Ruins of Autumn

15• We Are Not Free.

    How to meet each other again?
 
    Blerimi's plan had changed. Now he had no desire to go to a place where Leonora wasn't there. She was etched in the centre of his thoughts, as if she had always been there, but he had noticed her presence only after meeting her up close.
 
    The unfathomable feeling towards her, from the moment he had seen her, didn't give up on trying to find a place in his heart, and even though the arguments that he was wrong and had to stop thinking and feeling about her at all costs couldn't banish that insistent feeling, which urged Blerimi to remember Leonora's face, her gentle look as well as her voice, to think how beautiful she was and how much his life would change for the better if that forbidden woman were a part of it.
 
    How was it possible that he had never met her before when he blindly believed that there was so much romantic feeling between them? Maybe the arrest two years ago prevented them from getting to know each other? If he had been free, would they have met? He was certain that he would have felt the same way about her as he had a few hours ago. 
 
    Would she have felt too? Were his suspicions correct—that Leonora had experienced the same feelings—or was he really being misunderstood about her?
 
    If only she wasn't Albioni's wife! Such a fact was like barbed wire through his chest. He couldn't even look at her, as he wanted to, and talk to her to get to know her. He would have gotten rid of Albioni outright if he knew for sure that there wouldn't be any trouble afterward, but he was afraid that Leonora's brother-in-law, Agustini, would suspect her of having something to do with his brother's murder and would take revenge on both of them.
 
    He didn't want anything bad to happen to Leonora because of him.
 
    "A few more steps, and we will arrive at the restaurant," Denada said as they walked along 'Mine Peza' street. "Maybe I was wrong for suggesting we walk."
 
    "No," Blerimi replied in a low voice. He needed to walk.
 
    "Listen," she touched his right arm to get all his attention. "I thought about not saying anything, but maybe you might speak unintentionally, and it's better for you to know so that you can be careful."
 
    "Careful about what?" He looked at her, curious. 
 
    "Leonora, Albioni's wife, is the girl I told you about three years ago when I suggested you meet her at the party of the company where I used to work."
 
    Her confession felt like bleak water suddenly rushing into his chest. Denada had just told him that the reason why he was feeling sadness in the form of sorrow because of the forbidden feelings that he had for Leonora was the result of neglecting the opportunity to have a chance to express those feelings three years ago, for the sake of choosing to use Anila in order to get revenge against Amarildo and not to give up on the injustice to her by finding another way, where no innocent would be hurt.
 
 
    
    "Blerim, there is a girl that will come tonight to the party... The second I have seen her, I have thought, 'This is the right person for Blerimi.' "
 
    "Denada, I think an old lady has taken control of your whole brain."
 
    "No, no," she laughed. "I'm serious. When you see her, you'll think I'm right. She is twenty years old, and her name is... "
 
    "No," he replied categorically. "I'm hanging up. Goodbye."
 
    
    Leonora had been the prize. She had been the reward he would have received if he had chosen not to commit that crime against Anila, and since he had decided to destroy the latter's life, he hadn't even thought that there was the possibility that, in fact, he had been preparing such torture for himself—a forbidden and impossible love.
 
    While thinking that he had been burning Anila's soul, he hadn't realised that he had also been preparing the fire to burn himself together with Leonora. 
 
    "How do you know her?"
 
    Denada kept her gaze fixed on the pavement, thought about how, stopped before she went any further, and recalled certain fragments of the past, which had opened her plenty of trouble in sitting silently at the edge of her thoughts, and she replied dryly, so as not to fall into doubt, that she had no good memories of how she knew Leonora.
 
    "I was in the same class with her brother in high school."
 
    "Are they from Puka like you?"
 
    "Yes," she answered.
 
    That's how Albioni must have met her. His brother, Agustini, had been in the same class as Denada and Leonora's brother.
 
    He wanted to know more about her, her family, how she ended up in Tirana, and if Denada had said anything to her that day, three years ago, that she wanted to introduce her to someone, or had she only told Blerimi her plan about the two of them, but he didn't want his cousin to suspect that he had developed feelings for Leonora and put her in a difficult position, so he was forced to be attacked by the unquenchable curiosity and lose the fight with it, the consequences of which were more excessive sadness. 
 
    "I told you so that you don't tell Albioni that I once wanted to introduce you to a girl, and if he finds out that she is Leonora, you can both get into trouble. Who knows what he thinks then?" Denada referred to Leonora's husband. "It's something from the past, anyway. As long as it doesn't come back as an option and you have both moved on, even though not willingly, why cause all that trouble for nothing?"
 
    Blerimi nodded in silent assent and objected thoughtfully. Denada had just understated to Leonora that she had been forced to follow that certain course of life. Maybe she had said it casually and he had missed the point, or had she been for real and Leonora hadn't wanted to marry Albioni?
 
    There were so many truths that he wanted to find out, but he couldn't because of what he had done in the past, and there was no valid argument to justify him so that he could be excused and be with Leonora. 
 
