“Here you are,” Maria Olegovna Ivanova placed a plate with steaming risotto in front of Grigory on a table covered with a white beautiful tablecloth.

“Thank you,” the young man smiled.

Kirill Petrovich Ivanov smirked, “She cooks this meal the best. We call it her masterpiece.”

Grigory nodded his head as a sign of gratitude and looked at Kristina. Her eyes were shining with happiness because the evening went perfect so far.

When Kirill Petrovich met his daughter’s boyfriend for the first time tonight, he liked him. Grigory’s handshake was firm and confident. His black eyes had a straight look. While Maria Olegovna was preparing dinner, Kirill Petrovich, Kristina and Grigory sat in the cosy living room and talked. Ivanov was telling about his liberal views – resentment against monopolies, support for value of human rights, freedom of speech, and Grigory expressed his solidarity by enthusiastic nods. A sincere engagement into the conversation was conveyed via the young man’s forward-leaning posture and eyes fixed at Kirill Petrovich’s face.

Now, looking at Grigory, Ivanov felt a tickling of pain in his heart. He realized how many years have flown by. His daughter was an adult already and soon could get married and leave the family. He remembered one sunny day 15 years ago when he was playing with his little girl in a house yard. He was running away from her, and she was chasing after him, moving her tiny feet in a clumsy manner. Kirill Petrovich sighed with nostalgia and chewed the first spoon of creamy risotto.

“Tell us, what do you study? What do you want to do in the future? Kristi never tells us anything. She says she wants us to make our own judgement,” Maria Olegovna broke the silence, “I think she is just playing a role of an independent adult.”

“Mom!” Kristina exclaimed with displeasure in her voice, “Please, don’t bother Grisha with our family business.”  

“Don’t bother, don’t bother,” Mom teased her daughter, “Are you even going to invite us to your wedding?”

Kristina blushed, and Grigory spoke up. Kirill Petrovich knew that his daughter was angry at her Mom for being so fixed on the idea of marriage because she thought it was too early to speak of it. None of her close friends were married yet; they all were in the period of searching for the only one.

Kirill Petrovich was satisfied that the young man showed sensitivity to Kristi’s unspoken wishes and stopped the teasing that was annoying for her. When I was in love, I tried to guess every wish of hers, Ivanov thought, giving a glance back at his youth. He recalled how once he could not sleep for the whole night because Maria cancelled their date without any explanations. On the next day he went to see her, and they had a terrible fight. With her lips trembling and her brows looking red and puffy after long crying, she blamed him for loving another girl. For hours he dissuaded her, and eventually they got reconciled. He still remembered the feeling of happiness that spinned his head when he hugged and kissed her.

Where is this passion now? he wondered with another tickling of nostalgia. Over more than 20 years of their marriage, Kirill Petrovich had studied his wife in great depth. The adventurous spirit of exploration that inhabited Ivanov’s heart and made him nervous and stressed out at times when he could not guess Maria’s wishes, had deserted him…

“I’m studying on the Faculty of Physics and Mathematics,” Grigory was saying, “I have a part-time job as a street-sweeper. I have always been passionate about planes. I’d like to connect my future with aviation.”

“I am working as the Head of Flight Operations in Federal Air Transport Agency,” Kirill Petrovich said smiling.

“Wow! Kristina never told me that!” Grigory exclaimed. His spoon froze mid-way towards his mouth. Then amusement in his face got substituted by a tense expression of inner struggle. He frowned and lowered his eyes. It seemed that he was debating something in his mind. Eventually he chose to chew risotto and remain silent. However, the expression of disapproval did not leave his face. Kirill Petrovich noticed that his daughter looked uncomfortable – her eyes were rushing about, her cheeks turned crimson. He suggested that she did not tell Grisha about them, her parents, because she wanted to look as much independent as possible.

Suddenly Kristina started speaking in an a anxious voice, “Grisha wants to initiate a start-up. It’ll be a company that would help clients to choose the best private aviation training centers according to their needs.”

Kirill Petrovich thought: Am I so detached from my job in Kristi’s mind that she forgot that Grisha’s startup would be in direct competition with Federal Air Transport Agency? Moreover, tomorrow we’ll annul all pilot license granted by private centers.

“That’s brave. I encourage ambition!” Kirill Petrovich said despite of his thoughts because in his heart he supported the freedom of competition. He also remembered his youth when he dreamed of founding a huge successful company. It was something connected with optics. I wanted to sell the best glasses in the world, Kirill Petrovich thought with another tickling of nostalgia.

“Thank you, Kirill Petrovich…” Grigory made a pause. The doubts that visited him several seconds ago came back. Eventually, he gave way to the decision to speak out, “I understand that this startup might worsen the competition for Federal Air Transport Agency. The governmental aviation training centers are much more expensive than private ones. Frankly speaking, I can’t think of any pluses that they have.”

Kirill Petrovich felt respect to this young man for his courage. If Ivanov had not been the Head of Flight Operations in Federal Air Transport Agency, he would have shaken Grigory’s hand and agreed with him entirely. However, his post did not allow him to do so. Kirill Petrovich lighted a cigarette that he always did when he went against own views and leaned back in his chair. He hated his own well-moderated and calm voice when he repeated the official rhetorics of Federal Air Transport Agency, “Private centers use unrecognized training programs. They falsify the numbers of training flights that pilots had.”

Kirill Petrovich looked straight into Grisha’s widely opened eyes and despised himself. Have I selled myself entirely? Have I completely betrayed my liberal views? I am lying to this young man… His hand that was holding the cigarette trembled, and a pinch of ash has landed on his shirt.

“Okay, it’s enough talking about business!” Maria Olegovna broke the tense silence, “Kristi, help me to clean up and make tea.”

Kristina stood up, looking upset that her words caused an uncomfortable situation. Kirill Petrovich hurriedly changed the subject.

“Have you been abroad?” he asked Grigory who made a visible effort to conceal disappointment that his face was conveying.

***

On the next day, Kirill Petrovich woke up with a heavy feeling in his chest. He struggled to fall asleep during the night, and a slumber that descended on him closer to dawn did not bring refreshment. Ivanov sat up, looked at his wife who was still sleeping and sighed deeply. Wrinkles were covering his solemn face. There were bags under his eyes. He stood up, sensing pain in his back and knees, and slowly headed to the bathroom.

