The Lie - Yesterday

Of all my lies, the funniest one was when I told you how much I wanted to see my country again.

Your eyelids fluttered, you were moved, and you cleared your throat as you sought the words to comfort me and show me you understood. You didn’t dare laugh all evening. It was worth telling you the story just for that.

When I got home, I switched on the lamps in all the rooms and I stood in front of the mirror. I looked at myself until my image became blurred and unrecognizable.

For hours I walked around my bedroom. My books lay lifeless on the table and the shelves, my bed was cold, too neat, I had no thoughts of going to bed.

Dawn approached and the windows of the houses opposite were all dark.

I checked several times that the door was closed, then I tried to think about you to help me sleep but you were nothing but a gray, fleeting image like my other memories.

Like the dark mountains I crossed one winter night, like the bedroom in the dilapidated farm where I woke up one morning, like the modern factory where I have worked for ten years, like an over-familiar landscape you no longer want to look at.

Soon there was nothing left to think about, only the things I didn’t want to think about. I would have liked to cry a little but I couldn’t, for I didn’t have any reason to do so.