Thinking about all these things, looking at Luigi lying there motionless, he got a lump in his throat and could barely hold back his tears.
“The time allowed for visits is over!” shouted a servant, waking him up from his thoughts.
“I’ll go away immediately” answered Mario, walking towards the exit.
When he arrived on the road, the darkness of the night wrapped him like a dark mantle.
VI
I’m driving, I don’t know where I am meant to go. Around me there’s only darkness. And there’s no one that could help me, no one that could make me understand something of what’s going on with me, no one that could give me clues. How long have I been here? I lost track of time.
Sometimes I feel like being the main character of a freeze frame, then I realize I can somehow move. “Is there anybody?”, I try to ask, without getting any answer. I have confirmation that I’m alone. Inside a car, or some other vehicle? I didn’t understand that yet. Without other passengers, without other seats, without a gear shift. But with the steering wheel, that’s always in front of me.
What’s happening to me? I don’t know, but I think that I don’t know a lot of things. Maybe I’m here by chance. I recall experiments with the time machine, even if I always thought that it was the result of the imagination of someone that wanted to create stories for some book or movie, where they’re catapulted in a far away world and time. What was that movie’s name? I can’t remember, maybe it will come to mind in a bit. Now, even if I make an effort, I can’t get anything from my memory. I can’t even understand how I feel, but it’s a weird feeling.
There it is, my headache is back, my temples are pulsating, first on the right, then on the left, it’s a stronger pain than the other time. “Do you have a painkiller, please?”, but it was pointless because I know no one is going to answer. Anyway, I tried.
Now I’m thinking that I may be the victim of some candid-camera: they call you with an excuse, they place you here in the dark, in this kind of car, and they leave alone waiting. “It’s a bad joke, you know?”, I say speaking to the void in front of me. I almost screamed it, because this situation is starting to wear me out. How long have I been here? “Come on, come clean! I know you’re hiding somewhere!”
I don’t receive any answer, so I’m only left to wait.
The wait is exhausting, I never waited so long. Still I can’t see anyone. It seems like they don’t want to show up. They are scared, or they are just bastards and they are making me a prank that I’m not enjoying at all.
In traditional candid-cameras, if we can call them that way, everything is solved over the course of a few hours, or at least a day, but honestly, I feel like being in this place for a lot more time, but maybe I’m wrong. Deep down, I think that something happened to me, that made me become estranged; anyway, this is still a bad prank. You don’t do these kinds of pranks, not even to your worst enemy.
I’m afraid of the dark, because to me it means uncertainty. Or, rather loss of certainty.
I’m afraid of the dark and someone is playing on this, taking advantage of my weakness.
I realize that he’s a coward, since he has no intention to make me recognize him. Whoever he is, he understood that I would tell him off, so he is careful not to show his face.
“Is anybody there?”, I try to ask, tearing up the absolute silence that reigns in here. Still no answers. “Do you have a painkiller? My head’s hurting”, but clearly there is no one willing to hear me out. “Where are you? Show yourselves.”
No one comes out, no one is coming here to me.
What an ugly situation, I don’t like it at all.
If at least I could notice any activity, I could try to understand who’s the guilty party of all of this; but I can’t see anyone.
Thinking about it, I realize that everything is been the same since I found myself in here.
Me, on a car seat, with a steering wheel in front of me and darkness all around. A darkness capable to swallow me.
It could be a nice scene for a horror movie.
I can already picture it. And maybe it would also be adequately promoted. “Ladies and gentlemen, please come along to the preview of the new horror movie. It will make your skin crawl! You aren’t some scaredy cats, are you? It arrived to all the theaters. Come along, come along, come along…”
And I would be the main character. Lucky me! I would become famous, for heaven’s sake, but I’d rather do it in some other way.
I’m wandering off a little bit, maybe to avoid thinking to what’s happening to me, maybe to let come to mind some idea to understand how to get away from this situation. And, just for a change, I can’t think of anything.
“Is anyone there?”, I ask one more time, “I would need something to make this headache go away!”
Nothing and no one.
It’s discouraging, as a result.
I have nothing left to do but to wait, wait for someone, wait for something to change.
VII
The days went by alike the ones to the others, with the doctors spreading confidence to Luigi’s brother: “You can see the improvements”, they said to him. “The patient is acting good. His body is reacting in a good way to the suffered trauma”.
