Chapter 50
The cathedral was shining in its white embroidered beauty on a blue sky.
“This is magnificent”, I heard Jack say
I turned around and smiled in surprise, “You’re here!”
“What do you mean?”, Jack said arching his brows
“When did you get here?”, I asked
“I’ve always been here. Are you all right?”
I burst out laughing and grasping Jack’s hand I tugged him to the cathedral
“Let’s go see what’s inside!”, I exclaimed
But the doors were closed
“So?”, asked Jack
“So, what about gelato? My mouth is watering already”
He smiled and humored me, following me along to an ice cream shop. I couldn’t see the inside, because the glasses on the front were satin, with some transparent stylized flowers as decorations. When I walked in the place was white and grey, like FoodTech labs I thought. I turned around towards Jack, wondering if we should pick a better spot. But before I could ask the man at the counter addressed me
“Hello Iris”, he said smiling
He was a middle aged man, austerely handsome.
“How do you know me?”, I asked, pondering his outfit while he smiled a moment longer before answering.
He was wearing a lab coat on top of a button up shirt and suit pants, and when the thought he couldn’t be an ice cream man dawned on me I looked down at where the ice cream trays should have been and saw Petri dishes with bacterial cultures instead.
“I am Mauro Mori, good to meet you”, he said, coming on the other side of the desk to greet me
A cleaning lady walked out the back and eyed me
“Who is she?”, Jack asked
“I don’t know…I can’t remember”, I said. I felt the anguish foam within me without knowing why
Mori looked at her, bugging his eyes, while she kept at her task, wiping the same spot on the floor as if it was soiled by a terribly persistent stain, her eyes low on the floor now.
Mori considered her for a while longer, and then a flash of recognition crossed his face, he frowned and tapped his hand on the desk hard and I gasped in scared surprise
“Enough!”, he yelled, and then again, “Enough!”
But the cleaning lady continued wiping the invisible stain, and fear crossed Mori’s face too. He was silent for a moment, his forehead corrugated by a flow of thoughts
“Run!”, he said at last, with a great urgency in his tone
“Where?”, I asked, inexplicably calm now
“Run!”, he iterated
Jack took my hand and said, “Let’s go”
We were running against the wind, all of a sudden strong now, so that no matter how hard we tried, it was hard to move. Tears were running from our eyes and I was about to bail out when the wind changed its direction and began blowing on our backs. We ran fast and faster, with the air pushing us beyond our own steps, and finally we were in the air, floating few meters from the asphalt, then above the rooftops, and higher still, till we poked the clouds and were out in the pureness of the blue. The sun was bright, and as we were propelled upwards its light became blinding
“Jack?”, I called
I saw a fleck of his smile, till the sound of the wind and the ignited ball of the sun and the beat of my heart melt in a white, motionless, immensity.