Today Kirill Petrovich had to become an executioner who would break lives of hundreds of people. Even the word ‘executioner’ is too mild for the duty that I’ll carry out today, the man thought while brushing his teeth and looking at his exhausted face reflected in the mirror, I will be a vile murderer who would betray own views and stab the knife into men’s backs.

After several minutes of emptiness in his mind, during which the hand performed routine movements with the toothbrush, Kirill Petrovich started shaving. He stared at his old face, at his hair with glitter of greyness, at his eyes that stopped shining and turned dim and dull. A miserable ‘liberal’, he told himself with a mocking smile and felt how the pain in his chest intensified. For the first time in 30 years he reconsidered cutting his neck with the razor that he held in his hand. It’s so simple, he thought with a wave of depressive indifference to life that he once experienced in his youth.

Back then, he realized that he could not fulfil his dream of founding the huge corporation that would ship glasses and lenses all over the world. It happened after his new evolving company went bankrupt because it was outcompeted by another company that had a more effective advertising campaign. Young Kirill despite of having liberal views damned competition, bought a bottle of vodka, got drank and lost consciousness for the first time in his life. The next morning he considered suicide but love to Maria stopped him.

Did I agree to discredit all private aviation centers by annulling license that they give because it’s a revenge for my crashed dream? Kirill Petrovich thought, while washing away the shaving gel.

When he entered the kitchen, he saw that Kristi had already served him breakfast and was getting ready to go to university.

“Thank you, my dear,” he said in a cracking voice. What would she think about me when she hears the news? How will Grisha treat her after that? She seems to love him so much. If he leaves her, it’ll break her heart, Kirill Petrovich thought, while eating the omelet that seemed bland to him, However, I can’t lose my job now. I need it until Kristi is entirely independent.

On the way to work Kirill Petrovich kept regretting that he became an instrument of the insensitive government that decided to break dreams of innocent people and eradicate the freedom of competition. At the same time, he tried to steal his heart for the important duty that awaited him. He was staring at his hands holding the wheel and it seemed to him that the official explanation of Federal Air Transport Agency was tattooed on his knuckles: Federal aviation centers guarantee safety, as opposed to private ones. With trembling fingers Ivanov hurriedly lighted up a cigarette and inhaled tobacco several times. During the hour-long drive to work the text got imprinted into Ivanov’s mind to the extent that the man started believing in it.

After the annulation decree was published, Kirill Petrovich sighed and felt a void inside himself. He leaned back in his chair, craving for a cigarette. He drummed the surface of his desk with his fingers and stood up. Ivanov intended to go to the smoking area when his office phone rang. He ducked his head, slouched his shoulders, and sat down.

“Yes?” he said. His exhausted empty eyes were wandering around his cabinet. They stopped at the prize “Russian of the year” received just several months ago, at the portrait of the president that was hanging on the wall, at a small statue of a plane that Kristina once gave him as a birthday present and that was placed on his desk.

Suddenly his eyes widened, and drops of sweat appeared on his forehead.

“How?” was the only question Kirill Petrovich could mutter.

Then he stood up and headed out of the office with his hands hanging powerlessly on his sides. Instead of a smoking area, Ivanov was going to the administration office to write a resignation letter.

Later, while driving home, he was so focused on his thoughts, that he nearly caused an accident – he noticed that the front car had stopped at the last moment. Midway Kirill Petrovich went to a liquor store and bought a bottle of vodka. At home, he started drinking it alone, and when Maria Olegovna returned from work, she was shocked. Ivanov never drank vodka alone in the middle of the week; they usually allowed themselves to relax every Friday with a bottle of wine.

“What happened?” she asked, bemused.

Kirill Petrovich raised his red tear-soaked eyes and murmured:

“I got what I deserved…”

 

One day in the middle of spring 2019 I take a bus to Kelowna to view three rooms and choose one of them for rent for next year. It is warm in the bus, but instead of taking off my coat and reading a book, I close my eyes and allow the heat to take over me. I fall asleep. Midway to the first apartment on my list, I open my eyes and see how a middle-aged man gets on the bus. He looks like a traveler in his sleeveless dusty shirt and with a big black backpack.

The man sits opposite me and starts to inspect fellow passengers; his eyes roaming in search of eye contact. It irritates me because I generally avoid eye contact with unfamiliar people to the extent that often I might not even know how those around me look like. So, I close my eyes again and try to resume my nap. Meanwhile, the man initiates conversations with his neighbors in a loud and confident voice: “It’d be nice to travel on the roof, hey?” “Shall we open the window?” “It’s so hot!” Perhaps, I belong to the type of people who prefer minimum changes in their minimal circle of social interactions. 

Eventually I get off the bus and hurry through a quiet neighborhood to a large house owned by Nelly and her husband. As far as I know, there are several types of landlords who rent their private property:

• Politely distant.
• These are usually either landlords who are very busy or who lend apartments for the purpose of earning money.
• These are subdivided into extremely helpful and extremely controlling.

The politely distant landlords are usually those who carefully pick their tenants, verifying that the tenants would be a good match for other inhabitants of the house. These landlords establish friendly but superficial relationships with tenants. They do not engage in common activities with people who rent their accommodation.

Indifferent landlords are peculiar for their lack of care about personalities of tenants. They are ready to rent the accommodation to almost anybody as long as they are capable of paying. Usually such landlords are either entirely devoted to work or are unwilling to transform entirely capitalist relationships into those of a warm friendship.

Perhaps, the most contradictory category of landlords is invested ones. Being impassionate people, extremely helpful landlords might include their tenants into their close friend circle and offer as much help to them as possible even beyond the contract. Extremely controlling invested landlords might be strict with rules, generating revulsion in tenants. This latter subcategory is quite rare because after all the housing market is competitive.

Nelly who belongs to the category of politely distant landlords greeted me with a smile and reached out to shake my hand. It turned out that her house had rooms for 10 people. I examined the rooms, noticing signs of old age, such as cracks on walls and floors, peering from beneath the personal belongings of inhabitants. Antique style wall lights and chandeliers, fireplace in the living room surrounded by soft armchairs – everything made me feel accepted into an elite circle where everyone acts with polite manners, preserving the façade of decency not really caring about each other’s feelings and personalities. Then I noticed that there were no tables in rooms. Such configuration obliges tenants to share common areas for work and study.

