An Unsolved Mystery is a Thorn in Your Heart

An Unsolved Mystery is a Thorn in Your Heart

‘Such long fingers, I wonder what she would become one day, mother’s friend commented.

My mother and the other woman rejoiced at talking about the last night’s dinner, the dessert, one new recipe they just heard from a newcomer in the neighborhood. One chocolate, mug of milk, cups of sugar, vanilla … The sudden aroma of vanilla lulled me into my thoughts. That’s the moment where I exactly stopped listening to their cheerful conversation. My father was playing chess, as usual, with the husband of that woman, totally unobservant about their chitchatting, as well as of my thoughts. I evoked the sentence and started glaring at my hands. 

‘Such long fingers…’ I moved my fingers to the left and to the right, up and down, inside, and outside, they are so tender, white, and gracious, how come I can’t figure out what my profession would be.

Will I have an exceptional pianist career? Oh, no, not in this part of a rural area, nobody is about to teach me music. ‘Little child, why do you have such unrealistic dreams?’ I smiled to myself. 

If I won’t become a renowned musician, why do my fingers look like the ones of a pianist?

Who else has such slender fingers? 

What kind of comparison was she alluding to?, I wondered. 

Does the size of fingers have to do anything with the profession? No, I don’t think so. I smiled since such a silly, lighthearted conversation between the two of them had spurred me on, and at that moment I just realized that I was one step further to maturity.

I rushed to my window sill, sat there, and started looking through the branches of the linden tree towards a beautiful alley leading to the church. Delicate branches with aromatic buds were moving sharply and fast, as the thoughts roller coasted inside my head.

‘An artist? An astronomer? An esthetic surgeon? An English teacher?’, I don’t know. I can’t figure it out yet. The next step is a grammar school, and then I will make up my mind.

Being less windy, I am going outside, towards the river. My river – my sanctuary. Perhaps the river has the answers. 

The car with the two unknown passengers pulls the engine in front of me. The two men are going outside of it. They are laughing and flapping their arms.

The language they are speaking is unknown to me. I can’t understand it, it’s unintelligible, but I do understand the tone of their voices, which is not pleasant at all. It is annoying, deep, and harsh like an axe that has just hit another centenarian tree. 

No thoughts about my future job anymore. Out of the blue they vanished. 

The two men are now very close to me so that I can smell the strong odor of beer on their breaths. 

‘Will they do me any harm? A minute has passed. Two, three, four maybe five. I don’t know how many. 

Don’t you dare approach me any step closer, you, dirty drunkards!’ I thought, fixing my reproaching eyes on them. 

I continue glaring at them incessantly.

They utter even odder sounds. 

Standing up, the blond man unbuckled his belt and spread it laden across his waist. After some interrupted dripping sound, a sigh of relief ensued.

These seconds appear like eons to me. Will they see me?

Luckily, since it is noon, one group of parishioners are coming our way. It’s the call for the newcomers to get going. A dire situation is gone. 

In a few seconds, all I can see is the sky, those stones, the ripples in the river, flowers, paradise on earth. 

A great relief, I am unharmed. I am one day closer to myself in the future. Whatever I do, hopefully, I will live until old age. Only if everybody knew the following…

Never do you go so far away that you get yourself involved in any kind of a ‘bizarre’ situation. 

You are not born to hurt anyone; this is the part of your disposition, your thoughts, your actions, your upbringing, but what about him? 

What about them, or her? 

Stay focused. 

Your perspective is not the same as the one from other people; you are never too young to realize it. 

It’s always the right age and right time to discuss it with anyone, with people close to you, your parents, family, educators, friends, role models. 

My parents have somehow failed to talk about traumatic experiences in life, but they prayed to God to be with me at all times, which, being a parent myself, I am sure of now. Innocently enough, they believed that when you talk about such things, those things are evoked somehow and might become part of your reality so they preferred not to talk too often, or not at all. Perhaps, such an attitude of them somehow made me partially blind and deaf for my two teenagers' constant love troubles.

You just have to know to protect yourself instinctively no matter how young or old you are, and not to walk dangerous paths where no one can see you. 

Otherwise, colors of the rainbow mirroring in the river will not be seen by your eyes, ever again. 

Others will be able to watch their exquisiteness, not you, but just temporarily, too. 

Only then did I understand the power of knowledge, the power of prudence, the power of language, the power of luck, the power of safety, the power of always having the one by your side, the power of being with the one who knows all your steps, so it set my thoughts to the direction I am heading to incessantly. Hence, it is at all times you, yourself, and the person(s) that matter(s), never the materialistic things. 

Now, being an adult, at some celebrations or at home when I have company, I drink a glass of martini, a glass of mojito, a glass of red wine, a glass of any drink, one glass, rarely two, and not ever one beverage that so many in my neighbourhood savour drinking – beer. 

I think that I finally know the reason why. 

                                                                                          by Lily Blue