31st January, 1768 Mad day’s I’ve been living… We’ve met Mrs. Fife. “Lay Down with me”, she said. Five’s head was tilting side to side in a frightened way. “I’ll tell him you raped me if you don’t”, she said. “Your head will roll in the muddy ground if you don’t”, she said. She tied his hands and took his torn clothes. I felt regret and terror paralyzing Five’s muscles. He closed his eyes shut, he tried to get away from that situation. The cougar all over his weeping body, biting his shoulder, her claws sinking into his back matching the scars Mr. Fife had already carved. A sinful thrust stealing his last opportunity of meeting his wife, his family in another life. When that was over, she left him there, nude in the cold frozen grass. He stood up and started to walk randomly, in despair. His mind was probably filled with doubts about his living hell, about his involuntary betrayal, the way he dishonored his family and his vows. Pure sorrow was being whispered through his lips, in mixed up words I could not understand. He entered a building, and abandoned one, I presume. He hid me in a piece of cloth and lay next to it. With no food, no water, no one to care. And he has never said any other word since. And so this is the story of the mishaps of the man left alone leaning on the doors of oblivion.
Mariana Oliveiros Beatriz Martins