I recalled the moments of small talk that always make me feel uncomfortable. Somebody asks me “how are you?” and I freeze for several seconds in confused silence, while the interlocutor walks away. Somebody asks me “how are your studies going?”, and I start telling about my struggles and interests only to notice that the person is bored and is waiting for their turn to speak. I imagine myself on one Sunday morning far in the future in this house furnished in antique style. I am sitting at the common table in the kitchen. A neighbor approaches me and asks: “How are you?” and I feel despair, while reflecting on the fact that we shared the house for five months, and still I have no idea about how to answer the question without detecting the interlocutor’s longing to talk about themselves through the thrashing of their eyes, rapid breathing, and half-opened lips.

Meanwhile Nelly asks me:

“Tell me a little about yourself. What are your interests?”

I look at the woman suspiciously. Again, I’ve to pretend, to make an effort and seem to be better than I am. Again, I have to find weasel words, walk through the conversation with carefulness of a sapper detecting mines that might destroy my image…

“Well, I love reading books and writing stories,” I say, trying to decipher the woman’s reaction. Her face does not change its calm expression of relaxed eyebrows, pale cheeks and lips closed without tightness.

“Okay,” she says, “do you have any questions for me then?”

I feel disappointed as I always do when I share personal information about myself and people do not react. I recall a painful situation. One girl whom I had not met for several months, asked me to tell about my life. It was an uncomfortable moment for a deep conversation. We both seemed to be in a hurry: she was with a group of friends, and I was walking to a class. Nevertheless, I started telling her about all major events that happened in my life. Midway through my monologue I noticed that the girls’ eyes were staring somewhere above my head and the fingers of her right hand were fidgeting the bracelet on the wrist of her left hand. I realized that I lost her attention. Suddenly, one of my classmates approached me and I turned away to greet her. When I looked back to find my interlocutor, she was gone.

As I start asking Nelly questions about the terms of the rent, I keep thinking: She could at least ask what my favorite book is and what kind of stories I write… In the end of the showing that lasts around 45 minutes, the landlord reassures me that I am a suitable candidate because I am a quiet person, not a party-goer. As I walk back to the bus station to go to the next room, I stare at the world around me, struck by its complexity. So many people live in these houses, and I don’t know anything about them. What a shame!

At my next destination I meet Jessica, a young friendly woman who belongs to the category of indifferent landlords who lease their property for the sake of earning money. She leads me into a small house intended for four people, shows me a tiny kitchen and a tiny room. Jessica does not ask any questions about my personality. Having inferred something about me, she says: “Your neighbors are all employed adults. You won’t see them most of the time: they go to work early and come back late.” The tour lasts for about 20 minutes. In the end Jessica expresses hope to see me again.

I head towards my last destination. The showing is scheduled for 4 p.m. and it is still 2 p.m. I decide to spend time in a café. While I order latte and wait for it in the queue, I feel sad that most interactions with others – greetings and friendliness – depend on the value of money. I take a seat opposite a window and stare at the street, while thoughts are roaming in my head like homeless cows. Most of the time I feel comfortable with this distance from others. However, on some occasions it becomes so unbearable that I want to crash things and cry. Probably, it is the delirium of a hot spring day, but it seems to me that a procession appears on the road. They are carrying a coffin covered with banknotes… I shudder and the illusion disappears.

The next landlord’s name is Lorenzo and he is an invested extremely helpful one. He is clearly Italian. Not only his name, but also the dark brown eyes, black hair and beard, active gesticulation and active changing of facial expressions, indicate his culture. While showing me the house, Lorenzo asks me many questions about my biography and shows interest in my answers: “Where are you from?” “Why did you decide to come to Kelowna?” “What are you studying?” With the loud knocks on the doors of the rooms Lorenzo informs his tenants about my arrival.

One of them, an Indian, comes out, greats us and offers a treat. We talk about our home countries, and the conversation leaves me with positive feelings. I soon realize that I do not care so much about the rooms in the house, but I am rather interested in talking to these friendly people and knowing them better. Then Lorenzo shows me the room that might potentially become mine.

There he tells me: “I’m looking for someone who will rent the room for a long time. I’ve wife and kids, and I don’t want to turn this into Airbnb. I don’t want people to come and go all the time. I’m very open for discussions because I create a family here. I don’t want to turn this house into a business. I’m focused on building long term relationships.”

I nod, feeling myself like a fish taken out of water. A battle is happening between my brain and heart. You don’t belong here. How do you imagine yourself building a family with strangers? My rationality is warning me. If I was an ideal version of myself who is capable of constructing friendship this house would be perfect for me! A dreamer inside me responds. Meanwhile, Lorenzo leads me outside of the house and asks: “Would you like to plant a garden with us?” I reply with an enthusiastic smile: “Yes, of course!”

When it is time for as to say “goodbye”, one more tenant, an international student, approaches us. He asks Lorenzo for advice about his car, and Lorenzo starts giving extensive recommendations about how to repair the engine. I listen and marvel at how incredible their relationship is. Then I recall times when I used to listen to others for hours, sometimes, not saying a single word, and my heart falls into my feet. I’m a good listener, but nothing more than that. Do I want to spend all year listening to others with an artificial smile when initial interest will have evaporated? I am not that kind of person who can build relationships with people in which both sides are satisfied. I’ll never be able to perceive my neighbors as a part of my family. These are not my values, not my modes of behavior.

On the way back to campus I face the necessity of making the choice. What would I prefer? Should I decide to live in Nelly’s house where there is no escape from eyes of others and where I will always have to be self-conscious? Should I decide to live in Jessica’s house and sign the contract dried from personal feelings? Should I become a member of Lorenzo’s community and plant the garden besides the house together with him and other inhabitants? As the bus is proceeding, I start to doubt the whole typology, as well as Lorenzo’s sincerity. It is impossible to categorize people and discern people’s values from their discourse. Who knows? A bureaucrat might one day act out of compassion, and the friendliest person might justify their behavior with pragmatic motives. I raise my eyes, look at the passengers who are surrounding me. I come to the conclusion that people are controversial and unpredictable. I can not be confident even about myself: perhaps, one day I will make eye contact with a stranger and initiate a conversation?

Madina Abdullaeva is a fourth-year Uzbekistani student in university X in country Y. She is pursuing her degree in Engineering. In mid-October she learns about a university competition and decides to take part in it.

“Do you have any ideas?” her friend of Y nationality asks her.

“Yes! A robot that detects racist attitude in people. It warns about it,” Madina replies with a strong Uzbek accent, “It regularly scans humans’ brains… It’s trained to recognize racism…hmmm… what type of brain activity correlates it!” her eyes are shining.

“Sounds cool!”

