memory and no past. I am like some new attractive TV star appearing in a new serial, or childishly astonished like a fugitive who sees the stars for the first time after years of being incarcerated in a dungeon. I heard the call of silence, the like of which I had never before experienced, and I kept asking: Why buses, nights, towns? Why all these roads, bridges, faces? Why solitude that like a hawk overwhelms the night? Why words that get caught in appearances? Why time that has no return? I could hear the crackling in the earth and the ticking of my watch. Time is three-dimensional silence, the book said. I said to myself: So I am to die without understanding the three dimensions in the slightest, without comprehending life, the world, and the book, without, even, seeing you once more, Janan. That was how I was talking to the stars, these brand-new stars, when a childish thought came to me childishly: I was still too much of a child to die. And feeling the warmth of the blood that trickled from my forehead down on my hands, I felt the happiness of discovering, once again, the tactual, olfactory, and visual properties of things. I regarded this world, happy and loving you, Janan.
Back where I left the unfortunate bus on the spot where it had rammed with all its might into a cement truck, a cloud of cement dust hung like a miraculous umbrella over the dying. A stubborn blue light was leaking out of the bus. Hapless passengers who were still alive and others who would not stay alive much longer were coming out the rear exit, cautiously as if stepping on the surface of a strange planet. Mom, Mom, youâre still in there, but I got out. Mom, Mom, blood is filling my pockets like coins. I wished to communicate with them, with the avuncular man crawling along the ground, his hat on his head, a plastic bag in his hand; the fastidious soldier who was bent over carefully examining the rip in his trousers; the old lady who had abandoned herself to jubilant chatter now that she had been granted the chance to address God directly. I wished to impart the significance of this unique and impeccable time to the virulent insurance agent who was counting the stars, to the dumbfounded daughter of the mother who was pleading with the dead driver, to the men with mustaches who were strangers to each other yet holding hands and dancing for the joy of being alive, swaying gently like people who have fallen in love at first sight. I wished I could tell them that this unique moment was a felicity granted all too rarely to Godâs creatures like us, saying that you, O Angel, would appear only once in a lifetime in this wondrous time beneath the miraculous umbrella of cement dust, and ask them why it was that now we were all so very happy. You, mother and son clutching each other hard like a pair of dauntless lovers and freely weeping for the first time in your lives, you, the sweet woman who has discovered that blood is redder than lipstick and death kinder than life, you, the spared child standing over your dead father clutching your doll and watching the stars, I ask you: Who was it that granted us this fulfillment, this contentment, this happiness? The voice inside me gave one word as an answer: Departure ⦠departure ⦠But I had already understood I was not yet to die. The elderly woman who was soon to expire asked me the whereabouts of the cabin attendant to get her luggage out of the hold immediately because, although her face was crimson with blood, she was hoping to get to the next town where she was to catch the train in the morning. I was left holding her blood-soaked train ticket.
I boarded the bus through the rear to avoid looking at the front-row passengers whose dead faces had been plastered on the windshield. I became aware of the sound of the motor running, reminding me of the horrible engine noise on all the buses I had ridden; what I heard was not deathly silence but living voices that were grappling with
Back where I left the unfortunate bus on the spot where it had rammed with all its might into a cement truck, a cloud of cement dust hung like a miraculous umbrella over the dying. A stubborn blue light was leaking out of the bus. Hapless passengers who were still alive and others who would not stay alive much longer were coming out the rear exit, cautiously as if stepping on the surface of a strange planet. Mom, Mom, youâre still in there, but I got out. Mom, Mom, blood is filling my pockets like coins. I wished to communicate with them, with the avuncular man crawling along the ground, his hat on his head, a plastic bag in his hand; the fastidious soldier who was bent over carefully examining the rip in his trousers; the old lady who had abandoned herself to jubilant chatter now that she had been granted the chance to address God directly. I wished to impart the significance of this unique and impeccable time to the virulent insurance agent who was counting the stars, to the dumbfounded daughter of the mother who was pleading with the dead driver, to the men with mustaches who were strangers to each other yet holding hands and dancing for the joy of being alive, swaying gently like people who have fallen in love at first sight. I wished I could tell them that this unique moment was a felicity granted all too rarely to Godâs creatures like us, saying that you, O Angel, would appear only once in a lifetime in this wondrous time beneath the miraculous umbrella of cement dust, and ask them why it was that now we were all so very happy. You, mother and son clutching each other hard like a pair of dauntless lovers and freely weeping for the first time in your lives, you, the sweet woman who has discovered that blood is redder than lipstick and death kinder than life, you, the spared child standing over your dead father clutching your doll and watching the stars, I ask you: Who was it that granted us this fulfillment, this contentment, this happiness? The voice inside me gave one word as an answer: Departure ⦠departure ⦠But I had already understood I was not yet to die. The elderly woman who was soon to expire asked me the whereabouts of the cabin attendant to get her luggage out of the hold immediately because, although her face was crimson with blood, she was hoping to get to the next town where she was to catch the train in the morning. I was left holding her blood-soaked train ticket.
I boarded the bus through the rear to avoid looking at the front-row passengers whose dead faces had been plastered on the windshield. I became aware of the sound of the motor running, reminding me of the horrible engine noise on all the buses I had ridden; what I heard was not deathly silence but living voices that were grappling with
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