Ruins of Autumn

19• Souls Torturer

    Granit Vitori had rejected Albioni's offer to meet him at the airport because he was going to meet his close friend, Pavlin Dani, first, and that was why he was going to his bar.
 
    Maybe Pavlini knew something about Graniti's stop at the airport and would give him any idea of who could be hiding behind that incident.
 
    He saw his reflection in the glass wall of the bar before he went inside the building and headed for the entrance. He was stopped next to it by the vibration of his phone in the right pocket of his light blue jeans. An anonymous number was calling him.
 
    "Hello?" he answered in a distant and unfriendly voice as he looked into his clearly deep and judgmental blue eyes in the clear glass, the black coat and dark blue sweatshirt with a slight shade of closed green, and white trainers.
 
    He had thought about putting on the watch with a black strap but had settled for the one with the stainless steel, three-link, silver bracelet, which he had bought with his first salary, and since then had rarely replaced that watch with another one. 
 
    He had always argued with his father about it. Ardiani would tell him the excuse, that the bracelet would cold his hand and he would get sick, but Graniti had never let go to finally give up on the watch.
 
    "Hello," the woman's voice on the other end of the phone came to him calm and composed. "We are calling you from the Rainflex company, and we want to inform you that your number has been selected to benefit from a 50% discount on our products."
 
    "Do you sell mattresses?" His question came out in an unassuming, mocking manner.
 
    "Yes, sir," the company employee continued in the same tone of voice. "Would you be able right now to listen to the summary of the offer for you?"
 
    Graniti smirked before replying. "If you come with the mattress too, I'll take both of you," he indicated his final condition in a flirting tone of voice, and in response, he received the phone being hung up by the lady.
 
    He put the phone back in his pocket and walked into the bar.
 
    He had thought that upon leaving the 'Mother Teresa' airport, he had also left there the unexpected events behind, but the presence of Leonora, sitting only three tables away, with her hands on the black table, her red hair the same colour as his, tied behind her head, and dressed in black trousers, turtleneck sweater, and boots, managed to catch him off guard from the unplanned meeting with her. 
 
    His sister, nine years younger than him, had blocked all his contact, and in the last phone call two years ago on his birthday, on April 9, she had categorically reiterated to him that he no longer had any right to wish to talk to her after everything that had happened between them. She had blocked that number of Graniti's as well, and he hadn't tried anymore to communicate with her.
 
    Leonora reacted in the same way. She stared at Graniti, not believing that he was really at the threshold of the bar, and immediately lowered her shocked gaze to the table.
 
        Her knees, along with her hands, started shaking, and her strength was abandoning her. She had the impression that she was going to faint from the anxiety that had gripped her badly and was taking her breath away.

    She still couldn't handle his presence that close. The fear that had been present in her life for years hadn't completely disappeared, and if he continued to stand in front of her like in those moments, it would never go away.
 
    Maybe he had come to that bar for a personal business and they had met by chance, or he had found out from her husband that she would be there with Denada and had come to talk to her. 
 
    Albioni had told her nothing of his return. She thought she should have guessed that her brother would be coming home for the holidays in a few days.
 
    Graniti immediately understood her state and tried to approach her, but was stopped by the voice of Pavlini, who had just come out of the office in the corner of the corridor to his left.
 
    "Granit, hm. Did they want to screw you?" He dared to smirk after that mockery.
 
    "They thought I was you," Graniti replied, serious, while approaching him, and the black-haired man with the same body height laughed at his irony, shaking his hand.
 
    "What happened? Why did they stop you?"
 
    "My name didn't appear in the system. They did the same thing to me in America when I was on my way here. That surprised me."
 
    "Oh. I don't think that's a coincidence."
 
    "Coincidence of stupidity," Graniti said, raising his eyebrows monotonously. "Someone must have wanted to distract the police, and they chose me. On purpose, maybe. I'll see."
 
    "Imagine the police putting someone in prison for a crime that he hadn't committed without considering the idea that he deserves punishment for another violation of the law that they don't know he has committed," said Pavlini. "The criminal, meanwhile, even though he is careful not to go to prison, ends up there anyway, accused of something he hasn't done."
 
    "Both sides would be embarrassed." 
 
    "Will you have a drink here, or are you going to Puka immediately?"
 
    "I'm having a drink here since I'm feeling sorry for you," Graniti said compassionately, and Pavlini put his hand behind his neck to tap his left shoulder as they headed to one of the tables at the end of the bar.
 
    Graniti turned his head in time to look at Denada, approaching from the other exit at the table where Leonora was still sitting. He noticed how she hadn't changed at all since the last time they met two years ago, and he immediately remembered the fragments of the time before he cut off all communications with her.
 