The countdown towards the competition begins. On the first day Madina shuts up in the apartment that she rents. She starts research that lasts all day and all evening. Her friends send her a message calling out for dinner. Madina does not reply. She is focused on the work and her phone is on Do Not Disturb mode. Her friends shrug and go to the café without Madina.

While they are enjoying sushi and milkshakes and sharing lighthearted laughs, Madina’s fingers are moving non-stop across the keyboard. Her eyes are attentively scanning the screen. In the same way eyes of a dog who is waiting for its owner are scanning people who exist a shop. When the owner appears, the dog’s eyes flash with happiness. Similarly, Madina’s eyes widen with joy when she comes across a good idea.

On the second day Madina can only talk about her findings. When she joins her friends of Y nationality at lunch, she speaks for half of an hour about medial frontal gyrus, right putamen, medial insula and the complexity of their interactions that produce unobjective hatred between people. She also delves into the realm of machine learning and outlines how a robot will be taught to identify hatred caused by racial stereotypes.

At first, Madina’s friends are attentively looking at the girl who is sitting in front of the plate with steaming rice and who is gesturing in an agitated manner. Gradually as they finish their meals, they start to wonder if anyone else will have opportunity to speak and share their news. As last drops of hope evaporate, guys and girls start leaving the table one by one. In the end, Madina is left alone with the riсe that cooled down on the plastic plate and the speech that is still carrying on in her mind.

Over the course of the next days, Madina can be seen in a café, or in the library, or in an empty classroom. While her locations around university change, her clothes – a sky blue sweater, black jeans and colorful snickers – remain unaltered. She invariably buries herself among piles of papers with designs and notes. Madina skips meals to save time and her eyes are shining with passion.

“You’re going crazy!” her friend of Y nationality tells her, “Just relax!”

No one among Abdullaeva’s opponents puts so much effort into their work. Jim Brown of Y nationality brags that he will spend just one hour on the presentation. He is a tall muscular guy who goes to the gym regularly. He is remarkable for having biceps that are larger than his head. “Improvisation is the key! I’m greater than the scum that surrounds me!” he proclaims among the circle of his close friends. When just one week until the day of competition is left, Jim Brown is still seen lifting weights in the gym in the afternoons and drinking beer with his friends in the evenings.

                                                                           ***

It takes Madina 10 hours to put together her presentation.

“Could you, please, review my speech and correct grammar mistakes?” Madina asks one of her friends of Y nationality.

“Yeah, go ahead,” the friend replies lazily and does not look up from the screen of the MacBook with charts for Mathematics class.

Madina and her friend are in the library. When Madina starts her presentation in a low quiet voice, people around look at her with comprehension. One girl packs her things in an annoyed manner and changes the seat.

“Yeah, it’s Okay,” Madina’s friend comments in the end of the talk with indifference and continues compiling graphs.

Madina’s blissful heart jumps from her chest into her throat. Her grammar is approved by a native speaker! Wow!

“Thank you so much!” Madina exclaims, peering into her friends’ emotionless face with her faithful eyes as brown as a beagle’s.

“Shhhh! Please, be quiet!” someone nearby hisses with irritation.

                                                                        ***

On the next day Madina’s heart is bouncing while she is waiting for the meeting with her supervisor. The professor is still busy reviewing the presentation of another student. 5 minutes pass… 10 minutes pass… Madina starts to look at her watches more often. She even opens Google Calendar and checks the time of her appointment. Everything is right. Eventually, half of an hour late, the student walks out of the classroom. It is Jim Brown. His chin is high up and he is grinning triumphantly.

“He has just made the whole presentation for me!” Jim whispers into Madina’s ear and winks at her.

Madina’s stomach shrinks, her nose crinkles, and she frowns. That’s unfair! Her mind is screaming inside her head. However, she suppresses this exclamation and lets Jim pass by. As Madina enters the room of the supervisor, the following thoughts are flashing in her head: I’d love him to give extensive critique, but no intervention. I’ll do everything myself!  

After Abdullaeva finishes her presentation, the professor just nods and says: “It’s Okay, Madina. Good job. Good luck!”

Madina leaves the office with her head lowered. Her lips are drooping and shaking. There is a tight knot in her throat. She stares at the world with her big tear-soaked eyes, while her stomach is shrinking more and more. Then everything inside her succumbs to this process of shrinking until she becomes as tiny and helpless as an ant.

                                                                         ***

On the last day before the competition Madina is resting in the armchair for the first time in three weeks. She is reading her favorite book and listening to the melancholic melody of rain outside. Suddenly she hears a noise. Her heart falls into her feet. Someone is walking from the kitchen towards her room. Oh, my God! Madina is shaking and hopelessly reaches for her phone but cannot grab it because there is no power in her trembling cold fingers.

“Who is here?” she screams.

No response… The steps cease for a moment… Boom, boom, boom – Madina’s heart is ready to burst in her chest.

Then the steps resume, and she cries out when she sees a skeleton. It is covered in spiders that are weaving webs in its eye sockets and around its bones. It is holding a dead peacock in curved phalanges of its right hand. The peacock has died recently for the colours of its tail are fading away in a rapid succession. The left arm is squeezing a black bag that is filled with some round objects the size of human head. Voices remarkable for their purely Y country’s English accents are heard from inside the bag: “Hey, Madina. What’s up?”, “We’re making Y great again!” Suddenly the skeleton drops both the peacock and the bag, bends its knees, makes a salto and turns into a wolf. The wolf howls and charges Madina to rip her chest apart.

“Oh, my God!” Madina screams and awakens from the nightmare covered in cold sweat and breathless.

                                                                     ***

It is Madina’s time to present. She walks on the stage and faces twelve judges – professors of X university. One of them has been to almost every country in the world. Another has volunteered for Human Rights Watch organization. The third speaks with the accent of Italian community in country Y. The fourth is involved into providing help to refugees. The fifth objects against the Trump wall. The sixth has an intercultural marriage. The seventh wears a kippah. The eighth gave a talk in Silicon Valley. The ninth contributes to the research on the Universal Basic Income. The tenth is an animal rights activist. The eleventh is dedicated to the problem of climate change. The twelfth is unremarkable.  

Abdullaeva has about three minutes to prepare. She is feeling butterflies in her stomach. Madina connects her laptop to projector, opens her presentation, occasionally glances at the audience and gasps… The twelfth professor has transformed into a skeleton from her nightmare. It is walking among the rows, cutting off the heads of other professors. Every head that falls on the table is collected and replaced with the head from the black bag. The neck and the new head attach perfectly. All the heads look identical. No one notices the crime of head stealing. Madina starts flickering and itching her eyes to get rid of the illusion. However, it does not go away, even after the head of the last victim is stolen.

