XXXVII
He felt his head explode, the excruciating pain he had felt was nothing compared to the drop that had been falling on his head all night. It almost seemed to dig a hole in his skull. He wondered if it was like crying on the inside, his brain bathing in the tears and mud of his history.
He wanted to disappear, feeling sluggish and sad. He wanted it all to end and the ways, he knew, were two, either talk or die.
It was since that night, since he had seen her in the house with Luka, that he wanted to disappear, but these were the moments when you understand who is the champion, who is the hero who comes out after suffering blows and he no longer counted the times when he had spoken to death asking for a kiss on the forehead and fuck all those dames who would like to see him hanged, full of jewels to be worth something at least externally, he did not need them, his jewels were the faces of those who smiled when they were helped.
And fuck Prince Luka too, who was in his way. Yes, because he had decreed himself guardian of the only thing he really wanted. At least he, unlike him, had made Antoinette a woman.
Before her there had been other desires and dreams that he hadn't been able to realize, things he hadn't been able to have, that's maybe why he had taken everything else for others like him and now, every rich man who passed by, was his prey.
He lived in the dramas but he had made his peace with it, by now he didn't care if people lived or died in his assaults, so much that what was him was shamelessly killed and his friends who had left, surely, were better off than him.
May they rest in peace.
But what peace? There is not a single place in the universe to be at peace, not even near the Christ would those like them have found it.
He was chained to the ground, without his warmth he seemed to be a flower in the cold wrapped in frost.
He would have cried for hours and days on end promising her to be better, to make it up to her.
He felt empty, now more than ever he would have bet that opening his chest he would find nothing.
And he wanted to go back to his room to read the rhymes he was fond of, he wanted to go back to when he was free to take opium without worrying about finding company and ending up in his bed, a bed that hid a tombstone because that was where he died every time, between paranoia and lies told to himself. That's why he walked around with a dull look, let his hatred pour out on the bellies of satisfied girls, filled the void, a voice whispered in his ear that he was depressed but he didn't believe it, took drugs and alcohol and vomited a bit of soul around the streets of Paris while telling himself that he couldn't stay in this evil forever.
Then she had arrived in that square packed with people, she who had made him dream of a house in the green of Provence, a house with a view of the sea, with the wind blowing in her hair and she, who on the cliff, waited for him to come back from fishing.
She was like a precious stone shining in a seabed.
It had vanished with her that fantasy.
What an idiot he had been. Following a mirage in a barren desert. What had he been thinking?
This is what love had led him to.
He screamed with as much breath as he had in his throat, until his voice was hoarse, he screamed in despair and defeat. Maybe he would have emptied himself a little more inside, maybe he would have felt less pain.
<
He woke up when he heard the voice of a man who seemed to almost mock him.
<
<< I just think it's good to talk about it.>> The voice seemed to stop mocking him on the other side of the wall.
He didn't answer for at least two minutes. Then he sighed.
<< Why are you here? >>
<< I killed a man who apparently someone cared about, but he was just scum.>>
He looked bitter.
<< Do you usually pick those who have no affections?>> He feared the answer but he had posed in a swaggering, cocky way, almost mocking him.
<< I don't usually kill. You? Why do they treat you like this? >> He seemed to want to hurry up and change the subject. For some reason he didn't want to be the one examined.
<< Because I loved.>>
He closed his eyes and a drop fell on his skull again, with the same frequency as hours now. It was becoming a deafening annoyance in his head. He would have gone mad.
<< Love is an ugly fault. You deserve worse.>>
<< What are you doing, teasing? >> Adrien snorted.
<< I wondered who the hell you loved to make you like this.>> Curiosity and compassion shone through his voice.
<
<< I heard you cursing in the torture room, even insulting a certain Prince Luka and for making a prince lower himself to come here...did you fuck his mommy? >> He giggled at the stranger.
<< I think worse, but I don't want to talk about it. >> If only he could he would have loved to lower his head, but he couldn't even turn towards the window, his head was held down by a crude tool to prevent him from escaping the drops.
<< What do you care? We're going to die anyway.>> he said with extreme disregard for his own sad words.
Adrien had imagined him shrugging with a bitter smile on his face.
He had a point, but it hurt terribly to talk about it. It made his defeat more real. She, really, had been there, had existed, had had her...and then what? How had he lost her so easily?
<< I lived in a bad neighborhood, but it didn't matter because I only came home to sleep, I never wanted to have an education because I hated those who had one, I liked to go around with my gang, we made trouble, we got into fights, a desperate one practically, I idled and wasted my time. >> She heard him sigh.
<< Why are you telling me this? >> Adrien asked.