Mario was happy listening to these words, but after all he couldn’t wait to be witness of his brother’s awakening, to hug him again.
He wanted to see him like he remembered him before the accident: he was always happy, lively and, most of all, he walked with his own legs.
“He will need a little bit of rehabilitation: staying still for days in the same position, surely his muscles will lose strength. For a period of time he will have to do some exercise, to fully recover”, one of the nurses explained to him.
“He will do whatever it takes to be back to normal”, Mario Mazza confirmed, “He’s a willing guy, so he surely won’t have any problems to engage himself that way.”
“He will follow an accurate program, that will bring him to gradual, but also total rehabilitation.”
“Good, thank you for all that are you doing. We trust your experience.”
“Now, if you don’t mind, I would like a coffee”, said the nurse.
“Don’t worry. I’ll come with you, I need one too” answered Mario.
They went in the corner where the vending machines were, at the end of the corridor.
There was one for hot drinks, one for iced drinks, one for salty and sweet snacks and one for stuffed sandwiches.
Mario put the money and selected a classic espresso, while the nurse, using a magnetic key given to the staff of the hospital, chose a chocolate cappuccino.
“Sometimes I feel a little spoiled”, said the man.
“It’s good to allow yourself to make an exception to the rule. We all should do it now and then”
They drank their beverage and then each of them went his own way. “Now I have to leave you”, said the nurse, “I have a few things to do”
“Don’t worry, I’ll let you go. Thank you for your company.”
Mario Mazza went towards his brother’s room and stopped in the hallway, knowing that he couldn’t go inside.
He was glad that his brother’s conditions were getting better day by day, and that was enough to him now; once completely healed, he would have the chance to stay with him and make up for lost time.
One week to go and everything was going to be back to normal. Almost, at least.
He stayed until the end of visiting hours, then he got out and went home: another day passed by.
VIII
I’m driving, I don’t know where to. I found myself here alone, in the middle of a homogenous black of this room, with a steering wheel in front of me, my only certainty. That’s all I could see, the steering wheel.
I don’t understand what happened to the rest of the car. Because I am inside a car, right?
“Hey guys! I know that you are somewhere. Am I in a car? Can someone confirm it?”
No one is answering. Where is everyone gone?
They’re hiding, that’s the truth. They don’t want to be seen. They’re pranking me. A really bad prank.
I touch the darkness with a hand, but without feeling anything; I can’t feel the air moving, I don’t feel hot or cold…
I keep not understanding where I am, but I’m sure I’m alone. Who brought me here, left, or hid somewhere close.
“Come on, show up! I know you’re here”
Nothing, I got no answer.
What place is this? A basement? It doesn’t give me the idea of being a corridor. It rather seems like a closed space, a room.
At least that is my impression, it’s what I can guess from the elements I have at hand. If I had some more information, maybe I could have more certainty on my situation. I don’t even know if I’m in danger, I don’t know what to expect in the immediate future. Deep down, I still don’t know anything that could be helpful to understand.
How much time spent since I got here?
I realize that any of the questions I asked myself is having an answer; I don’t like it, I’m a person that based on certainty every moment of his life, and losing them could, long-term speaking, bother me.
Is it possible that there’s no one whom I could ask for help? Any kind of help…
I also gave headache, so I wouldn’t mind taking a painkiller, bit I don’t know who I could ask it.
“Is there anyone?”, I shouted, but as an answer I only get silence.
“I need something that makes this headache go away! Please, if someone is hiding there, it’s time to come out!”
I can’t see anything, the place seems empty, besides the car I’m in.
I already saw this scene somewhere: me, on my own, on this vehicle.
Darkness reigns all around, where is everybody?
Someone besides me exists in this World, or not?
Oh my God, in my head is making its way a quite worrying thought, or at least it is for me: what if, by any chance, I’m in another World? In a parallel word to the one where usually humans are?
Have I been kidnapped by the aliens?
I hope I will have an answer about all the question marks that are growing inside of me. And I hope I will have it soon, or I could take the risk of going crazy.
If there’s some kind soul somewhere around that would know something more about the few things I know, I’d like that he would show up and explain the situation to me.
No one is showing up. No one come out, they’re all cowards, sissies here because they know they’re wrong and because they know that I could kick them for what they’re doing to me.
