Languages:Languages:
We all have our own problems.
In a solitary universe, there was an infinite, cold field cut through by a road. The road was like a giant scar that divided the field into two vast, endless parts of yellowed, tall, brittle grass that surrounded it. But this road had a peculiarity: a single sound could be heard, breaking the immensity of near-deafening silence.
A lanky man walked, his hat well-adjusted, his heavy coat over his shoulders and a briefcase hanging from his right arm. The world seemed dead and its color palette was unsettling and strange: the dark-green of the man’s suit, the faded yellow of the grass and the grey, almost black, of the road and the sky, in a bleak, overcast world. And, in that universe of limited colors, the man did not speak, did not shout, and his movements were the only audible noises — his shoes striking the worn stone, or the metallic contents of his briefcase clinking in time with his steps.
The emptiness that filled the place was so great that the man himself could hear his heartbeat, and could almost smell the faintest scent carried across the distance; but despite the adversities, his focus was on the road. Each step echoed in a space where sound seemed not to know where to go. The musty smell of his coat mixed with the freshness of the oxygen, making the air feel heavy. The man continued to walk without hesitation, with firm, resolute strides. His eyes were fixed on the horizon as if they pierced the fog that covered the “end” of the road, almost as if he could see beyond it. One thing he was sure of: he would reach the end of the road.
In the middle of his walk — a distance only a divine figure could know — he felt a small breath, a cold caress that touched his coat: it was wind. A signal had been given to the man. The world around him seemed to sigh in the silence. The only interruption was the sound of his own footsteps echoing on the stone. The wind brought with it a slight chill, a feeling that nature around him was beginning to manifest, as if the road were alive and watching him.
As the walk continued, now accompanied by the light cold wind, things gradually began to change. The man, his eyes fixed on the horizon, slowly began to notice that the ground around him was no longer empty. Small and large stones of various shapes, distributed evenly, emerged from the fog, as if the world were revealing itself, taking on a new form. However, the difference was not enough to make the man lose the concentration he had imposed on his goal. The man kept walking.
The wind grew stronger; it was bothersome to the man — no longer a simple puff as before, but an irritating breeze that seemed to disturb him. For quite some time he walked among various stones and boulders, still arranged uniformly, but which were extremely far from filling even half of the immensity of the field that gave off a damp smell. Were the stones merely a warning that something different was coming?
Suddenly the wind became so strong it seemed to push him backward, as if the world were against him. The man had difficulty moving and, in a desperate motion, he began to run. He was not willing to let himself be carried away so easily. The wind was a mere complication created against him, believed to be a trivial obstacle by some divine figure. He was so determined to fight the wind that all his olfactory senses had gone; he smelled nothing else and thought of nothing else. The wind’s complication was the only thing in the persistent man’s head. He ran without stopping until, inevitably, his hat fell and vanished into the surrounding fog.
The man stopped. The serious expression on his face remained. Is this the end? He sat down on the pavement, set his briefcase on the ground and opened it, revealing a pen and a canned vegetable soup with a large sticker, the text scrawled in red ballpoint ink as if done in haste: it read “POISONED.”
The man pulled a crumpled piece of paper from the back pocket of his trousers and, while the strong gusts made the whole process difficult, he grabbed the pen from his briefcase and wrote a dense text recounting his life.
After writing the text, the man put the pen back in his briefcase and tossed the paper into the air; it quickly vanished into the fog as it was carried off by the strong storm. Then he took the canned vegetable soup that had been stored in his briefcase, opened it and drank. He knew he was condemning himself, and accepted the fate he had chosen. But the man enjoyed the poisoned soup in a disconcerting way; it seemed he had not eaten for more than six hundred years. The hot liquid touched his tongue and, in a breeze as uncomfortable as the others, it relaxed him instantly. The taste of the vegetables was intense, with carrot, potato and onion standing out. The salt provided a pleasant contrast. This would surely be the best meal he would ever have.
A sense of fatigue began to envelop his body like an invisible hand squeezing him. His legs, once firm, now felt heavy and lifeless. The air became denser and his chest tightened as if the road itself were trying to suffocate him. But he no longer cared. His hands, still holding the cup of poisoned liquid, trembled slightly, but he did not drop it. The end of the road no longer mattered.
The soup, now cold, no longer warmed him. Each sip felt like a farewell, a last sigh drawing him closer to the end. He felt the poison running through his veins, each drop consuming him slowly, as if his very life were draining away. There was no more strength to go on. He knew he would not rise again. The horizon, which had once seemed distant, now appeared like an illusion. The path he had traveled no longer made sense. He sat there, alone, waiting for the end.
The wind, which had once irritated him, now seemed to whisper words he did not want to hear. But the man no longer had the strength to react. The poison and the silence became his only companions.
He closed his eyes for a moment, allowing the weight of his decision to surround him. There was no longer a struggle. Only the acceptance of inevitability. The road, the field, the void and the wind around him disappeared completely. The end was near and his efforts to express himself had been in vain, but at least the gust had stopped and the soup had indeed been the most delicious he had ever eaten. And so he remained, sitting, waiting for what would come next, with no strength left to resist.