    Denada looked at him indifferently, unlike what he had expected—that the woman would also be taken aback by the encounter with him—and sat down calmly in front of Leonora. 
 
    "Did that waiter come?" Denada asked her, who was still shocked by the meeting with her brother and couldn't hide such a reaction like her boss was able to.
 
    "He just came."
 
    Denada instantly looked back and got up from the table to go to the employee.
 
    Graniti followed her walk towards the young man, who had just arrived at the bar, and saw his sister's concern on her face. He strengthened his hand in the glass with the drink that he had ordered, to keep himself under control and not to get up and find out, in a not-very-quiet way, what the problem was, to help them.
 
    Just a sign from her, and he would immediately react. An inner voice was telling him to go to Leonora in those moments without waiting for her approval, but he didn't want to interfere and create more rifts between them. He was staring at her and silently asking her to call him.
 
    He deciphered straightaway his sister's desperate look at him as a plea for help, and that's all it took for him to react.
 
    Granit Vitori left the glass on the table, put his hands on his legs next to his knees, and exerted pushing force on his shoulders to stand up. 
 
    "What's going on?" Pavlini looked at him, surprised.
 
    "Nothing," he said briefly before walking among the tables with his shoulders slightly raised, his arms left loosely at his sides, looking threateningly around at his right to see if anyone would dare to stand before him as an obstacle, and focusing his gaze on the three people in front of him, towards whom he was headed.
 
    Leonora opened her eyes more at his aggressive look at the waiter, but protectively at her, and guessed that he was going to argue with the employee.
 
    "Granit." She came forward and put her hand on his left arm to stop him.
 
    "What's wrong?" He looked rudely at the waiter as he left with Denada to the staff room and then at his sister for an explanation.
 
    "Denada forgot a file here yesterday and was asking if anyone had found it." She realised that Graniti was in a dilemma, whether to believe her or not, and from the transformation of the dark blue colour of his eyes when he was furious to clear blue when he was calm, she noticed that her brother decided to leave it at that.
 
    "OK," he said.
 
    His gentle look, as if he was happy to have met her and missed her, succeeded in cheering her up and raising her hopes that maybe he had changed, but the walls of defence immediately rose when she guessed that Graniti was trying to manipulate her because he needed her help to achieve his goal, and then he would act as if she didn't exist.
 
    She removed her hand in a flash from his arm when he tried to touch her elbow and went to the exit of the bar.
 
    "When can we meet alone one day, you and I?" Graniti stopped her. "I want to talk about something with you."
 
    "Never," Leonora refused flatly with a stern look, so as not to change her mind.
 
    "Nora," he begged her. "Don't... "
 
    His sister didn't turn her head back for even a moment when she left the bar, and Graniti sighed deeply. He had expected Leonora to keep standing, but not for so long and return the coin so bitterly.
 
    Just like he had chosen his ego three years ago, she was doing the same now and was ignoring the blood relation with him. 
 
 
    She was greeting her family members before leaving her home in Puka to live with her husband, Albioni, in Tirana.
 
    She hugged her father and Zana only because others were looking at them, and she didn't want to be gossiped about more in society, how they got along with each other, and because of that, to be reprimanded with a harsh look from her brother.
 
    When she went next to Graniti, she looked at him, ready to forgive him for everything they had been through, only if he stopped that marriage while they were in time.
 
    She wrapped her arms around his neck and grabbed his jacket, as if she wanted to stay safe and protected in that embrace for the rest of her life.
 
    He only touched her shoulders slightly because they were in front of the guests. 
 
    "Granit," she whispered desperately in tears so that he would come to her aid, and in response, she took her brother's hands on her waist, and he slowly pushed her away from him.
 
    He thought, under the influence of a moment, about stopping that marriage when he saw deep torment in her eyes.
 
    'Please!' Leonora gave her brother a beseeching look for him to help her. 'Please!'
 
    "Leave." Graniti broke eye contact with her so as not to be affected more, and she silently showed him through her gaze that she had just been permanently broken by his sellout.
 
    How is it possible that we seek rescue from those people who, we know very well, don't want to save us? 
 
    She looked painfully at her brother once more before getting into the car, and when she realised that Graniti wouldn't change his decision for any reason, she looked with hatred at the man who had just given her such a fatal stab, when he was supposed to have protected her from those kinds of stabs.
 
    Graniti realised at that moment that Leonora had just removed him forever from her life, and she would never want to see him again.
 
 
    Denada approached the exit of the bar with the green folder in her hand, neutrally observed Graniti, who seemed to be remembering the same time when they had been friends during their high school years, and tilted her serious gaze towards the open door.
 
    "Altin Gjozefi's daughter. Aren't you greeting me?"
 
