other side of virtual reality, recomposing them into a new and astonished middle-aged woman who could not help but admire the world she had come to. It was in a silicon valley, dominated by its characteristic metallic grayish colour, where all the dreams that allowed to overcome human limitations had come true, to the point of forming a society of excellence generated by the most intelligent technologies, where the most stupid human generation that had created the planet lived pleasantly.
Eva disappeared forever from Zaragoza. No one else heard from her. In their family they were aware that she had spent a lot of time in a well-known hot date chat, but her friends were unable to provide any information. They didn't even know their friend was spending her time on it. No one was able to provide names of their last relationships. The dating company, under pressure from the police, pointed out that it had come into contact with their machine hook and contributed to the conversation it had started. It also pointed at the truck driver, married with two children, but, in addition to the conversation that was systematically recorded in the company, it gave them a story so clarifying that they had to discard him from the list of suspects.
The mystery remained unresolved and the matter has long since closed, in the face of the disbelief of Eva's office, police and environment.
But Eve lives her immense eternal happiness in the company of the alien she dared to kiss, in an unknown, trouble-free place. And she'll never come back.
TALE OF THE GYM SLAVE
La Ciotat (France)
November 2005
Carlos kept looking at Mediterranean Sea to relax his impulses, with the resemblance of existential nausea slipping down his lips. He was the only human being along the promenade of his small coastal town. Sunset had arrived, bringing to the trees of the walk successive waves of strong cold winds, which forced life inside the homes. Only some hasty car was passing through the street, getting lost in the distance. Then, silence.
The waves came to break on the shore, creating the relaxing daily rhythm of repeated noises over and over again. Each heartbeat of the sea was an impulse to his existential reflection.
- What am I doing here? - he said quietly.
He thought again of his mother, with whom he lived at the age of 36. She was a divorced teacher who had been laid out on a couch on retirement. There she was accompanied by an insistent talk of never-ending gossip programs that kept her in absolute silence and without provoking any reaction. Carlos had long since given up about accompanying her as a TV viewer. After fifteen minutes of listening to the gossip of empty characters, who were increasingly enriched by their insults and social nonsense, Carlos' sensitive state of mind was decaying to the point of absolute hatred for humanity. After his usual withdrawal to his room, which repeated day after day, he finally decided not to watch TV with his mother anymore. Their family life consisted of sharing an elegant but cold flat, where the voices from TV for the mother and the chill out music for the child coincided, although in separate rooms. Dinnertime, when they were both at home, was just over ten minutes to eat their usual pizza and ice cream accompanied by a couple of glasses of wine per head.
But this time his mother had gone on her extensive retirement holiday, usually to the Amalfi coast, and he was free at home. Free but bored, almost depressed. Something was missing in his life. Someone with whom he could feel his heart beating in parallel. He went through the many faces with which he had lived in one way or another. Although a few still shocked him, he thought he probably didn't know what love was yet.
He had plenty of company, they entertained him, almost adored him, but his short-lived companions considered him to be just a throwaway guy, and his feeling of loneliness remained and grew as he was spending his life in their provincial city.
For them, Carlos was a juicy topic of conversation when he appeared in the supermarket to buy his unsophisticated food. At 5.30 a.m. the coffee chat around a table at the middle-aged clients' bar usually focused on the body quality of their collective gigolo, before being given a lift to the family home and not seen each other until the next day.
- Look at him. He looks gourgeous in his jacket!
- This week, he's probably been at the gym.
- What shoulders, my god!
- What's going on? Who are you talking about? - the least adventurous woman in extra-marital matters said.
- Don't you see his athlete's body?
- That boy?
- His name is Carlos and he's very eager to give us pleasure, isn't he?
- Yes, of course he does," said his regular clients, amidst size-indicating hand movements, whispers and laughs.
- Haven’t you tried him?
- Me? I don't do that. I have a husband.
- You're stupid. Are you going to compare a farm chicken to a pheasant?
- I'm happy with him.
- You've got used to easy life, lack of emotion. Try this once and then we'll talk. If you decide to date him, I have his phone number. And it's only fifty euros, whole service.
- Please don't talk like that. It bothers me.
- You've been a nerd ever since we were in high school. You're missing out. I used to think so too. But I fell. And I don't regret it. What I was missing....!
And so Wednesday afternoons went by. After the incisive glances of the women on each centimetre of his anatomy, calls and datings, demanded with total discretion, would arrive, which were progressively increasing in frequency, so that these joyful married women of La Ciotat could continue to combine their extra-marital sexual encounters with work and family. Carlos had always admired his clients' ability to make his role of satisfaction go completely unnoticed in such a small town.
Carlos was spending his life between the daily punishment of bodybuilding in the gym and the hourly sex he so successfully offered at homes. But now, in front of the sea, next to no one, he was thinking about the meaning of what he was doing, what it might take, what the future might keep for him.
He felt the weariness of a dark day. His daily activity of punishing his muscles with the sophisticated torture machines that filled the space of gym, as job training for his job, became increasingly uninteresting to him. He'd been thinking about retiring for a while. While doing weights or cycling or walking on various machines he had already remembered his whole life from start to finish.
- Will I always be like this? Will I end up an old man with an impressive physique and an empty head?
He knew he had to keep his body resources stable and even improve them, as his clients detected any excess or defect that had arisen and did not hesitate to let him know. And he kept on and on running without moving, pushing machines for nothing over and over again, swimming laps and laps in the pool to always returning to the starting point. Action without imagination, without illusion, without satisfaction.
But now he had another reason to stay there day after day. It had been 7 years since his partner died, the most intense social experience of his life.
He stared into the void as he heard Mina's distant voice and laughter come from the past. And he remembered. He recalled that they met one night of partying as they