Then Madina is asked by the moderator to start her presentation. Throughout her whole speech she is staring at the impudent skeleton that is sitting beside the eleventh victim. The skeleton is smiling encouragingly. When Madina finishes, the black bag with stolen heads explodes with screams: “Bravo! The idea is great! Madina Abdullaeva deserves the first place!” Madina bows and can not suppress a happy smile. As she leaves the stage, the skeleton vanishes in the thin air and the ovation fades away.

After an hour, Madina and other participants of the competition are informed that the prize was given to Jim Brown who forgot the words in the middle of his talk. Jim jumps up from his chair, claps his hands, and shows victory signs with his hands.   

Madina runs out from the hall and locks herself in the bathroom. She bursts into tears and weeps uncontrollably. She falls to her knees, her head is squeezed between her arms, her shoulders are jumping up and down. After an hour of shedding tears, she stands up and looks in the mirror at her red puffy eyes. She turns on the tap and starts washing her hot face with cool water. Then she starts staring at the vortex created by water flowing down the sink. This endless process of disappearance echoes her despair. Almost a quarter of an hour passes before she rises her eyes. The mirror reflects the skeleton behind her. It is smiling triumphantly.

Fiona, a second-year university student, woke up in her rented apartment. She sat down and stretched, spreading out her arms like wings. A broad smile appeared on her face upon recalling yesterday’s resolution: I’ll never go to a shopping mall again. To prove the seriousness of her oath, the girl donated a huge part of her belongings to a local charity organization.

Yesterday it took her 3 hours to transport all clothes doomed for donation to her Mercedes. Those neighbours who occasionally peered out of the windows could see a girl in a blue hoodie, black leggings and colorful snickers carrying huge plastic bags – 5 per arm. When Fiona was driving back, she felt as though she obtained wings. It seemed to her that she was not sitting behind the wheel, but rather floating in a cloudless sunny sky. Never again! Never again! a happy thought was buzzing in her head.

Everything in Fiona’s life up to this moment screamed of addiction to shopping. Her poor grades screamed addiction. She was constantly thinking about shopping malls, which screamed addiction. The tumor of emptiness that was growing larger and larger inside her screamed addiction.

This addiction that lasted for two years was finally overcome.

Today while brushing her teeth, Fiona was humming to herself: My grades will skyrocket!

Then she started flying around the kitchen. All her movements were unusually confident and powerful. She was wearing Calvin Klein underwear and a silk gown.  

Firstly, to one shelf to get a pan.

After that to another shelf to grab Quaker oats.

Almost immediately back to the cooker.

When the burner was on, she soared to the kettle and turned it on.

Throughout this activity, there was never a moment when the thought: I’m free! left Fiona’s mind.

Eventually breakfast was set up. The girl landed on the chair in front of her bowl with steaming porridge and a cup of coffee. Fiona switched on her iPhone to check social media. Hmm… an email… Fiona thought and tapped the screen. From Amazon… recent orders… suggestions… Hmm… I’m not interested in this anymore…

The girl put the spoon full of oats into her mouth. Several touches transported Fiona into Instagram.

Wow! So amazing! she gasped when she saw a new photo of her favourite model. The slim young woman was standing in front of an endless sea. She was wearing a light blouse from Nordstrom collection that was flapping in the wind.

Fiona felt a wave of unconditional love. She wanted to become a source of happiness for her magnificent role model. She wished to express gratefulness for daily inspiration. There was not a large choice of options of how to convey the breathtaking feelings. Fiona coloured a heart underneath the photo in red. Then she carried on chewing oats.

While driving to university in her Mercedes, Fiona felt that her wings weakened due to the email from Amazon and the sight of the model. The girl decided not to pay attention. For around a quarter of the first lecture Fiona was focusing on the professor’s speech.

Then flashes of memories started distracting her, like pheromones of a sweet taste distort the trajectory of a fly. The girl was recalling how she would sit at lectures and enjoy online-shopping. The surrounding world would cease to exist. Billions of splendid dresses would diffuse through her skin and substitute her blood cells and neurons. They would be endlessly circulating in her body and constantly firing in her brain. After each session Fiona would wake up to reality with a bitterly blithe smile.

Soon these memories became so lucid, that there was nothing left to do except to bring them to reality with several strikes of keys on her MacBook’s keyboard.

The lecture ended. The graphics of clothes got stuck in Fiona like threads of dreams. They intertwined with a blissful memory of ordering magnificent high-heeled shoes on Amazon. The agitated imagination set her hands to constant shaking. Only touching the smooth fabric of the blouse identical to the one that was on the model from Instagram could stop the trembling.

I shouldn’t fall into temptation, Fiona was still trying to resist.

After the second lecture she got her essay back. D+! That’s inevitable! I’ll never get even C! she wailed in her mind with an inextinguishable sadness. The inner struggle was over. Fiona dropped her MacBook into her backpack, put on her coat and left the classroom. The tread of her high-heeled shoes could be heard all around the university building. It resonated through the walls and caused a magnetic eraser to disconnect from a whiteboard in one of the classrooms and fall. The eraser hit the floor with a hollow and dull sound.

Here I come, Nordstrom! Fiona thought, turning on ignition in her Mercedes. The engine roared and the car moved ahead. Fiona’s hands were tightly squeezing the wheel and shaking uncontrollably. Her palms were sweating, leaving drops of moisture on the leathern surface. Apple watch on her wrist was detecting a pulse as fast as 120 beats per minute.

Then the colossal building appeared. It seemed as though infrastructure respectfully moved aside. The pheromones of sweet dreams and memories were all leading Fiona here. The highway kneeled in front of the department store, and Fiona’s car rushed down. The girl felt the painfully familiar knot of jubilation in her throat. Nordstrom was as majestic for Fiona as a Venus trap for a fly. She rushed into the store with her head freed from thoughts. There she found comfort.

Her fingers were caressing the soft fabric of clothes. She was blissfully burying her face in the soft folds of attires. She was inhaling the head-spinning aroma of luxury. Fiona did not suspect that her movements stimulated the trigger hairs of the Venus trap. The mouth of the carnivorous plant was shutting down above her head.

