in his head. There was no one else. In this vast, last open space, ending in the nearby trees, the two of us stood there, wondering what to do.
The old man carefully brushed the grass off himself and approached Łukasz, who was still lying next to us. He made the sign of the cross over him and, from what I saw, probably anointed him.
"He needs to be buried," he said as I pocketed the gun.
"Here?" I looked around.
The priest stood and wiped the sweat from his forehead. The sun was mercilessly hot, though the day before yesterday it had been snowing heavily.
"What difference does it make..." the old man extended his hand.
"Jan."
I extended mine and returned the hug.
"Gabriel, nice to meet you.
" "The pleasure is all mine."
We spent nearly an hour digging Łukasz's grave and searching for suitable branches to place a cross on. A flock of crows perched in a nearby tree, watching the whole thing. Several times, his body shivered with post-mortem shivers, frightening us to no end. During this time, to distract ourselves from his bouncing body, Jan told me almost everything about himself, withholding some juicy details from his life, which he probably wanted to erase from his memory as quickly as possible.
"You left, why?" I asked, not sure. This man still harbors many secrets.
"Because I saw," he replied, placing the last stones at our companion's final resting place, "I saw pain and despair."
He threw the last stone aside and approached me. I finished tying the branches into the shape of a cross and looked into his eyes.
A truly Dantesque image emerged. Four angels, bound by rope, writhed in pain, trying to break free. In the distance, I saw another man trying to blow a trumpet, then he put it down and, drawing his sword from behind his back, approached the bound men.
"I know," I said. "I know why.
" "If he frees them," the old man whispered in my ear. "Woe to us."
We marched for another five hours, leaving Łukasz behind with a hole in his head. The trees and mountains drew closer and closer, forcing us to climb higher and higher.
"This city is the highest in our country," Jan said, boasting of his knowledge of the local topography. "We'll be safe there for a while, but I don't think we'll get there today." I glanced at my watch. It was almost six o'clock, though the sun was due south.
I stopped for a moment and closed my eyes.
And I saw her again. She was looking at me. By the time Jan and I had been walking, she had managed to run up to me and was now standing so close I could almost touch her.
Jan stopped for a moment, probably giving me a strange look, but he didn't say a word.
Her hair flowed over her shoulders, and her white dress gently billowed in the breeze. Her slender figure hid the sun, whose flames shone from behind her like in the paintings of great painters. She was already on the other side. Wednesday was ending, and with one step I was close to fulfilling my promise to her. The promise to see it through. With all my heart, if I had one, I longed to see her again, but equally, my lack of conscience compelled me to live until Sunday.
"Bend over," she said.
I looked at her in surprise, but she put a finger to my lips and repeated it.
"Bend over."
I opened my eyes and leaned over. Beneath my shoe lay a newspaper with today's date. Or so I thought.
The Daily Newspaper. The only newspaper in this country. Besides the PZS, we also had the only truthful newspaper of our wonderful government, which we elected in a difficult vote almost forty years ago. I remembered how beautiful it was then. The apple trees blossomed earlier than usual, but no one cared. The ordinary citizen didn't have to worry about surviving until next Monday. The government provided everything. We truly lacked for nothing. Full wallets and collapsing shelves of goods—that's a brief description of my country. But suddenly, everything ended. Those who gave reached out for our freedom. Giving up free will was the price of prosperity. And then the Daily Newspaper appeared. I was born on the tenth anniversary of the first issue. Thanks to this strange coincidence, the Daily Newspaper landed on our doormat for free every day. At first, I felt appreciated because my access to information was regularly monitored, but later I realized I had no other choice. There was no other newspaper but the Daily Newspaper. There's only one piece of information, the one from the Daily Newspaper.
With disgust and full of hatred, I picked up the newspaper and looked at the date. 26.12.39 AFTERNOON EDITION.
Yes, that's right. Today's. And the afternoon edition, at
that. I read the article on the front page and was sure nothing would surprise me anymore. I handed the newspaper to Jan, and when he read it, he wept.
We stood there for a moment—one unmoved, the other wiping tears from his cheeks. After a moment, Jan threw the newspaper behind him and said it was time to go. I nodded, and we set off, leaving behind the Daily Newspaper with the article, the title of which, printed in large type on paper billowing in the light breeze, read:
TRANSPORT PLANE "WORMWOOD" WITH CHEMICAL WEAPON CRASHES OVER SOUTH AFRICA. HUNDREDS OF THOUSANDS OF CASUALTIES.
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