Dream (eBook)

Alex Petraru (Autor)

eBook Download: EPUB

2018 | 1. Auflage
48 Seiten
Publishdrive (Verlag)
978-0-00-010455-7 (ISBN)

Infos

The setting for 'Dream' is sometime in the near future. Some may consider this work to be science fiction, while others may consider the statements made in 'Dream' to be outdated. Behavior can be controlled, and it is mentioned within the pages of 'Dream'. Maybe the methods described will not be used. Or will they? We will see.

Textauszug

Dream

By Alex Petraru.

“Dream” occurs sometime in the near future. It may be considered

science fiction writing. It is possible that some informed people will consider what is said here to be outdated. Behavior can be controlled, and this is mentioned in this text. Maybe the methods

here described won’t be used. We will see?

“Hu said nothing, yet again. He was almost a professional mute,

because he wasn’t mute, he just assumed a lack of voice, just as he

had assumed a lack of own ideas. Gustavo and BoozeBottle also

belonged to an immense legion of people who only had a voice

amongst their peers, they were “mutes” to everyone else. Gustavo

thought about the silliness of this situation. How many “mutes”

were there in this world?”

To all my readers, my Thanks.

Carlos Mota.

(This book was published in Portuguese as: Mota C, Sonho, Junho

de 2006. Papiro Editora, Porto, Portugal. ISBN: 9728916736.)

1Walls

Gustavo looked at the walls as he always did, or rather, as he used

to do. He looked at them and wondered whether they had been

built from the top to the bottom or from the bottom to the top and

then thought about how silly his ideas were. In fact, none of it

mattered. It would actually be interesting if the walls were built

from the top to the bottom, though it didn’t seem likely. Nor did

that “Freedom” exist, Gustavo thought! What Freedom existed?

As a young boy he had moved to that neighbourhood, that area,

that place, that home.

I remember Banana, WindyBag, BoozeBottle, grunted Gustavo

in the general direction of his friend Emílio. Remember them? No,

and I don’t care to. What is the point of remembering what doesn’t

exist anymore? You’re right, Emílio, it doesn’t exist anymore. But

it does exist, deep down it exists because it is what made what

exists now exist, it exists because it exists in us, it still exists… Stop with the old man’s stuff, Gustavo! Not even you exist, have you

thought about that?

Gustavo became slightly annoyed and continued talking to himself.

Emílio was too much of a realist for his taste. Deep down he considered himself a “great demystifier”, as Gustavo would tell

him. But he wasn’t. Neither him nor anyone else, actually.

He had spent many years there, in the Bairro de Santa Clara,

between Víboras and Camelo, number 31, as it appeared on his

postal address. Had he seen the World or had he seen nothing? He

had been travelling for a few years, today he didn’t know if it had

done him any good, if it had harmed him, if it had done anything

to him at all! He had recently met a young man. He would be

around twentyseven years old, a kid, he was a doctor, who knew a

lot more about life than he did! At least he, Gustavo, thought that.

His travels hadn’t given him any special knowledge, maybe they

had even made him a more confused person, kind of mystical,

without a sense of objectivity, without any real knowledge of anything necessary. After all, any doctor knew more than he did

and was much more useful than he could ever be! He had heard of

a powerful man of Good, an Indian, who cured from a distance. He

had been there, in India and hadn’t learnt anything, he now thought. Can you learn something amidst the deepest misery?

Maybe you can learn resignation. Is resignation a gift? An art? A

wisdom? He looked at his hands. The palms of his hands. There

were people who mixed scientific knowledge with the reading of

palms, with a search for signs. None of this made sense, he thought.

Hands were like walls. They told stories. But they told them with

little accuracy: they could easily mislead. The lines on hands were

like rock paintings. What would his hands tell a stranger? Nothing.

That was most likely.

Stop being silly and come eat. I’m coming, Emílio. They set out.

The Sun was getting stronger. It fried, it didn’t burn. Before, a

long time ago, it had burned; for some years now the Sun fried, it

became increasingly harder to bear.

Do you know anything about the Shelter? We will be going past

the door… Yes, you can hear noises over there, replied Emílio. The

new legislation which was published is more restrictive, you know?

No, what’s up? Well, it was on television. From the age of sixtyfive

confinement in the Shelter is mandatory.