A green parasol with inscription “STARBUCKS COFFEE” provides sunshade for a couple of young immigrants. Susan and Michael sit opposite each other and wait for their French Vanilla Mochas to arrive. The woman is wearing a light blue dress with a big brooch which depicts a lily of the valley. The dress exposes the woman’s thin arms and slender legs for it covers only halves of her thighs. Susan has her latest version of MacBook in front of her and is focused on typing. Her eyes as brown as truffles are moving from left to right, while manicured fingers hit the keys with both English and Russian letters.

One time the woman gives the camera to her husband and leaves the table to pose for a photo. She is standing with her knees bent, with head cant and thick flying hair, while the camera is clicking. Then she sits back at the table and continues typing until barista serves coffee. “Thank you,” she says with a big smile, closes her laptop and puts it aside.

“How is the article going?” Michael asks his wife.

“Very well! I’ll submit it by the end of the week,” Susan replies and takes a sip of her sweet drink, “Oh my God! It’s so tasty! I love it! Sometimes I think that we’re in Paradise. Can’t believe it. A job that I absolutely love. Affording such amazing coffee on my birthday! In such country as U.S.! I’m in a philosophical mood today, you know? I believe that with hard work you can achieve anything. We achieved our Paradise together,” she tenderly puts her fingers on her husband’s hand that is resting on the surface of the table.

“I have a present for you, Susie,” Michael takes a small box out of his bag and gives it to his wife, “Happy birthday, my dear!”

“Oh, wow! Thank you!” Susan opens the box and her rounded eyebrows rise, she closes her mouth with her hands.

“It’s so pretty!” she starts walking around the table to give her husband a hug. He also stands up and they lovingly embrace each other. Then Susan puts the ring with a brilliant on her left middle finger.

Suddenly a person wearing rugs appears. He is strolling down the street with an absent gaze and a large plastic bag full of trash. He decides to rest under a parasol next to Susan and Michael. Susan’s lips pull up and her nose crinkles. She anxiously looks around and notices that other customers of Starbucks start frowning. Susan quickly puts the ring back into the box and hides it securely into her handbag. She also packs her laptop into her bag which she places on her lap.

Michael says, “There’s no need to be so worried. He won’t rob us.”

“How do you know?” Susan asks in a trembling voice, “I hate when these tramps come so close. Why the government doesn’t do anything about them? I actually hate these tramps who enjoy living like animals.”

Michael objects: “Susie, don’t call them animals. They don’t enjoy such life. Our society determines inequality. You and I are just lucky to have both suitable qualities and circumstances…”

Michael waves his hand at the barista.

“May I have a bagel, please?” he asks.

“Are you going to give it to this tramp?” Susan’s eyes become tense and narrow.

“Yes. I feel sorry for him.”

They continue drinking coffee in silence for around 10 minutes. Susan often glances at the man who is sitting on his plastic bag and staring at the blue sky with his red and emotionless eyes. Each time she shudders and hugs herself.

“Susie, let’s not spoil your birthday. We have different views but that’s okay,” Michael suggests peacefully.

“I want this tramp to disappear. I can’t bear him,” Susan says not caring whether anyone else hears her or not.

The barista approaches with the bagel.

Susan with her brows frowned observes how her husband approaches the man and gives him food. They exchange some words that Susan does not hear due to the traffic noise. When Michael comes back, Susan exclaims:

“I’ll call the police, so that they remove him from here. He is not supposed to be in the café because he is not paying. Why is the staff ignoring him?”

Susan takes out her phone.

“Oh my God!” Susan exclaims and shows the screen of her phone to Michael, “Look at this!”

Michael feels how his heart skips the beat when he notices unexpected fear in the raised eyebrows and opened mouth of his wife. He glances at the screen and reads: “Solar Superstorm Warning. Danger of solar superstorm hitting the Earth. Power grid in North America will be destroyed in 60 minutes. Do not panic. Check local authorities.”

Michael frowns his brows and his lips become tight. Susan starts googling “sun superstorm” on her phone.

“Let’s go! We have to get to the closest bank and withdraw money. Otherwise we will lose it,” Michael exclaims and looks around. People are yet unaware of the approaching catastrophe.

Susan does not hear him – she is too focused on skimming an article about solar superstorm. She sees with the corner of her eyes how Michael approaches people at the other table. They all jump to their feet. Gradually noise around Susan intensifies, people are engaged into nervous discussions.

“Let’s go! To the bank! To get the money!” Michael repeats loudly, as he approaches Susan.

“What’s the point?” Susan exclaims, raising her tear-soaked eyes that are black as night, “Money is useless now! Think about how many people will lose it in just one hour! Do you want to be murdered with so much cash on your hands?”

She stands up and looks at the sky. She is left breathless: Aurora is shining across the sky. Bright blue, green, magenta colors are reflecting in her eyes. Susan’s fingers find her wallet in her hand bag. She quickly walks into the café, leaving the bag with her laptop on the chair.

“I’d like a cake, please,” she gives the last cash she has to the young woman who looks shocked. The woman accepts cash and gives a plate with the cake. She is still not realizing that soon cash machines will stop working.

Susan approaches the poor man and gives him the cake. He is completely distant from the panic surrounding him. The pauper is enjoying the bagel; he gives Susan a toothless smile.

Susan smiles back and buries her face into her palms to hide the tears that rash out of her eyes that are dark as endless universe. Her shoulders are shudder due to laments.

 

Genes determined that by the age of 19 Karina was very slim, with a fragile skeleton, narrow skull and lantern jaws. The bones of her arms were visible reflecting the little volume of her muscle mass. Karina’s legs were slender with knees touching each other when she was standing straight. She had a friend Rachel whom she thought she knew perfectly well because together they did their homework, went to lectures, and were friends on Facebook and Instagram.  

On one day Karina woke up in the night and sensed not a bedsheet underneath herself but a rigid fur. Her nostrils took in a damp air of a cave. She sat down and her heart sank when she did not see the ceiling and walls of her dorm illuminated by reflections from streetlights. The impervious darkness that was surrounding Karina made her hands shake, her heart beat speed, and her head spin. She collapsed back on the fur and pressed her eyelids together as tightly as she could.

Karina woke up again when it was already the morning. What she saw first made her gasp. The cave not only remained the part of surrounding reality, but also obtained definitive shapes due to beams of sun that were getting inside. Through the entrance an endless sea was visible.

Suddenly Karina realized she was not wearing any clothes. Her cheeks turned bright crimson. This color intensified when the girl noticed that she was surrounded by naked people. One man with large muscular arms was sitting nearby and striking two rocks together. Repetitive clashes were routinely intensified by echoes. He had large brows and hair all over his tanned body.

