Gloria... where's your undying love?
Coma Girl:
I can’t recall her name, but I didn’t forget her…
She was extraordinary, unique and there will never be a girl like her anymore…
She wasn’t pretty, but she had a beauty of her own, an inner beauty that made her shine like the morning sun, a beauty that inspired awe, sometimes even fear…
And I had the lucky to be her friend… her “shrink” like she loved to call me…
She was there for me whenever I needed her, she listened to me patiently and she could always put a smile on my face, even in my darkest days…
We had so much in common, we had the same way of thinking… we shared everything, from the first unlucky love, to the first kiss…
I thought I knew everything about her, but she knew how to hide her weaknesses, her anguish behind a wonderful smile... or, maybe, I was too blind to notice she brought with her the burden of an unconfessable disease that seemed to broke her fragile shoulders…
She was lonely…
Against her fears, against tomorrow… she had no one, no one to hold her, no one to love her…
While she softly talked her eyes gleamed with a fast, bright lightning… the sparkle of a memory…
I remember the day I met her like it was yesterday: a girl dressed in black, determined eyes, she leaned against the wall, listening to music from her blue I-pod which he was holding tight in her hand like a little, precious gold bar…
She was looking straight in front of her, but her proud eyes weren’t focused on anyone, on anything, sometimes she moved her head rhythmically and her young, luscious lips spoke silent words…
Overcoming my shyness, I approached and I asked “What are you listening to?”
She didn’t reply, just took a quick look at me and handed me her left earphone…
A piercing guitar, a hoarse bass and abrupt drum shots… a confused mess of instruments that played on their own, without anyone to prevail on the other…
She began to sing in a low voice, closing her eyes, shaking her head occasionally, she sang with transportation, passion… as if in that minute and half was enclosed the story of her life…
Everything happened so quickly, I couldn’t believe it, as I can’t believe it all ended…
Day by day I saw her often lost in her thoughts, and we drifted away a little…
Every time I tried to begin a conversation, she just smiled at me naively and said, warmly “Mhm… Gloria… maybe later okay?”
Every time…
It was a boring evening like many others…
But in that cold, dark January evening… my life changed…
I felt restless, empty, incomplete without her beside me, and every time I saw her at school, quiet and sad I was the first to suffer…
I couldn’t understand, she changed… suddenly, under my eyes, and I almost didn’t notice… or, more likely, when I finally opened my eyes it was too damn late…
I was at the window, looking at that dark blur that was the city…
All was still, motionless, even the air, even my heart…
I grabbed the phone, and with trembling fingers I dialled her number… I waited… nothing…
I tried once more, in vain…
I looked above, I looked at the window…
I must see her… a voice inside of me was telling me something had happened…
All the way to her house I was nervous…
Along all the way I kept on articulating thoughts on thoughts, like sandcastles that I liked blowing away and start again…
Finally I got to the building she used to call her home… I looked at the front door, I swallowed and I realized I suddenly I forgot everything I wanted to say…
I knocked…no reply, then I noticed the door was open…
I took a quick look at the hall, then I rushed to the stairs that led to the basement…
There, in a small, cold, bare room, she lived, slept, cooked and reflected… she didn’t have parents or relatives, let alone someone to keep her company, but she tolerated her misery without complaint…
I looked at the door, before gently knocking… but also that door was open…
“Don’t you know it’s dangerous leaving the door open at night?” I said, caring like an older sister…
The room was empty… wrapped in a loud, heavy silence…
In a corner, next to the dirty, sticky wall was a little bed, a messy mass of blankets… she laid there…
I got closer “What’s the matter with you? Do you have a cold or something?”
“Gloria… don’t… come… any closer…”
She slowly shove the blanket away, she was merely breathing, from her lips ran a thin trail of blood
“But… you’re bleeding! What… what’s happening to you?” I said, worried…
He looked at me, sadly, her beautiful, hazel eyes dulled “Forgive me…” and then she closed her eyes “I’m so tired…”
I don’t know how long I stood still…
Seconds, hours, days…
I brushed the blanket lightly from her…
Her throat…
A deep wound on her throat, and a razorblade clenched in her fist, a little piece of paper in the other…
It was then…
I finally knew how much a decision could be dangerous…
Her lips were pale, her body cold, her skin nearly white, but her blood was vivid and burning… and that voice… that blood… it seemed it could still talk… still scream…
Who knows how long she could have still resisted…
Was she allowed to forget?
That girl? That day? That song?
I took that small, folded piece of paper from her hand…
My eyes ran quickly on those lyrics…
A lump was chocking my heart, leaving me out of breath…
A corner was dripping of a black, small writing… hers…
“Gloria…
Yes that’s true… I’ve made my decision… and… you know… maybe that’s all… all I ever wanted…
Please don’t cry for me… I don’t deserve it and… you’ve already done too much to me…
Selfishness… also mine…
Regrets… I’ve had a few…
I just wish you’d have never got to see this… but… as I wasn’t able to avoid this, sorry if I’m offering this morbid show to your innocent eyes…
I… I’ll never forget your wonderful green eyes… never… not even in the underworld…
You… my only regret, Gloria…”