Nobody turned on the light!
All dark!
I had a vision, maybe I saw it and, much sleepy, just came back to sleep: a hooded man was knocking on the doors of the houses in my street; if someone opened the door, he stuck his foot in the gap, went in and quickly went out with something in his hand, which he stuffed into a black bag.
I wrote notes warning residents and slipped them under the door of every house on my short street.
Small city, with few streets, and I was sure that the message would be shared with all the houses in the city.
Nobody saw my message, or they didn’t want to get in trouble.
I looked for my lighter, it was in my T-shirt pocket, I reached in, it slipped from my trembling fingers, it fell. I got down on all fours, ran my hand over the rough, strange floor, put my hand on it, something, an object, took it.
I looked for my lighter, it was in my T-shirt pocket, I reached in, it slipped from my trembling fingers, it fell. I got down on all fours, ran my hand over the rough, strange floor, put my hand on it, something, an object, took it.
Explosion! The lighter exploded.
There was time to see where I was, see the figure that was running, he hit the wall he didn’t see, and he fell; I ran to the switch, turned on the light. It was intense and blinding and swirling, going from red to green, throwing me now to the left, then to the right.
Dizzy, I sat down on the floor, closed my eyes.
Eyes half closed, I saw the wall where the figure hit, I dragged myself there, I leaned against the wall.
The wall collapsed, and some pieces fell on me; they were like Styrofoam bricks; amidst the cloud of plastic dust,
I covered my nostrils, crawled forward, and reached a darkened space, an object resting in my right hand: it was a lighter, I lit it, it was MY lighter, intact!
The space was very large, a square, perhaps ten meters by ten, crammed, in the front right corner, cell phones of different types, shapes and colours, almost beside me, many rectangular bags of orange-green colour.
I lit a cigarette to calm myself down; the smoke alarm went on.
I ran to a red button on the floor, pressed it; the alarm stopped.
With my movement, four led spots of yellow light, one in each corner, turned on.
Someone took my lighter from my hand and smacked the cigarette, almost shoved it in my mouth, grabbed me by the collar of my sweatshirt, and dragged me to the opposite corner of the mound of cell phones.
− Why do you want to blow up my treasure?
Ahead of me was the figure, swathed in a black cloak, hood down to reveal only a blurred, wrinkled black face, red eyes glowing.
− I don’t want to damage or explode anything! I entered here when I leaned against the wall where a figure hit, maybe it was you, the wall collapsed and I walked forward, fleeing from the plastic dust.
− And lit a fire and a cigarette!
I became calmer: I could talk to him.
− Please, let’s go somewhere far from your treasure, I’m nervous, I need to smoke a cigarette.
− With his left hand, a hand with normal temperature, smooth skin, without calluses, he took my right hand, helped me to get up, he started pulling me towards a door — which there didn’t exist before, he passed by pulling me by the hand; with his right, he picked up one of the bags on the left.
We were in front of my house!
Day clear as it was before,
− Rosalvinho! Why did you do this?
Rosalvinho took off his cloak and hood: he was wearing the same navy blue suit, white shirt and red tie that he wore in his bookshop, he served us and helped us choose a book.
− I had to! You spread the notes, you wanted to break up with me, with my bookshop.
− You know that’s not it; and how do you explain the mountain of cell phones that I saw, or do they not exist either?
− They do exist, but I cannot burn everything: they are proof of my risky work to save my bookshop and everyone for my affection for citizens, so that they never use cell phones, stop hearing and seeing lies and nonsense, and go back to reading books.
− But they will buy others.
− Not in this city: I bought José Masquim’s bric-a-brac shop, and all the cell phones in the bar and cigarette shop.
− People will come to visit the city and their relatives.
− This bag that I always carry with me has already solved this problem; it’s a project of mine that Akira Tokara made for me in Sacolejo de Cima: it detects cell phones at whatever frequency they use and burns the plate without destroying or heating the body; I’ve already installed one at every entrance in the city. I will use one of them to destroy all the ones in the building, and keep some at home as replacements if needed; clear the place to use it as a new books warehouse.
Nobody wanted or thought about going to the Police Station and reporting they had their cell phone robbed, the policemen didn’t complain either that their ones didn’t function; everybody had landlines.
Two months later, Rosalvinho had already earned enough to replace everything he had invested in his project; the happy residents continue to buy books.