    Graniti had just used one of the nicknames once given to her by him, also jokingly mentioning her father's name, to stop her from leaving, and he succeeded.
 
    The nostalgia of those days, when they had been teenagers, was able to turn her to face him, while he had placed his forearm on the white column to his right and was looking at her, smiling, as if he were still the young man with the bright gaze full of energy and positivity, before the world shattered him to the ground, after it had given him wings to fly for a while, in order to manipulate him, as it had done with many others.
 
    That look had managed to save the same energy, but now Graniti used it to protect himself from suffering the same slips in life and not to give optimistic vibes like he used to in the past.
 
    "No," she answered dryly, and he laughed even more, removed his arm from the column, and went near her.
 
    "You have decided to stay the same person for the rest of your life, I see," he remarked ironically.
 
    "Just because you think you'll never change doesn't mean that the rest of us will stay the same too, Granit." Denada retorted harshly.
 
    "Has anyone told you I haven't changed?" He tilted his head with narrowing eyes, letting her understand that she was wrong in her judgement, and Denada saw him in disbelief that the American continent had managed to open his eyes.
 
    "No one has to say it. It's obvious."
 
    "Oh, but why don't you say so, then? We should go out together sometimes, so I can prove you the opposite."
 
    "You don't have to prove anything to me." Denada attacked his teasing smirk with a harsh tone of voice and bitter look and turned her back to leave.
 
••••
    Albioni locked the main brown door of his house and took off his black sneakers.
 
    "Nora." He called her as he took off his dark blue sweatshirt too and placed it on the hanger to the right.
 
    "I'm here."
 
    The loud answer that came from her bedroom made him pause for a moment and anxiously guess what unusual thing had happened.
 
    They both only spoke in the northern Albanian dialect when there was a disagreement between them, and she was nervous.
 
    He walked slowly to their bedroom and found Leonora laying on the bed, facing the window to the right.
 
    "Are you okay?" he asked softly, approaching her.
 
    "Albion, why didn't you tell me that Graniti has come to Albania?" Leonora asked with a bitter gaze fixed on the gloomy grey sky.
 
    He remained silent, feeling trapped. Had they met and talked? He had relied on the fact that she didn't want to talk to her brother, and Albioni didn't have to do anything to put obstacles between them, but now he was doubting that sooner or later Leonora would give in, reconcile with Graniti, and, taking heart from his support, she would ask for the divorce. Albioni would no longer be able to keep her a prisoner in that marriage.
 
    "He didn't ask me to tell you." Albioni blamed Graniti since he knew that Leonora couldn't ask him to find out whether her husband had just lied to her or not.
 
    "Did you meet him?" He stretched his hand towards her loose hair on the pillow behind her back. 
 
    "Don't touch me!" Leonora commanded bluntly.
 
    "There we go," he stood up angrily. "It's like you can't wait to debate with me. Where and where to find an excuse."
 
    Leonora snorted ironically and raised her eyebrows in judgment. Another attempt of his; to cast ashes in her eyes, and make her think that she was the problem, not Albioni.
 
    "What a bad habit from my side," Leonora replied sarcastically, unlike other times when she kept quiet to end the debate. "I'm surprised because you're a very good person." Leonora looked at Albioni. "How is it possible that I do not take an example from you at all? You considered my opinion when I told you that I don't want to marry you, and when I asked you if I could go to university, you accepted immediately, ... when I asked you for a divorce, you didn't get hysterical at all, nor did you threaten me that you would lie to Graniti, that I have had a secret boyfriend before marrying you, for him to kill me, in order to save the honour of our family..." she told in a sardonic way, everything that he had done, while Albioni looked at her, indignant that Leonora was beginning to point out her choler at the life that she has been forced to live.
 
    The arrival of her brother seemed to have given her a lot of strength. That's why he hadn't told her anything about his return to Albania.
 
    "Why? Is it my fault that your brother doesn't love you and doesn't even recognise you as his sister?" He didn't spare at all the venom in the harsh tone of his voice and left Leonora, broken by the truth in those words, to go to the kitchen.
 
    By thinking only that the woman would get over that state once Graniti went back to America, he managed to ignore the suspicion that perhaps Leonora had met another man, and now she wanted to live free from Albioni, but the following days went on in benefit of the doubt about her acquaintance with someone else.
 
    She constantly aimed to avoid him when he tried to kiss her, and when she allowed him, she clearly showed by reacting through her body language that she wasn't staying with him because she wanted to, but only because she was forced.
 
    Maybe she had met someone at work. He had allowed her to have a job so as not to completely shut her in, but now he was regretting it when he thought that she had really fallen in love with someone else and was probably planning to run away with him.
 
    He had to find out, as soon as he could, who that person was.