Karina covered herself in the fur trying to relax the muscles on her face that immediately contracted in a grimace since the fur was covered in drops of dry blood. The girl remained motionless. Meanwhile, there was a constant whirl of activity around. Some women were producing diverse sounds that did not make any sense for Karina. The females organized themselves in a band and left the cave presumably to search for food. Children were restlessly running around and shouting so loudly that Karina’s head started aching. She was shifting her eyesight from the kids to a man in the middle of the cave chamber who was patiently grinding two wooden sticks together.

Eventually Karina felt that she could not bear it any longer. She stood up and headed towards the entrance of the cave. As she passed among men and women who remained in the cave, they all resumed their activities and did not stare at their uninvited “guest”. Outside of the cave in a distance Karina saw people walking along the marine and perhaps collecting seafood like turtles, seashells. However, the girl did not join them, but wondered away along the sea.

She was strolling bare foot in green grass under burning sun and gazing at the wild landscape. Her hands were still clutching the fur skin wrapped around her body despite of heavy drops of sweat that appeared on her forehead and back of the neck.

Suddenly Karina froze. In a short distance she noticed several large and extremely thin hyenas each reaching her chest. Her hands were strongly trembling as she crumpled the fur in a measly semblance of a shield. Ugly muzzles were approaching; robust canines were glittering in the sun. The closest hyena attacked. Karina screamed in a high-pitched voice she never thought she possessed; felt how the jaws closed around the fur skin. It seemed that the canines have pierced her hand. Simultaneously she experienced pain and suffocation as if her spine crashed as it hit the soil…

Loud calls and shouts resembling those that Karina heard in the cave arouse. The girl felt that the hyena let go of her arm. She opened her eyes and saw how several strong and muscular men and women with large stones and wooden spears were fighting against the hyenas. Karina collapsed.

She regained her consciousness in the cave. A woman who could hardly be described as gracile with a scar across her cheek sat nearby consuming mollusks whom she extracted from shells that were burned. Behind her back a fire was flaring, and other members of the band were holding mollusks in their hands waiting for them to open up. The woman noticed that Karina was looking around and made a strange sound, simultaneously stretching her arm and dropping a mollusk on the fur beside Karina.

Karina sat up, deeply sighed and started to slowly move her eyes towards her right hand that was still hurting. “Phew,” she breathed out, noticing that her arm still consisted of three parts and only deep scratches covered by the blood that dried out were visible. Her spine was aching, but this was a tolerable pain.

Karina realized how thirsty she was. She caught the woman’s look and imitated drinking from a bottle, then made a pleading sign. The woman frowned, took the mollusk and threw it on Karina’s lap. The girl shook her head and scratched the back of her head. Then in an inspiration she performed a gesture she would make when drinking from a brook.

The woman repeated the gesture, then stood up and headed in the darkness of the cave. Karina followed, wrapping herself in the fur – the farther they went from the hearth, the colder the air was getting. The large round shoulders of the “guide”, her strong arms still visible for the girl due to the glow of the fire did not mind the frigid condition of the cave’s intestine.

Finally, Karina shaking from head to toes heard the sound of streaming water. At the same time, the silhouette of the “guide” vanished in the darkness and the girl’s heart started skipping beats.

Suddenly someone’s hand grasped Karina’s wrist making her gasp. It took her several seconds of desperate panic to convince herself that she was grabbed by the woman and not a cave bear.

She was being pulled down, so she kneeled and felt how her hand was plunged into… “Ahhh!” Karina screamed withdrawing her hand as quickly as possible from the water cold as hell. The echo was still repeating “Ahhh”, while Karina heart was pounding in her queering chest. She heard the woman beside her drinking. It took the girl a while to regain control over herself and manage to satisfy thirst by lapping the water like an antelope.

On the next day Karina woke up both thirsty and hungry. After she has rubbed her eyes, she began searching for the woman who took care of her yesterday. However, all the women around were unfamiliar. So, Karina ventured to go and find the brook on her own. As she was kneeling near the stream, she kept glancing into the depth of the cave and imaging how a bear would attack her and tear to pieces.

When she came back to the camp, she took several stones and approached a man who was in the process of making a tool. She sat opposite to him and waved. The man ignored her gesture, however, all people nearby started staring at Karina. When she exclaimed: “Hey!” others made themselves scarce. The man still did not rise his head. However, his lips became curved downwards and a frown appeared on his wrinkled forehead. “Could you, please…” Karina began when suddenly a man roared, grabbed a bone lying next to him, stood up and hit the girl’s head with it.  

A stream of tears rushed out from her eyes as she ran away and hid behind a stalagmite. A half of the day passed before she gained enough courage to approach a group of women who were busy striking stones together and possibly making tools. She anxiously observed their reactions: nobody frowned, nobody roared. On the contrary, one of the women – in whom Karina recognized her “guide” – immediately turned towards Karina and started showing where to strike the stones. Her fingers were dirty and with long broken nails.

Karina spent four days manufacturing her weapon. During this period, she fed on mollusks whom other women brought to the cave. The polish on her nails was wiped off and a nail on index finger got broken. Still, she felt warm gratitude towards the woman with the scar while she was giving the final touches to the spear.

On the fifth day Karina departed from the cave with a group of female gatherers. Her friend was among the band. They wondered away so far from the cave that Karina became terrified as to how they would find their way back. While she was anxiously looking around, her companions were calmly collecting seashells and turtles and dropping them into fur skins. She made an incredible mental effort to memorize the route as they walked back loaded with seafood. This habit of memorization saved her life when one day she went to the savannah with her scarred friend and several other women to hunt hedgehogs and collect ostrich eggs.

Hunting and gathering required a lot of patience and endurance as the band roamed the landscape under the heating sun. Suddenly, Karina felt herself sick. A loud buzzing noise invaded her head which started spinning uncontrollably. Everything became blur. Then darkness…

Karina awakened still in the savannah in the high grass. She must have been lying there for a long time since the sun was closer to the horizon and the unbearable heat receded. The girl’s head was bursting with pain and she needed water. Nobody was around. Holding back tears, feeling hatred to the woman with the scar whom she considered her friend, the girl staggered back to the cave. She was recollecting the way with enormous efforts. By the time she reached the entrance of the cave she was not sure if her head was aching due to the heat stroke or mental work. Surprisingly she managed to get to the brook and drink despite of her exhaustion. Then she curled up in her corner of the cave and fell asleep immediately.