<
<< How old are you? >> Asked the blond, now intrigued.
<< Too many, for not having really lived, too few to be able to die.>> He sneered, hoping to have confused him.
<< I don't think it's ever too late to live.>>
<
< A few seconds of silence passed in which the man on the other side of the wall tried to take all the strength he had in his body to begin his story.
<< I said, I was a wretch with no future, then, almost like a manna from heaven, a miracle wanted by God only for me, she arrived. A woman with the appearance of an angel. She wasn't perfect, but she was for me. She was beautiful, blonde, emerald green eyes, slim, with an angular face but the sweetest character I have ever known. I had fallen in love with her before I even knew how she smelled. I don't know how or why but she reciprocated my feelings. We loved each other, madly. That love consumed me.
I discovered that she was promised to a nobleman but that she would never marry him, she loved me, she wanted me. Can you imagine the joy of realizing that she preferred a poor man like me to a rich man?
We ran away, we hid for years, we started a family but...>> He froze suddenly.
Adrien wondered why, but perhaps the answer was in the man's broken voice.
Even if little, he saw himself in that story and couldn't help but notice that the end had been the same. The angel, the miracle, all these things could not exist for two such as themselves. What had they believed in? Hope plays tricks on them.
<< Sorry, it's difficult from here on.>> He justified himself.
<< It's okay, if you don't want to...>>
A new drop fell on his head, he realized that, caught up in the story, he had been so distracted that he had not thought about that insidious torture.
<< At least someone must know the good I wanted and still want for those children. I feel like a piece of dung, but there's no turning back, I should have thought about it before instead of chasing that woman uselessly.>>
<< What do you mean chasing after her? Wasn't she your wife? >> The younger man asked confused.
<< We never married, how could we as fugitives? >>
<< Are you here because they found you?>> Adrien was becoming more and more intrigued.
<< They found her, coming back from the market, they kidnapped her, they took her away from me and I couldn't do anything. I saw the carriage taking her away and I followed it, when it stopped I saw her coming out with two men, one of them was her betrothed. I approached her and struggled for her, who was crying and begging me to take her away. I was removed and beaten, held for almost two years in a cell. >>
Adrien heard a snicker and his heart clenched. He was surprised he still had it.
<< My children...>>
It sounded like a whine, an anguished litany repeated between the hiccups and the gasps.
Was that a man or a wretch beyond the wall?
The drops diminished, the pauses between one and another were more and more prolonged, and maybe that was why the brain had started working again.
<< What was their name? >> He whispered, hesitating to really want to know the answer.
<< Who? >>
<< Like who? Your fucking kids. What were the names of your children?" he said, shouting in annoyance and annoyance at having to repeat that uncomfortable question.
As soon as he heard him speak he closed his eyes. He didn't know what he wanted more. If a confirmation or a denial. He only prayed not to die.
<< The eldest was called Adrien, the youngest Rose.>> He said breathlessly and without delay.
Already from the first name, the blond, had crossed his eyes.
And now what would he have done? What would he have said?
He who had poured hatred on his parents, who had erased them from his thoughts not believing them worthy.
Only one question swirled in his head....
<< After those two years, what did you do? Why didn't you go back to them?
To them, after two years they were still theirs, Rose wasn't dead yet and maybe she could have been saved. If only there had been at least one parent with them.
<< Because I tried again to take back my angel, but she wasn't the same, she didn't want me anymore, the life full of riches had surpassed the one full of love.>> He said bitterly.
<< And you couldn't give up and go back to your children? >> He asked altered.
<< Are you yelling at me? >> He asked perplexed.
<< Well, I'm pointing out what a piece of shit you are...>>
<< Hey! You're exaggerating, kid. I already know what a shit I've been. I pissed, I couldn't see anymore and I killed the man who had taken her away from me, I tried to run away but that's how it went.
He said hastily.
<< And she still didn't come back to you.>> He held out the boy.
<< She looked at me with hatred.>> He lowered his tone of voice.
That was the father. He was talking to his father.
Did he have to tell him?
The shock was strong, but the resentment perhaps more so.
<< And what do you want to teach me with this story? >> He asked, longing for what a son should always have from his father.
Maybe that would be the only thing his father would leave him in life.
<< That love is not the most important thing in life, life itself is more important, that undoing yourself, losing everything, losing yourself, is never worth it. Even if you believe that she came down from the sky just for you, even if her eyes make the stars envious and your heart explodes from the wonder she sees in that smile, no, it's never like that, it's never for the poor. You don't make a living from love.>>
He would have preferred something that gave him more hope than that, especially on this night, which could have been his last, lived without Antoinette.