It was the End of the World waiting at my bedside as I slowly woke up. It didn’t even look at me, its eyes fixed on a faraway point in space. I looked out of the window and noticed that the sky was just as grey as when I last saw it, before sleep. The rooftops on the opposite side of the garden formed the same dusty image of an old postcard patterned with flickering lights as if in desperate attempt to escape oblivion. It wasn’t even that late, but yet I felt as if I had slept through the entire day and whatever miracle was supposed to happen had already been missed. It was time to go out. It was my going out day, since it was Sunday and Sunday was indeed the day when I went out. This time always made me remember the now unfamiliar names that I used to give to different days of the week. I reached inside my memory to get them out and say them out loud, repeating a few times until the sounds rounded in my ears and uncovered the layout of my old habitual existence. I didn’t know what I was doing it for. There was no more place for the words I so badly tried to remember. In the world that I woke up on that fateful Sunday, mornings no longer existed. Time was only ever measured in afternoons, each single measure blinding me with its bright grey robes.
The going-out-day was a day of a fight. It was the risk that I had to take, fearfully reaching out to my shopping bag for comfort, but on that fateful day I was surprisingly willing to do so. There was nothing waiting for me at home, since the miracle was already gone and all that was left for me would be staring blankly at The End of the World, who wouldn’t look back at me. I knew all the dangers waiting for me outside. I knew well enough all the dangers of the day. Especially once being out I could see the day up close. I knew my way through it by heart.
Standing outside my front porch, I thought of the End of the World, whom I so rudely left behind without as much as a word. I abandoned it to simply run some errands. But then it still wouldn’t look at me as I packed one of my reusable bags into the other and folded my shopping list, so I could safely assume it was going to do its job whether I stayed behind to watch or not. Afterall I had my own walk to make, not looking down at my boots, not paying attention to anything on my way as it could move then and who knows what would it do to me if it caught me staring. I was a point on a map, moving through the day. The route ran till the end of the street and then to the left, passing a fruit stall, a repair shop and an abandoned restaurant. Then it continued to the crossroad, where I didn’t have to look either left or right as I always knew when to cross, and when to wait. After that I strolled through an empty bus station, like I did thousands of times and into a dark little alley, that was once planted with blossoming trees to provide sweet shelter for couples in love. But these days it was only me there, with my two reusable shopping bags and a distressed shopping list. The alley opened into a square with two large buildings looming over my head, one of an old library, the other one of a heavily lit supermarket embellished with a red bricked pattern. The drugstore was squeezed in between two dark holes of permanently closed shops without names or purpose. I took a basket and automatically packed a toothpaste, a bar of soap, a cheap book from the clearance shelf, a pack of dried toasts. As I exited in a hurry, I saw an elderly man, leaning on his stick and clutching a sizeable colouring book in his spare hand. I asked politely whether he needed any help, although he was clearly fine. He smiled with his eyes and thanked me and proceeded to walk away, as I felt a sudden longing to talk to him, to receive his thanks once again and fill my hunger with his sincere smile, his warm eyes. I stopped outside and watched him go as he moved along the cobblestones with his stick. I stayed so focused on him that I almost missed it.
When I raised my eyes it had already started
and there was nothing I could do. But deep inside I knew I wouldn’t have
stopped it anyway. I was only there on errands, and there was The End of The
World waiting for me back home. Meanwhile, the sky turned bloody orange. It
cast its bloody light on the contours of the buildings and I felt a wave of
heat rubbing against my skin, until I noticed the flames closing up on the
cobblestoned street. I could no longer see the sky. Instead, emerging from the
flames, I saw the shadow of the elderly man. I wanted to run to him, save him.
But I stopped as if a wall stopped me. Through the glass wall, I saw the flames
stand still. They were made of cupboard. Flickering on the sky, there were two
large sheets of cupboard, painted bloody orange and moving back and forth, like
clockwork or puppets. No one else stopped. No one else saw it. These were my
own props of my own show, for my eyes only. I stared and stared at the
clockwork flames, until the shadow of the older man disappeared consumed by the
phantom fire.
On my return, as I moved down the once
enchanted alley, I realized it was finally getting dark. The newly arrived
darkness soon soothed me and brought me calm. I turned back towards the square
and saw that the cardboard fire was gone, now replaced by the familiar coolness
of the night. The madness of the day was gone. I walked by a grocery store and
collected a tin of sweetcorn to pack into my reusable bag. I was no longer in a
hurry. Outside, the night reigned. The darkness emptied the streets and the air
brought back the cold. Tiny stars shined above my head, few tiny faraway
sorrows. I felt a sudden desire for white chocolate candies. I shouldn’t be having
candies. But then I remembered The End of The World waiting for me at my
bedside, still and abandoned with its eyes fixed on imaginary point beyond my
bedroom wall. And so I ran my fingers through a bowl of candies, and I picked
and picked and picked until both my bags were full. The friendly darkness
screened my fears and desires as it always did without fail. My best friend
darkness that never left my side, and now loyally followed me to meet my End of
the World.
It still didn’t look at me when I got back
home. But this time, it was dark. And that’s how, on one Sunday, the world has
ended. Not burning in cardboard flames, but with two cups of tea, the sweetness
of the night and white chocolate candies.
