Unholy lands

The Anna puzzle

As usual, Anna prefers to pretend, to make everyone think everything is fine. That way no one will ask her unnecessary questions. But there is no pretending here, she reminds herself. Anna thinks she remembers that her husband assured her that in this therapeutic session all of the masks could be removed, that she would be able to try to speak freely.

"My name is Anna Ezra I work at the Gideon Decision on the Mossad," She says to the middle-aged man sitting across from her in a small almost empty room. Both of them are dressed in everyday clothes, chosen especially for them. On the white wall behind the Doctor, a reproduction of a work of art is watching the therapy session.

That Doctor isn't moved by Anna's statement. He even isn't looking at her as he talks. "Anna, is everything okay?" The Doctor is not happy with any of Anna's answers, the process this time is not as easy as it was with the other Mossad agents. But the doctor knows this is the only way, He needs to keep asking more questions, this is the only procedure he knows, to check if the hypnosis is working.

"Yes," Anna says calmly as she looks away from him, Her eyes notice the reproduction of the famous painting on the wall behind the Doctor. Her eyes are trance fix on the fake masterpiece. She tries to move but It's become hard for her to detach her gaze from the sunflower.

"Anna, do you know why you are here?"

Anna's black eyes sink into the intense yellow brushstrokes as her thoughts travel far away from the clinic. A memory of another yellow draws her to the past.

"Where are you?" Anna barely hears the Doctor. She tries to find an answer, but her mind is drifting to someplace else. A yellow shirt, Eli was wearing it then.

"Aroma Tel Aviv" Anna whispers.

"Are you alone?" Now the doctor is satisfied.

"No, Eli is here too"... Ana concentrates on the yellow painted flowers until they become a blur. After that, the clinic fades and in front of her eyes and the cafe shop on Herbert Samuel Street appears. The smell and sounds emerged from the past to fill her present.

"Please, Anna, tell me what you see"

"I'm sitting and waiting for Eli. He went to get us our order. There are a lot of people here, I feel they are all looking right at me, but I know they don't. The curious looks of the aroma diners hurt me. They punch holes in my soul like when arrows hit a target."

"Concentrate on Eli," the Doctor asks from her.

"Here, I can see him walking towards me, he is big and tall and full of love.

As usual, when Eli sees me, he smiles, he doesn't suspect a thing. As always, I'm tense. He noticed that and said words to let me know everything's alright. But nothing could stop my intuition that something bad is going to happen.

As he sat down, Elie talked about how much I'm important to him, but I didn't hear him, I was busy playing restlessly with a white paper napkin. Eli kept on talking, he didn't notice that my fingers were drumming on the table or that I was searching for possible enemies."

The words slip away from her and become a third-person monologue. "Anna knows Eli must not know she knows, so as always Anna plays the pretending game. Eli sits in front of her, she recognizes the disappointment expression on his face. For Eli, it's like the end of the world when he does not get a smile from her.

"Anna?"

"What?" Anna answers him impatiently. She hates when she acts like this, but Anna doesn't know how to stop. For some times control isn't her strong attribute.

In moments like this, she misses her true husband. Despite his appearance, Anna knows that it is a clone with really poor acting abilities."

For years, in her mind, a storm full of conspiracy theories is blowing. In Anna's opinion, she doesn't have a problem because her theories are all based on facts.