I will fill your Days with Life

03. Look how beautiful life is

I have been walking for hours without a destination, the cold of Novosibirsk penetrates every garment I wear, seeping directly into my bones. I do not remember having ever experienced a cold like this before and therefore, the clothing I brought on this trip has not been appropriate for a country like Russia, this walk really is becoming unbearable.

Almost twenty-four hours have passed since I arrived in this city and in all that time, I have not managed to write a single page of my book. I can no longer bear to sit in front of my computer screen looking at the blank page, waiting for the extraordinary idea to materialise. No, now I find myself walking, in this unbearable cold, because it is too overwhelming to stay in that small hotel room procrastinating or sitting alone in a cafe with a hot coffee, although that does sound good right now.

I feel restless and nervous, my thoughts confuse me... and what are those thoughts about? That girl... Valentina. I have not been able to stop thinking about her, her history... her way of being... her strength... her gaze... I don't know what's wrong with me or why I'm like this. I admit that I know very little about her, but... it feels strange knowing that I will never see her again. Something that I cannot even begin to explain to myself.

I suppose when any human being meets someone new and discovers that the person is going to die... it hurts... right? At the very least there is a small feeling of sadness... Right? I'm not sure who I expect to answer my silly questions!

But the truth is that it does hurt... Even if I don't know her, even if I only know what she told me, although all I really know is her name and that she is ill... but there is something about her that causes me sadness. A sadness that I have never felt before.

I have always been an independent person, traveling, writing my stories, and immersing myself in a world created for my characters. I know that I am somewhat strange. I accepted it from a very early age, I have often wondered if I give too much love to the characters in my stories and in the end I have nothing to offer in the real world. I have always kept my distance from people, emotionally speaking, not only in romantic relationships but also friendship or with any person that may have the ability to hurt me.

I was twelve when I discovered that people leave your life the same way they enter, without warning. I vowed a long time ago that I would not allow anyone to hurt me again.

And this is the reason why I have become a 'Lone Wolf', as she had put it, or a freak as others have said. The reason for my ramblings is that for the first time in many years, I feel a sadness that is beyond my control, something that has nothing to do with a bad day or a block in my work, it is something I cannot solve with walking, seeing the sun or convincing myself that life is beautiful.

The truth is, at this moment, I do not believe that life is beautiful. After meeting Valentina, an amazing woman in her twenties with the most stunning smile I have ever seen and discovering that she may only have a few weeks to live. How can I believe that life is beautiful? Why does a person with such a will to live, have to leave so soon? She should have her whole life ahead of her. God! The world seems so unfair to me right now... I would like to know why it has affected me so much, why I have been thinking about her constantly for the last twenty-four hours and why this tightness in my chest will not disappear.

Tonight, the train will leave again and continue its route, but tomorrow morning I will return to Moscow. I have decided to go wherever the wind takes me... or like she said, I will follow the signs. Again, she appears in my thoughts. I decided there was no point in following the Trans-Siberian route, so I'm sure I will never see her again, but... will I ever stop thinking about her? Yes! Surely in a few days my meeting with Valentina will be nothing more than an anecdote and I will be able to continue my journey. After all, she is just a woman... just a woman...