Hum, with the confusion that’s going on, I don’t know if they can

implement that!

They can! There is confusion, everything is in a bad state, you

can see that, but it’s easy to put that step into practice. And,

furthermore, who would want to avoid such a thing? Old people

get in the way, they occupy spaces, they complain, they eat. At the

Shelter they are taken care of, nothing more happens, I think it’s

good. In fact, if it weren’t for you I would have nobody to talk to.

At the Shelter I will always have somebody, it’s fatal! The number

of people there are there! It’s only natural that amongst all those

people I will find somebody to talk to. Out here it is harder. You

were talking about people I hardly remember, but they existed, I

know; so what? Where are they?

We are here. The smell is weak today! It smells of the same old

meat Gustavo! You are very demanding! No, Emílio, you are very

patient! It doesn’t matter, eat!

They ate in silence. Silence was compulsory, after they had sat

down. Some two thousand people filled the huge, long tables, full of

“meat”, something like a sausage with rice from times past. All

mixed up, it was eatable. You didn’t pay, you drank beautiful

liquid. It was like perfume, that liquid. It was said that it had

vitamin supplements. Kind of greenish, it would slide down the

throat in a viscous flow, thought Gustavo.

Viscous! He suddenly remembered hearing a woman scream that

several years ago. He was on the street, he had just arrived. It was

another time. She sold glue for shoes. It was a sunny day, a warm

wind blew from the harbour, the huge rusty ships sailed in lazily.

Gustavo stepped back, he heard a woman cry “Viscous!”. He approached her. They loved each other and how! He never thought

you could love someone like that, just like that! But every time he

mentioned it, Dayna replied.

And how do you love someone? Isn’t it always just like that? Do

you want to explain everything? What for? What do you get out of

that?

They hadn’t had children nor had they felt the need to. By that

time the socalled “pill” had already killed the white man.

The dick is counteracted by the effect of the pill, Banana would

say, one of the first friends Gustavo had made when he arrived

there. And it will be the end of the white man, Banana would also

say, laughing.

In that time he had worked a bit as everything. He had painted

walls, fixed pipes, studied at night, became a teacher. In between

times he was with Dayna. They would escape to the most unlikely

places and devour each other. There really wasn’t any explanation

for the desire they felt for one another or for the empathy which

also united them in the most absurd details. They spent many

years like that, aging at a snails pace. Slowly, they became older.

When he had nothing to do, Gustavo stayed at home. Dayna had a

large circle of friends she went out with, sometimes for days and

days, until she returned again and always to the company of Gustavo. She liked going out, not actually to see anything new, but

just to get out. He stayed. He thought there was nothing new, he

used to say that everything would become more alike, in the future,

just as it was becoming then.

What was the point of travelling the world? The whole Earth is a

grain of sand, in the Universe! Yes, Gustavo, but we are a grain of

sand in relation to the Earth! So it is important to travel.

Dayna was right, Gustavo pondered, but only in part. He had

travelled and he didn’t feel like travelling any more. It wouldn’t

make a difference to him to see any more. That way he stayed at

home, he looked after Dayna’s rooster. She held that rooster in

high regard! She called him little one, fed him, the creature was

very tame with her. Gustavo suffered some rooster pecks. He got

irritated but then it would pass. Humans need pets so they don’t

feel their loneliness!

Yes, Gustavo, I agree! We have telephones in one pocket, we talk

to people all over the planet, but we are lonely! It is the great

theme of our days. And we are also lonely because we want to be.

We are not made to be…

We are, Dayna! We choose a lifestyle which leads to loneliness!

We don’t want the company of friends, or acquaintances, or of our

old folks, we don’t have children, we don’t want them, we need

pets. Without them we would die even more alone!

I don’t need all that. It is important to know how to live with

yourself. We have to get used to living with ourselves, to like ourselves. If we can do that then we are fine when we are alone....

Produkt-Details

• Erscheint lt. Verlag: 5.9.2018
• Sprache: englisch
• Themenwelt: Literatur ► Fantasy / Science Fiction ► Science Fiction
• ISBN-10: 0-00-010455-8 / 0000104558
• ISBN-13: 978-0-00-010455-7 / 9780000104557