“Show up, have the guts for your actions!”
Nothing changes. No one answers.
I have nothing to do but wait, but I hope that soon someone explains to me what’s going on here, because soon I will lose my patience, and when I lose my patience… every man for himself.
IX
Every now and then, thinking about what he went through with his younger brother and seeing the current health conditions, Mario Mazza got tears in his eyes.
He looked after him since they were children and has always been next to him during the following years; they lived many happy moments.
They had similar characters, other reason that made them get on well, and they felt really good when they were together.
The image of a smiley, playful Luigi came to his mind and he remembered only a few sad moments, since his brother, like him, was positive and optimistic for nature.
Although the discrete age difference and the belonging, as a matter of fact, to two different generations, Luigi and Mario together were a good pair: they compensate one another and between them there was an almost indescribable understanding.
It was like they were best friends: the one considered himself the perfect half of the other, at lest under certain points of view, and this situation became stronger and stronger as time passed by, especially after Mario was widowed.
Luigi felt in his debt for all that the older brother did for him: “some things you can’t forget”, he told him the day his wife died, “I’ll always be next to you, always”
And Luigi kept his promise.
Not even a day passed by without them seeing each other, or, for the worst, talking to each other on the phone, usually they always knew the other’s appointments, when they felt the need they asked and gave each other advices.
It was a long time that they both were single and, even if they mutually agreed to live in different flats, they still felt together, the one next to the other.
Sometimes they had like the impression that, in the long term, they developed some sort of telepathy between them, and that developed it with time. They understood each other right away, it was like they transmitted their thoughts with a gaze, and often they didn’t even have the need to talk to decide certain things.
I never thought that all of this could be broken in a few seconds, thought Mario while he found himself before his brother’s body, lying motionless in a comatose status.
Luigi’s conditions kept getting better day by day, or that at least was a good news, but seeing him always there, in the same position, put Mario in an uncomfortable situation: he felt a knot in his throat that would hardly be dissolved before his awakening.
All the days passed by like that since the accident: they all were alike, like photocopies.
And even that day the night came without that Mario Mazza realized, so immersed in his thoughts he was.
When he was awakened from a servant’s voice that invited him to leave the hospital because the time to visit the patients was over, the man walked towards the exit, went down the stairs and, with the coat well closed, he prepared to face the bad weather: outside it started to snow.
X
I’m driving, I don’t know where to. I’m here alone, for a few days now, with a migraine that pulses in my temples at a variable intensity and no one that could help me let it go. Sometimes I feel like dazed, stunned by the pain.
I try not to think about it, but that is pointless because the headache persists anyway.
I’m still sitting on the only seat of this car, I see the steering wheel before me, but now I decide to take my hands off and stretch them along my hips: I could never drive with such a strong headache.
The darkness around me endures and from time to time I touch it lightly with my fingers, as to find a solution to all my problems.
Despite my attempts to understand where I am, I haven’t understood anything yet and that is starting to get on my nerves: when I am missing assurance, it feels like I am suspended in air.
I can’t see anyone here, I can’t hear any noise around, maybe I am isolated from the rest of the world, rolled up in darkness, under a soundproofed glass bell.
Turning at my left, I feel like seeing a shadow, but it stays quite vague at my sight. That, though, gives me hope, I start to think that there’s someone like me here, even though this “someone” wants to stay anonymous, he doesn’t want to be recognized, maybe because he’s scared of something.
I try to be careful to the possible movements, to try to see again that shadow, but I don’t see anyone anymore.
Maybe there never was anyone there besides me, and the shadow that I saw was only in my head, it was result of my imagination.
Is this sort of isolation having some kind of negative effect over me? On my body, but also on my mind? Is it destroying me psychically, slowly wearing me out?
I hope not, in the meanwhile I see that shadow again, as it passes sneakily and hides somewhere, moving from time to time.
That’s what’s going on: someone is playing with me.
Yes, I’m starting to be sure, but that’s a game that I don’t like at all, you know? Where are they hidden? I can’t see the shadow anymore.
Actually, I can, I’m seeing it, here next to me, so close.
I turn to my left and see something: the outline of a human figure, of a dark grey tone, that I can distinguish in the middle of the dark unvarying black thanks only to this light tone difference.