    Would she feel the same way about him if she found out that he had been in prison? Would she believe him if he told her that he had fallen prey to injustice and not that he had been guilty, just as he had accused someone innocent of being guilty three years ago? Would she understand that he had been blinded by the pain of the brutally tragic loss of his sister, that the thirst for revenge hadn't allowed him to consider anything else, and that Leonora would give him a chance anyway?
 
    His imprisonment had ruined all his plans. He would have gotten rid of Anila long ago, and he wouldn't have been worried at all in those moments that maybe Leonora knew Anila and his ex-girlfriend had told Leonora what had happened to her because of him.
 
    Now Blerimi was afraid to kill Amarildo's sister. In case something didn't go according to his plan, he would end up in prison again, and this time he would be sentenced to more years of imprisonment, and he wouldn't be able to see Leonora. At least outside, he had a chance.
 
    But perhaps those two had never met before and never would. Leonora would never discover the past between him and Anila, and Albioni's death meant an opportunity for Blerimi to be with the woman he had feelings for. 
 
    The ignored conscience, since it had discovered the reason for Xhuliana's suicide, dared to do a comparison between the boy he had been before his sister's loss and the twenty-nine-year-old he was now—from someone who wouldn't even think of doing the slightest harm to anyone to a heartless man who was willing to kill people just to get what he wanted.
 
    Yes, he had won against Amarildo, but Amarildo hadn't surrendered without getting revenge, and Blerimi had the impression that Xhuliana felt lost in front of Anila's brother because her brother had given up on humanity.
 
    He blinked longer than usual, overwhelmed to go on, but Leonora's existence drew him to the life that was condemning him for Anila by loving Leonora but not having a chance to be with her. That life was also manipulating him into wanting to live by giving him hope that, if Leonora didn't love Albioni, a way could be found for the two of them to be together. 
 
    "Oh, Albioni."
 
    Denada's words made Blerimi look at his cousin, fully conscious of his surroundings, and then look in the direction of her surprised gaze to his left.
 
    Albion Huba parked his black car next to the bar in front of them and got out of the vehicle, laughing about his friend's release from prison.
 
    The person he was supposed to know, by thinking that he was his close friend, Blerimi recognised him from the fact that he was Leonora's husband. The dark blue-grey eyes of the man looking at him, cheerful, had seen her naked body, and the hands that soon would touch his had touched every part of her body. The fact that he had washed them didn't change that truth, nor did the guess that Albioni would do the same thing that night when he got home and his wife would be waiting for him.
 
    "When even the prison can't stand you and they let you out early, just to get rid of you," Albioni remarked mockingly, stretching his arms behind Blerimi's back to pat his shoulders as a sign of greeting.
 
    Blerimi just slapped his shoulders lightly, and the frown on his face revived when Albioni broke away to look at him. 
 
    "Happy birthday! I'm glad you got out safe."
 
    "Thanks."
 
    "When did you get out?"
 
    "This morning," he replied with an evasive look elsewhere. He couldn't look at him without thinking about Leonora.
 
    "OK, but you may look at me when I talk to you. You're not in prison here. We can stand you, no worries," Albioni badgered him.
 
    "How are you doing?" Blerimi asked dryly, ignoring his joke.
 
    "Good," Albioni replied in a gleeful mood. "Working, as usual."
 
    "We're going to have lunch at a restaurant nearby. Why don't you come too?" Denada invited him with the thought that Blerimi would also be glad if their friend joined them.
 
    "I can't break away from work," Albion refused sadly. "I stopped now just to say hello to you. Another time," he promised.
 
    "Okay," Denada smiled understandingly.
 
    "Well, I'll see you then." Albioni shook hands with her and then with Blerimi, who tortured himself more by thinking that Albioni was soon going to meet Leonora in the evening at their house, and he could do nothing to prevent that meeting.
 
    There was no low-risk solution. The right thing for him was to accept giving her up, to convince himself grudgingly that it was just a passing thought, that he loved Leonora because she had seemed very beautiful to him for a moment, not that he really felt for her, and then after some short time he would forget her. 
 
••••
    Leonora startled when she heard the main door of her house in Tirana open.
 
    "Albion," she called, to be sure.
 
    "Yes, it's me," came the answer from the threshold, and she took a deep breath, gripped by grief, knowing that she would have to endure another night in the same bed with him.
 
    There was no way of escaping, from which she had given up on thinking when she had married him because she had no longer felt the strength to fight alone in a battle in the midst of which she had been thrown since birth, but meeting Blerimi had been like seeing the solution to all her problems and healing from the past.
 
    His existence had motivated her and given her indescribable strength to rise and fight, but that strength had been killed within seconds by the circumstances that had knocked her down on the ground from the endless free space that she had dreamed of with her eyes closed, and those circumstances made her admit that that kind of strength was just another false hope in her life, and it would soon be all gone.
 
