Short story number 7

Hello friends,

Please read at your leisure number 7.

Best wishes, Philip

The Heart of a City

The streets may be dirty, the buildings unkempt, the shop traders noisy. When a man has a friend, he sees beyond the physical incognito and what may have been hostile and alien now warms his heart and he feels truly at home.

Meredith had lived fifty years in the city. After seven he had stopped counting. The place had claimed him for its own. He could have left at any time, it was certainly ugly enough, but something had knotted him to it, like a tangled green moss wedded to a wall of granite.

“Full cycles”, “Things come round again” – was that something he’d heard in a song? He hadn’t allowed his thoughts to develop the notion further but, nevertheless, the phrases sat uncomfortably on his chest. Was this city going to discard him after all? a faithless lover who would drop him off now she’d taken all she’d wanted? He turned into Rua Otavio Rocha. So many people, rushing, rushing, “The city is anxious” he thought, “but what could be so pressing?” He wondered if anyone of them would abruptly keel over should he stop them suddenly. Did they see what he saw? They were trampling all over his town. It was his town, not theirs. What were they doing? They had no business to be pounding their vulgar trainers over its cobbles and pushing, pushing. “Perhaps they will push me over?” He felt small and frail. A shudder of helplessness shook him and he teetered into a doorway where in the sudden cool of its corridor he sensed an aura of protection.

A long gray corridor with a number of faceless offices to right and left but right at the end something completely different. There are plenty of such corridors in Porto Alegre. It is impossible to know all of them. Exactly at the end of this one was a large plate glass window and a simple glass fronted door to the left; a beacon at the end of the gray gloom. There were lights burning and the place was buzzing. Instinctively he walked towards it. A large counter swept away to the left and waiters in long white aprons were gliding deftly between the tables. He noticed that there was plenty of movement amongst the customers themselves; some were sitting, others standing. There was a contagious air of animation among them and he stood transfixed at the window. It was then that he saw him. Somebody leaned forward and for a moment he could see a couple sitting a little way behind. He gasped. “João, it’s João!” The gap closed again and he felt his head grow strangely hot. “João, my dear friend, but…”  João had died some forty years previous. He must be mistaken but, no, his prematurely gray beard and moustache and the way he hunched his shoulders forward when he was talking. Had João noticed him? Yes, he had for a moment looked up. They were his eyes; brown laughing eyes but with a whisper of sadness behind them. It was too much. A waiter was walking directly to the door and he quickly moved away back down the corridor and out into the busy street.

How they had laughed together! It was after knowing João that the city had begun to change. How many coffees had they drunk together? How many films had they seen? And what about the choir? Yes, he’d even joined a choir. Those were good days, such good days, and then he’d suffered a devastating stroke and that wonderful friend had simply passed out of his life.

Meredith steadily made his way home but he was no longer conscious of the pressing crowds around him. He was walking once again with João and the certainty of a true friend filled him with an unspeakable joy.

The morning bought with it cold reason. It was just a coincidence; of course, he hadn’t see João but, nonetheless, he got dressed with a curious lightness in his heart and knew without knowing why that he must find that corridor again.

Rua Otavio Rocha once more and teeming with bodies. Perhaps he wouldn’t find it? Perhaps he’d imagined it? Panic gripped him and his head began to swim. A dumpy looking woman stepped out of a doorway and, to avoid colliding with her, he veered sideways and, lurching to the right, found himself standing again in the familiar cool. He slowly raised his head and there it was. He’d not been deceived. This time there was music playing. He knew the tunes, good ones. He could have danced to the door. How cosy it looked. How inviting! There was such laughter and so much activity. He longed to go in. It seemed busier than yesterday. There were people leaning up against the counter and cups and glasses were passing to and fro with a delicious clatter. He couldn’t help it, a smile, one that had long been discarded, crept across his tired face. A peal of laughter, fresh and candid filled his ears. He knew that laughter. Only one person in his life had laughed like that; Elza, his saintly friend, the kindest soul he had ever known; a shoulder to cry on, an ear for a good gossip and a ready companion for any adventure. There she was; a glass of something in her hand and she was looking directly at him; her round eyes laughing and her face radiant and full of love. But dear Elza had been brutally murdered. Her assassin never discovered and her simple, beautiful life extinguished. “Please, come in, Mr. Williamson”. The door was open and an olive skinned waiter with a neat black moustache was standing in the entrance. His long white apron was smooth and spotless. His tray covered in glasses of varying shapes and sizes, “If you want to come back later, please do. We’re keeping a table for you”.

Meredith began to back away. He felt his breath coming hard. He wanted to scream. He wanted to turn around and get back to the clamour of the streets and yet, it looked so tempting and the waiter had such a smile. Elza, João, there they were, and behind them he could just see his old friend Bernardo and Dona Linda, and there was Seu Henrique, dear Seu Henrique.

“Yes, yes, I think I’m ready. Please show me to my table”, and stepping lightly, he crossed into the warm embrace of the little café.

*********

A small crowd had gathered at the end of the gray corridor. They were clustering round something crumpled on the floor.

“Do you know him?” a voice said.

“Don’t think so. Looks pretty old, poor thing”.

“We’d better call the police but first, let’s move him away from in front of the fire exit”.