Something (serious) to say

What time is it? It is around seven p.m. Two people are sitting in a bar. A woman and a man. Obviously. They are looking for something, waiting, alone. They keep in silence, watching nothing except the clock which is on the wall. They haven’t been there for a long time. Nevertheless they have been watching the time again and again. They are waiting for something, evidently. Both are smoking, but in a different way. The man takes the last cigarette from the empty box and lits it up with a match. He smokes calmly, taking care when it’s time to throw the ash. A cup of coffee is near the ashtray, he is going to drink it soon. He looks very manly with his clean clothes. Black jacket and pant, Armani’s sunglasses. Does he have a date? For sure he has an important one. In spite of his calm manners he is looking at the clock anxiously.

The woman looks into her handbag. She takes her Marlboro’s, tears the cover, and lits one with a golden lighter. She is doing it in a wrong way. She doesn’t realize it until she feels a bad taste in her mouth. She throws it immediately and lits another one. This time she watches it out to do it in the right way. What is she thinking about? She seems as if she were worried about something. She has a lot of papers on the table which she has been reading and she is tidying them up. She looks pretty tired. Perhaps she is over about those papers, or maybe she is over about her own life. It’s difficult to say what is really happening with her. She keeps facing the time.

Suddenly, at the same time, both get up and go to the door. They have decided to stop waiting, evidently. They go on watching nothing. They realize it when they run into each other. Then the papers are laying on the floor. So is the man. Some of them are under his back. Everything is fallen. The woman begins to pick her papers up. She has to turn him over to pick the rest. They are so dirty. With all the papers in her hand, she goes on her way while he begins to stand up, carefully.

I liked a lot that woman. I knew her some years ago while i was trying to deal with my life. I was a little elder than her, however she looked very young. At first i had looked up her face, but when time began to go by i had found out more than that. She was that kind of woman who was difficult to meet. Even more, she was completely different than my old wife. We had been married during six years, luckily no kids. The first month together everything had been okay. During those days we had spent a funny time, having sex almost every time, without any words about themselves. Everything went on the right way. She began to spend more time in my home, to leave some clothes there, and, when the first month was ending we were living together. The first day after the first month we began to talk. That day, the troubles showed up immediately. Nevertheless we remained other five years and eleven months trying to get rid of them. I couldn’t understand what kind of troubles we had really had. Besides, i could never understand why i had kept living with her. And, of course, vice versa. We shouldn’t have talked. That had been the solution. But, as always, it had not been possible. So, our issues went on rising until that day when i found himself with an empty bottle in my hand, trying to throw it on her. I had stopped myself just in time. The end was easy. Without any word she had taken all her things, called a taxi, and vanished forever. Firstly, i had to admit, i had rarely missed her. I met myself alone again and i didn’t know how to deal with the new situation. After some days i felt he began to come round. Loneliness could be an interesting way of life. For that period i saw her for the first time. We met each other and began to be friends. We used to talk about work, music, movies and that kind of things that people use to talk when they are just meeting themselves.

I enjoyed her company and i began to feel that body-sensation that men use to feel when they are in front of an amazing woman. What could i do? She didn’t seem to have the same feelings than me. Surely she never watched out a man like me. I had just decided to take her as a friend when, last week, she told me she had something serious to say to me. What does she want to tell me about? Thinking about it, i put clean clothes on and went to the bar where we had to meet each other.

Where have i left the papers? I can´t find them. I really need these papers where everything is explained. I could tell him about the matter, but writing-word has more value. I know it. With papers everything will turn easy. Where are they? Yes, they are in my handbag. I have put them there not to forget them. Is everything there? I have my cigarettes, my lighter, money, my lipstick, and of course some tissues just in case. I am ready. I have to do it because i told him i had something serious to say. He wants to know about it, surely. Maybe he suspects something. Never mind. i have to go to the bar and to tell him everything. I have been waiting for the right time, but it has never happened. I have kept in silence, enjoying his company, dying for love. I had to change the situation in some way. He is the man who I have always dreamt with. Never ever would i find someone like him. I wanted he had invited me to go to somewhere. But he didn´t say the first word. So, i had to do it instead. I have invited him to drink a coffee one day. And today is this day. At last my secret feelings will going to show up. How am i gonna to begin the talking? What am i gonna to say? I have rehearsed the scene many times. I have read the papers so many times that i am be able to repeat the exact words without reading. Still i need them. I am afraid of forgetting something…I am afraid of a lot of things. How do i look? It´s ok. Time was over.

It was an autumn Friday evening. It was beginning to be cold. The clouds were moving by the sky, changing the light. The sun began to disappear among them. There were many people in the street. Many of them were coming back home after a hard work’s week. Their faces looked very tired. It seemed as if everybody were in his own mind, alone. Perhaps many of them were suffering from loneliness. Perhaps when they were at home they would imagine to look for someone else, to join with somebody. However they went on walking without paying attention to the others. They looked busy. So did the street. Some people came in the bar before going on with their ways. The bar had its customers. Inside it the landscape was a little different. The noises weren’t so loud and nobody looked very hurried. Some kind of different expectations were there going around. There was a group of middle aged women near the window, who were drinking tea, talking and laughing; some couples of people were talking seriously in different tables; some kids that looked like students with their schoolbooks were in the middle of the place; and, at the back, a man in black, who was smoking, and in another table, a woman who was reading some papers. There were also some empty tables. It was cute because the place wasn’t too big. Some kind of intimacy could be felt there. Besides its own noises the place had its own rules. Every table kept just in its own business like isolated worlds. Like the calm which was before the storm. Just like that was that atmosphere.

And then, suddenly, the two lonely people, stood up. They seemed focused in their own minds. Like two clouds, they were moving to the entrance. Just there they crashed each other. A storm of papers broke out. They were falling all over the floor. The woman looked desperate. The man was fallen on some of her papers. Without any words, she picked them up. She was in the street when the man tried to stand up from the floor. On his feet, he put his glasses on and went on his way.