    Albioni would never leave them alone. If not him, it would be his brother, Agustini, and if not the latter, Graniti would be after them. Overall, he was the reason why she was living as a prisoner in that version of the present.
 
    She no longer remembered him, when she watched Albioni walk into the kitchen, to think afterward that the reason she was married to him was only because of Graniti, but she thought about Blerimi, his look, the feelings of love expressed in his eyes with the colour of the most beautiful and unique brown she had ever seen, and she was frightened at the guess that he had decided to erase that forbidden feeling for her, hadn't even thought that maybe she wanted to leave Albioni and be with Blerimi, but he had made up his mind, that it wasn't worth getting into trouble, for a woman, whom he could forget very quickly, and it would be much more in his favour, if he dated someone, who had no such obstacles at all. 
 
    'Graniti!' she clenched her teeth from the unquenchable hatred for the latter for years, for the life that he had forced her to live while returning her husband's kiss.
 
    If he hadn't existed, the present would have been very different, for sure. At that moment, she wouldn't have been eating dinner with someone she didn't love as her husband, but maybe with Blerimi. She was convinced as if she had seen with her own eyes in reality another version of that present; like she had met Blerimi a long time ago, they had instantly fallen in love with each other like that morning at Denada's agency, they had gone out together to get to know each other more, and they were in a relationship, expressing that they had the blind impression that they were soulmates.
 
    No matter how many other people they met, they would belong to each other wholeheartedly until the end.
 
    As if ruining her life until those moments hadn't been enough, now Graniti wanted to talk to her.
 
    How dared he find the courage to even think about her existence? All those years of living life, he had learned nothing? He was thirty-two years old. What was he waiting for? To have the history repeated and experience the ruin on his own, to be convinced to change?
 
    Maybe... that was the reason why he was looking for another chance to fix the relationship with her, because something exactly like that had happened to him. 
 
    She didn't care at all. She owned him nothing, to be forced to wait until such an event occurred in his life for him to reflect and realise that he had been wrong about them all along.
 
    Granit Vitori was a torturer of souls who didn't deserve a second chance.
 
    She was eating in silence while mourning the death of the version where she was free and independent, working as a hairstylist in a beauty salon, and Albioni didn't sleep with her against her will. A version where she was with the man she loved, and he felt for her too.
 
    What an impossible version to happen!
 
    Albioni went closer behind her, placed the glass on the counter to Leonora's left, and cupped his arms along her stomach.
 
    "Leave them," he referred to the dishes placed on the sink for washing, while passing her red hair loose on the right side to reveal her neck and leave a deep kiss on her soft skin. "I'll do the dishes tomorrow morning."
 
    Leonora took a deep breath through gritted teeth to muster the strength and endure the unwanted touch from her body.
 
    "There aren't much," she said more rudely than she had wanted, hoping that he would leave her alone and that she would deliberately delay until he fell asleep.
 
    Albioni turned her to face him, looked at the reluctant plea in her eyes, scared to ask out loud not to go any further and leave her alone, responded with dismissive kisses to her plea on her lips, and slept with her that night, reminding her with every possessive touch and kiss that she belonged to him and not the other way around.
 
    It was a tradition from a long time ago that the wife had to obey her husband as the head of the family that he was, and Leonora had the duty to follow all the rules of that tradition if she didn't want to be punished later for the consequences of disobedience.
 
    She silently subdued all the cries of her soul to fight, like she was too, and waited until she heard Albioni's breathing while he was asleep to get out of bed. 
 
    "Where are you going?" He woke up immediately, as soon as he felt her move across the bed.
 
    "I'm wearing pyjamas," she told the truth, without looking him in the eye. "You know that I can't sleep without clothes."
 
    "Don't get dressed." Albion pulled her by her arm next to him and held her tightly in his embrace so that Leonora wouldn't leave.
 
    She closed her eyes, exhausted, to breathe more in that reality, when there was another present with only happiness in it that was waiting for her.
 
    Keeping all the suffering inside and not having the opportunity to at least express it by crying was hurting her much more. Her eyes had no more strength left, and they let the hot tears fall noiselessly from the prison lids down her face and onto the white pillowcase.
 
    The hope that if she dreamed that she had escaped from Albioni, in the near future she would really be living as she desired seemed to her like a sweet poison that she drank willingly just because of the taste that it had. That poison deceived her for some moments with its sweetness and then violently led her to an undeserved, despairing end.
 
    An end, Blerimi felt like he had already touched it.
 
    He was lying on his bed with his face towards the white ceiling of the other bedroom in Denada's house and was only imagining that he had accepted his cousin's invitation three years ago at the Ring Shopping Centre to meet Leonora.
 
    Therefore, in those moments, they were together; she wasn't in anyone else's bed but his, smiling at him, kissing him, and showing that she liked to be touched only by him.
 
    They both thought the same thing that night before they fell asleep apart from each other and with each other in their thoughts: that there isn't a greater torturous prison in life than the one created by people themselves in their minds.