Karina woke up in her dorm and heard knocking on the door. “Phew,” she breathed out and wiped away the sweat from her forehead. She sat up. Her blanket was lying on the floor and her bedsheet was craped. Knock, knock, knock!

“I’m coming!” Karina exclaimed and walked to the door feeling herself as light as if she got into zero gravity.

“Hi, Rachel,” she said smiling and immediately felt shivers down her spine – Rachel was frowning.

“I’ve been waiting so long for you! Did you forget that we arranged to have breakfast together?” Rachel grumbled.

“Oh, I’m so terribly sorry, Rachel,” Karina folded her hands in the pleading sign, “Let’s go to drink,” she folded her hands as if drinking from the brook, “and have something to eat.” She imitated sucking out a mollusk from a seashell. Rachel’s eyebrows raised, her eyes widened, and her mouth opened.

“Aren’t you going to get changed? How about brushing your teeth?” she nearly screamed in a high pitch, staring at Karina’s nightshirt.

“Where are they!?” Karina exclaimed looking around for hyenas and immediately felt that her cheeks turned crimson color.

“In your room. What’s the matter with you?”

“Oh, that dream…” Karina mumbled wondering whether to describe it as a nightmare or not. A hundred of questions were whirling around in Karina’s head: Rachel, what are your hobbies? What makes you most annoyed? What makes you most happy? What are you most scared of? Would you ever abandon a friend? If you would, why? What do you value in people the most? and so on. She was trembling with jubilant excitement as she looked forward to getting the answers.

They met each other while they were volunteers on archaeological excavations in Israel. At first, they just spent time in the common circle of volunteers, keeping each other’s names in memory: Jack and Lily. Two young people in mutual attraction soon found out that they lived in cities situated relatively nearby.

Then she began to approach him, when he was lying on the ground, resting after the tiring day of fieldwork. Lily would lie besides the young man on artificial grass of a yard circumscribed by houses where volunteers lived. The girl was attracted to strength that Jack’s body with larger robust bones and muscles illuminated.

While they were discussing similarities and differences in their life experiences: films, books, travels, they were getting used to each other’s presence, manners of speech and gestures. Being together simultaneously with perceiving sounds of nature – high-pitched whining of jackals exotic for ears used to city noises, singing of invisible birds – increased levels of dopamine in both young people. Consequentially, joint stargazing became a habit recorded in neural pathways.

On one evening Jack and Lily had a philosophical conversation:

– You know, I nearly canceled the whole trip altogether ’cause my Mom got very ill. Fortunately, doctors didn’t diagnose anything life-threatening, – Jack said thoughtfully, sensing Lily’s head on his shoulder. The weight of this head with burnished dark hair was stimulating sensory neurons to deliver signals to the brain that instead of provoking attempts to get free from the pressure caused the increase in levels of oxytocin.

– That’s great, – Lily replied. Then she added after a short pause, – I was also hesitant about coming, – she smiled, trying to catch Jack’s eyesight, – my friends were trying to change my mind: “why would you spend half of the summer in mud?” – Lily laughed, while her hippocampus was recreating the faces of her friends.

– I think, it’s our destiny… There is a meaning behind the fact that we both had obstacles. It means we should be together, – Jack suggested. The dim light from the far stars was hitting his retina and traveling to area VI of his brain. Was there any meaning behind the appearance of the universe?

Lily was not responding for a while. At first, she was blithe about his hint on having feelings towards her. Then, she perceived the meaning of Jack’s words and compared them to her own world view:

– Well, I doubt there’s a meaning out there…

Then the conversation faded away…

When the season of excavations ended, Lily and Jack kissed one last time before parting. Alas, their romantic relationship started to decline rapidly after separation. Jack was relying on somebody to bring them together, however, no coincidences happened any more. On whatever concert of popular music band or other excavations Jack went, Lily did not. Online conversations between them were happening less and less often. Lily felt that Jack’s efforts to support their status of a couple attenuated, and she assumed that it was partly because of his waiting in vain for an external force. Lily did not want to reflect meanings, she wanted to construct them. So, after sending a break-up message to Jack, she started a new relationship.

Did this decisive action trigger Jack to reconsider his world views? Let’s ask his ancestors, the early humans, who performed rituals in attempts to reflect meanings of the external world. Their believes into the ability to have control over nature slowly pushed their cognitive evolution forward. Their world views are fossils in the layers of coeval outlooks. No wonder, Jack blamed Lily of sinfully disobeying the Higher Order and put a lot of effort into exhibiting a flawless behavior in his every day routine.

Juliet with eyes closed from pleasure was slowly sucking up chocolate milkshake through a plastic straw. She wore an elegant evening dress that made her slender body look attractive. A bangle butterfly bracelet surrounded one of her thin wrists. Juan stood beside her, feeling how his arms were sweating, even though it was a warm summer evening. The young pair was on the pier Torpedo Wharf facing the Golden Gate Bridge lit up with torches.

‘The water is so mysterious. When I was a little girl, I wished to become a mermaid,’ Juliet whispered.

‘You’re like a mermaid,’ Juan said, and the pace of his heart beat sped up when he looked at her…

In the Pacific Ocean, miles away from the place where the couple’s feet touched the ground, a young pilot whale was suffocating and swimming with great difficulty. He was starving but could not eat because his stomach was full of plastic mistaken for food that has not digested. It was hard for him to breath; he lost his pod; he was lonely.

‘May I call you… my mermaid?’ Juan asked in a quiet voice that was nevertheless thick with emotion. Juliet turned to face him, and he saw her wide smile.

‘Of course,’ she replied. Juan, feeling blithe about the beginning of “forever together”, embraced her graceful waist. 

The pilot whale gave up the struggle and let the ocean current to carry him; his heart pulsing slower and slower…

Juan and Juliet’s lips started getting closer. Due to an impulse, Juliet’s hand that was holding the now empty plastic cup let it go. Both her arms passionately wrapped around Juan’s neck. The cup fell into the “mysterious” waters of San-Francisco Bay.

The sunset was reflecting in the opened but motionless eyes of the pilot whale as his now dead body was floating on the surface in solitude. 

The black butterfly that was attached to Juliet’s bracelet suddenly came to life, flapped its wings and raised in the air unnoticed because the only pair of eyes that could have seen it was closed due to a flame of passion ignited by the kiss. The perturbations that the butterfly produced pushed the cup further into the ocean…