The Dreamseller_ The Calling - Augusto Cury [7]
The man’s breathing slowed. And soon, he began to recover who he was. Julio Lambert—that was his name—was the bearer of a sharp, quick, privileged mind. In his promising academic career, he had earned doctoral degrees and become an expert in his field. He reveled in grilling aspiring young graduate students presenting their theses with his incisive, biting critiques. He had always been self-centered, and expected that others would orbit around his brilliance. Now, however, his theories were being picked apart—by a man in rags. He felt like a helpless child realizing his own fears and ignorance. He was being called a boy and didn’t react with rage. Instead, for the first time, he took pleasure in recognizing his smallness. He no longer felt like a man reaching the end, but one starting anew.
The Losses
INSANITY CAN ONLY BE TREATED WHEN IT DROPS ITS DISGUISE. And Julio, who hid behind his eloquence, culture and academic status, was now beginning to remove his mask. But there would be a long road ahead of him.
The sun was low on the horizon. And thoughts of suicide were dissipating atop the San Pablo Building. At that moment, the stranger said the number twenty, and a rush of sadness consumed him momentarily.
“Why do you call out numbers while you talk?” Julio asked.
The stranger did not reply immediately. He stared at the horizon, saw several lights across the city being turned on, others extinguished. He breathed slowly, as if wishing to be able to relight them all. He turned to Julio, looked intently into his eyes and spoke:
“Why do I count numbers? Because in the brief time we’ve been on the top of this building, twenty people closed their eyes forever. Twenty healthy but desperate people gave up on life. Twenty did not give themselves a chance. People who once played and loved, wept and battled, felt completely defeated . . . Now, they leave a trail of pain for their loved ones in their wake.”
Julio could not understand why this man was so attuned to others’ feelings. Who was he? What had he experienced to have these deep sentiments? That’s when he noticed the stranger was weeping. It was as if this man were feeling the indescribable pain of children who have lost their parents to suicide and grow up wondering, “Why didn’t they think of me?” Or it was as if he were reading the minds of parents who, having lost their children to suicide, are wracked with guilt and wonder endlessly: “What more could I have done?” Or perhaps the stranger was simply remembering his own unknown losses.
The fact was that both the stranger’s words and his tears completely disarmed Julio. The intellectual began a journey along the path of his own childhood and could not bear it. He allowed himself to break into tears without caring who was watching him. This man who rarely showed his pain was deeply scarred.
“My father used to play with me, kiss me, and call me ‘my dear son . . .’”
And, taking a deep breath, he said something he had always thought forbidden to say aloud, something which even his closest colleagues didn’t know, something which, though buried deep within his heart, continued to shape his life.
“. . . but he abandoned me when I was a child, without any explanation.” He paused, then added, “I was watching cartoons in the living room when I heard a loud bang from his bedroom. I rushed in and found him on the floor, bleeding. I was only six years old. I screamed and screamed, begging for help. My mother wasn’t home. I ran to the neighbors, but I was so despondent that for a few minutes they couldn’t understand what I was saying. I had barely begun my life and had lost my childhood, my innocence. My world collapsed. I came to hate cartoons. I had no brothers or sisters. My mother, a poor widow, had to go back to work and struggled to support me. But she got cancer and died when I was twelve. Relatives raised me. I moved from house to house, always feeling like a stranger. I was a difficult teenager, and hated family gatherings. Sometimes