Shadows
Today, I don’t know what day it is; right now, I don’t know what time it is. My footsteps echoed down a cold, empty street, as if I were walking inside my own head. I remember that I have to solve a homicide. Someone was killed in cold blood, allegedly during a robbery. I would have preferred to be in his place.
I arrived at the crime scene. Everything was so silent that I could hear the glassy beats of my heart, which seemed to be cutting itself. After examining the poor soul lying on that floor—dirty and unworthy of an innocent death—I reached my conclusions: it was time to follow the killer’s footsteps.
The footsteps seemed nervous, confused, and circling, as if the perpetrator were struggling with himself. That man couldn’t believe what he had done; suddenly, in the blink of an eye, he had earned the title of murderer. I followed the trail to another alley. There was a shadow there.
I readied my gun, but that shadow fired first. I fired back two or three times. The bullets fell like tears falling. By the time I managed to take cover, the figure had already vanished. I felt the devil’s hand piercing my body to squeeze out what little humanity I had left. I was bleeding.
Was this the end for me?
I didn’t know how to feel. I didn’t know whether to be happy about finally experiencing something, about feeling alive—or perhaps dead. The little I remembered of my life flashed before my eyes. I remembered a woman I’d fallen in love with who had left me; her voice, the one I thought I’d forgotten. I remembered the taste of whiskey and the jazz music in the bars: the soundtrack to my own death.
That man, the shadow I had shot, seemed to be in the same situation as me. Just before closing my eyes, I asked myself, “What is he remembering right now?”
