Memento .
Livio stood up. For once he had put aside his discretion and had reserved for himself the place at the head, in the perspective of that solemn moment. He went to the window, opened it. Again his gaze through the darkness, leaping instinctively to the many windows phalanstery popular in front of him and that in the past been a source of many unwarranted anxiety. He took the bottle of Sauternes from the ledge that had kept aside for special occasions. He returned quietly to his seat, accompanied by just curious glances from friends, fixed on his pace unusually solemn. Grab the bottle opener we stand, thus confirming their suspicions. His eyes were fixed on Claudia, who soon would announce the friends gathered their engagement.
The phone rang in the general disappointment.
Livio had to leave the bottle dissatisfied with the cork in half, but was determined to settle the matter in two lines. He rose to the cordless, picked it up in anger and pulled his ear.
- Hello?
friends saw him listening quietly and gradually change its attitude, with the muscles of the body that slowly faded away. It was as if he was doing an anesthetic effect on him quickly. When the phone went back to place their backs were to the sides. He turned to his friends and said
- Memento was the office. I gotta go.
in the dining room of rowdy fun until one minute before, A silence fell cold and numb.
happen in fact that in times like this, somewhere in the world, came the call to that office. He never good news. And almost always calls ended with the call. Claudio But there was and tried to resuscitate his friend:
- They are wrong. In the end you still have not said anything.
- Never mind, Claudio. I put the Sauternes of the window because now there were eleven degrees, the perfect temperature. It will be enough for that. The vranno seen. However, now we know at this point that words do not count. And even gestures.
- Yes, but Claudio is right: sometimes they are wrong - he tried to assume his cousin Carla.
- Well, someone says, but no direct experience-Livio replied calmly -. I think it is a comforting myth. Hope's remains useful, avoid desperate actions. He dismissed
friends with mutual commitment not to lose sight of, then pack your bags to Claudio that together all the time that he did not say "but why? Why you? ".
The answer was given to her man half an hour later, sitting at the table by the official of the Office Memento.
- So, dear Mr. Lentini, tonight she was going to take a big step towards happiness, right?
- How to deny it? But I still think and claim that there was nothing wrong! - Livio said, yet decided to support its case.
- Sin - shook his head, raising the official recorder for a glance at the cards - these are statements that make our work more difficult.
- Finding happiness, in fact. This would be my fault.
- Oh no, Mr. Lentini. We do not pretend to judge anyone, let alone establish guilt or what is right or wrong. Our justice system is simply based on prevention. And happiness, it is now established, has always been the root cause of crime. Causes insane instincts in those who would like to reach, those who have lost or those who are afraid of losing it and defend it. The thief steals because he wants to get rich and be happy, but he does so because every day is the evil of envy in seeing, or even imagine, the smile of the rich. The imagination sometimes hurts more than the reality. Men and women every day go mad with jealousy to think the object of their love or desire in the arms of another. Husbands and wives cheat you are looking for something that not even they know how to describe but which suffer the morbid attraction of incompleteness platoniana. There was a short time in which they were committing crimes every day, to reach it, to defend it, for it, not to divide, to envy. Yeah! Happiness attracts misery as a powerful magnet. To this end, once the unfortunate sacrifice to that end any decency, any moral and material inhibition. And spared the use of evil to achieve good. But now there is us, the wonderful organization that has destroyed the happiness of society. And do not believe as some say, this has meant the victory of unhappiness. Quite the contrary. Knowing he is unable to reach, men have discovered the first ataraxia, then we have appreciated the immense value. The rediscovery of the small pleasures, now is the limit that is allowed to reach. It is not the happiness of the individual who must be eliminated, but the socialization and the devastating effects that derived.
- But now that I do?
- You know very well. And basically this is what can make you happy. You will not feel pain, I guarantee. The rest is the absence of pain, the real goal. That you had a wonderful and rewarding life or that he was one of those gray beings who spend their lives in gray office from morning till night, and never see the sun, his hair thin and illusions that you leave so horrible, irregular, when the call comes're just like everyone else. All troubled by useless regrets for a life that inevitably regret the loss.
sent him home a few days later. A quick stay. Now he could confirm it. No longer felt nothing. She would never hurt anyone.
even to himself.
.
