the disease. A neat white beard and big hands laid on sheets. I woke up on the armchair next to him, but from that night he has never opened his eyes anymore.
The song is over, and I found myself with bulgy eyes full of tears that try to overcome his absence. I turn everything off, I remove my headphones, and I let the storm cradle me while it’s still raging outside the window blowing on the shutters howling at the wind. When I woke up I am still a little shocked, so I decided to stay in bed a little while, wallowing in the warmth of the night that has already gone. The only thing that gets me out of bed is thinking that I am going to see him again.
When we arrive at the bar, the first time I notice when I enter is that he is already there, and this surprises me a lot. For the first time he arrives before me and he doesn’t even turn to look at me, even if I am sure that he is aware of our loud arrival. I stop at the door, a little annoyed from the fact that he’s not noticing me, but when the barman welcomes me and asks if we’ll have “the usual”, we answer in the affirmative and we head to our table. I am about to sit when I see a little daisy just in front of my place and for the second time in a few minutes I stop perplexed and a little bewildered for a gesture that changed the normal way things are processing. That was definitely
him, but this must not happen. Why is he looking for a different approach from our every morning usual mysterious look? I found myself sitting down with that little flower between my fingers looking at his back while he is at the counter, when he whips around, gives me a look, and furtively runs away from the bar. Yes, it was definitely him the one who laid that flower on the table… On my table.
It leaves me speechless and excited at the same time, but also a little confused and not so sure he was the one who made it. My friend looks at me and starts giggling, being a witness of that childish scene of two adults lost in such an absurd story that it makes no sense to the rest of the world. I look at her and, after the barman brought us our breakfast, I realise that I am still holding the flower in my hand and I quickly put it down next to my cappuccino just as if it was a burning object that was bursting my skin. I start to feel different emotions in a totally racing alternation. First of all, I feel honoured by that little present, then I become reluctant and I ask myself if I’ve really got the point. And if, perhaps, it was for my friend? What if the mysterious looks-giver was attracted by her and not by me? But so why is he always looking at me? No, ok, I am the source of his interest… But if it was only an exchange of looks and some secret smile, what does this ‘present’ means? As if it was a relic, I pick up the flower again, and I put it inside my book, and then I make it fall back to the big and large bag. Camilla, who can’t control her laughing, tells me that now we are at the turning point of this absurd non-affair, and hearing this from her voice scares me, and I want to run away for not coming back to that place again. Then I think about how I feel when I don’t see him, I couldn’t ever give up on these ten minutes that we share, even if at
short distance.
When the breakfast is over, we immediately go to work, knowing that today the working day will be short and at lunch time we will be able to escape for a shopping afternoon together. Luckily, the night rain gave way to the sun, leaving behind only some spare clouds. At 1
p.m. we are out, like a clockwork, ready to take the car in order to spend the afternoon at the Outlet to do some shopping taking advantage on the sales. In the car we were blasting Claudio Baglioni, singing with the windows down like two teenagers free from any concern. At the first false note, we burst out laughing, while we discern in the distance the wheat fields with bales ordered in a row. They’re beautiful to see, I’ve always managed to picture me behind them, laid down in their shadow, looking at the sky, waiting for some plane passing by and leaving its white trail that cuts the blue. I would invent stories on its passengers and on the journeys which will take them far away, maybe in some exotic place or in an unknown city After a few silent minutes, Camilla goes back to seriousness and starts for the first time to take seriously my non-affair. ‘You’re the one who must make the next move, the game must go on in two. He gave you a signal, he wants to continue in a different manner, but without dive immediately into a real acquaintance. Now you’re the one who must keep leading the game in an equal romantic and mysterious way.
In short, not banal. It would be too easy to go there and thank him…’
She’s right, the little move of the flower is designed to change course, to choose which path to follow, and it must be done in a creative way in order to keep that veil of mystery that for quite some time makes us look at each other with passion but without going further, without
saying a single word. We don’t even know our names, and this has been enough until today. Now it needs to be decided if we want to go on in a different way or close the door. Maybe he’ll be the one to regret his move, today he ran away as ever. Maybe tomorrow he will not even show up. ‘You need to make a change into your life, maybe the mysterious watcher could be the man for you and if he’s not, you need to start living again and finding someone to share your life with.’
Camilla continues with her serious tone. A great desire to play comes alive in me, a desire to break the rules and to dare, even if this means losing everything. I start to laugh while the wind strongly enters from the window and throws my hair on my face: ‘Ok, let’s play’.
Arrived at the shopping magic world, this is how we like to name those massive haute couture low-cost outlets, we start to go around the various windows without much conviction, until we stop in a little bakery where we decided to eat something, given the fact that we didn’t even had lunch. A slice of chocolate cake and a coffee for me, while my friend limits itself to a whole wheat croissant and an orange juice, since she needs to keep the scale under control. Camilla is a beautiful woman who with her girth gives a sense of serenity and a pleasant sight when she goes by. Always all dressed up, without a hair out of place, she’s the type of woman who makes man turning in the street, despite a bit of extra weight well-proportioned on her harmonious body.
A new excitement involved the two of us in the play with the stranger, so we both start to think of my next move. Usually, he enters the bar, goes to the counter where he has breakfast standing, and then he immediately goes away. What could it be my next move to
concentrate in those few instants and without even have a precise spot in which take action, as he has been able to do with our table? The only thing that I know is that I want to leave him a tangible sign too, maybe linking to the daisy in order to make him understand that I am undoubtedly the sender. In the bakery I have an epiphany: I notice in the window a green chocolate box within there’s a beautiful white and yellow sketch of a daisy. Therefore, I add the box of chocolates to our bill and I start to think about how to have it delivered to him, maybe with the usual coffee that he orders every morning. I feel like a teenager, I went back to the high school times when the most beautiful side of a love story was exactly the one before the declaration. The nights spent with friends thinking of if this or that boy could be ‘in love’ with us or dreaming of the first kiss in front of a pizza and a glass of Coca Cola, when a simple ‘Hi’ started to assume three thousand meanings that we analysed one by one. Times when the heart was racing even when eyes met, and the excitement was about the idea of going together to the same party, standing by and hoping on his first move.
Almost forty years old, I am back to be an unexperienced teenager who discovers love for the first time, with a crazy desire to play. I feel like I’m reborn, I came back to life and I am no more afraid to feel something for someone. It seems absurd, but that little flower has been enough to shake me up so much to make me realise that have been wasting my time and that I had to go back to make my clock go round and round. I come back home that is already late, so I decide to stop to eat a slice of pizza at the pizza place down the street. When I enter the restaurant, there’s anyone, not even the owner who I overhear moving
in the kitchen, probably baking the
