For Kariotakis The young men who arrived to the deserted island one night counted themselves and found you missing. They looked each other in the eyes and no wonder they shook their heads in sadness. Many nights they recalled that from your loneliness a sign of fire you would send and they knew the sad welcome of the abyss that lighted the roads and for this they stayed in their familiar places. Left in their grief, as if fatefully and sorrowfully hanging from the “rock” of danger. And when you said goodbye, you, the forever desperate, they sang a few verses of a traditional dirge. The young men arrive to the island every year and they search for the elegy of life in your vacant spot. In their eyes two tears they maintain for you and for the new Epoch you have established.
“Sounds good, Eteo.” “Okay George. How expensive is this going to be?” “For you, Eteo,” George replied, smiling, “for you, you know … I could do it for 16,500. I have to cover the prospector’s expenses, that’s about 2,500, and 8,000 for my office expenses. That leaves a nice chunk for the good guys.” “Sounds good to me,” Eteo replied, smiling back. “Go ahead and prepare the papers and send them to Rebecca.” “I can have an agreement ready for your lawyer within a week. Will that work for you?” “A week sounds fine,” Eteo agreed, and the two men shook hands. Alone in his office Eteo checked the prices of a few stocks. Platinum shares were trading nicely, with good volumes and steady buying slowly driving the price up a few cents a day. A classic case of what they called “healthy” trading. Eteo hoped it would carry on like this for a while longer, but he also knew that all good things come to an end. The key was to know when to get out. As for Golden Veins the price was stale. Eteo had had a couple of offers, which he was selling through a different brokerage company so that no one would know he was the seller, but he didn’t expect anyone to buy them anytime soon. At that moment Logan came in to his father’s office with a broad smile on his face. “Sam regrets selling some shares the other day,” he announced. “It never fails, does it? Even when we sell something at a good profit, if the stock goes up even a little bit after that, Sam regrets selling. Now he wants to buy it back. What should I do, Dad?” “Do what he wants. There’ll be some profit in it even at this level, and he also has some of the cheaper stock, so his average won’t be that bad. Go ahead and buy it back for him.” A few minutes later Eteo noticed a buying order of 6,000 shares bought by his house. Sam’s stock was in hand. On impulse, he dialed Ariana’s phone and caught her doing her morning errands. “Hello, sweet baby, want to hook up later?” Ariana laughed and said, “What a question, but of course I want to. Come and get me as soon as you’re done.”
In reality I knew that suddenly something unforeseen would had cancelled everything and when I heard them talking I felt as if I hadn’t grown at all so indifferent they were (and I had to protect that and there wasn’t any safe place anywhere) and as I walked into the street I, as desolate as ever, stretched my arm to no one because who knows whether someone would be there waiting; then the doorbell rang “why you returned?” I asked him; he was an old childhood friend “I still have something to finish” he said and all night long I heard him sobbing in the next room because he had died very young and he had returned to cry so his purpose on earth could be fulfilled.
Manolis Aligizakis 