Eveline

Carmen Llena Pérez

She stood among the swaying crowd in the station at the North Wall. She looked quite nice, with her Brown dress and a tiny suitcase in her hand. Inside, she was completely lost and confused. Suddenly, the world stopped and everyone was staring at her. “What’s wrong? Why is everybody looking at me?” Tears ran down her cheeks, she started feeeling anxiety and found herself shouting for help. No one would move a finger. Eveline closed her eyes, started breathing slowly trying to keep herself calm. Then, she opened her eyes. Everything was normal. Frank was almost 10 metres away from her. She run to his arms and kissed him desperately.

- Eveline, the visit has ended.

She looked at the person whose voice had just sounded. The voice belonged to a serious woman dressed in a white uniform.

- Please…a little bit more

But she knew it was not possible. She had to say goodbye to him, Thomas, her husband. Where was Frank? “We have told you before Eveline, Frank is not here” they would answer every time. But, where is he, then?

She hadn’t known anything about him since they met at the station. At that moment, she was so scared about the future that was waiting for her, that she ran back to her home. Time went by, and she never received any letter. She didn’t send anything neither. After a while, she met a man, Thomas. She was not in love, but she still married him in order to help her dad, who was dying. She did everythinmg she could, but he passed away two months after their wedding. Eveline was not happy with her life. Thomas loved her, he was crazy for her and because of that, she started feeling uncomfortable, desperate, remembering her old life: her family, her home… and Frank. She became obsessed, she could only think about him. Thomas knew that, but he never said anything. After three years of marriage, Eveline started feeling so paranoid she couldn’t sleep. “Frank… Frank…” she would say at any time of the day. Her husband did his best to please her,
but she was so sick, so immerse in her past that there came a moment when she was not
living in the present anymore.

Now, she is in a mental sanatorium, recreating every day at every hour the moment
when she saw Frank at the station. And Thomas, with his broken heart, imagines how
his life would be if he hadn’t met her, if she had gone with Frank. But you know, love is
love.

December 2018