Roxy told him once that each of us lives in a kingdom governed by the word. Spoken. Or written. Some words are the essence of our lives: heart, love, hate, sadness, pity. Others are bestowed on us through the sluice raising the mausoleum of our personality. Some words require a particular space and time to be spoken. For you cannot say wherever and whenever "I love you" to someone, no matter how much turmoil your pineal gland handles at that moment.

The word kingdom meant for Edi only four letters: dose. He knew these were already letters depleted of wisdom as if wisdom was missing its consistency, its marrow. The moment he was alone with his inner self there was only one universe –his and there no longer was any place for Roxy in it.

Early in the morning Edi jammed some of Roxy’s books in his backpack and ran like crazy to catch the bus. Before, there was a time he did not care if he was late for the Doric sculpture course but he knew now he’d get the chance to dream alone if he’d made to class later tonight.

As soon as Edi stepped off the bus, he saw Martin on the steps leading to the University. He sat among his books spread like orphans, abandoned by some unscrupulous parents there on the steps of history, roaming with people passing by like a multitude of insects. Steps caught in an entomological sidewalk.

The book covers looked like tobacco leaves yellowed by time. From time to time, the morning light wind blew through the aged leaves.

Edi stopped near Martin. Three years had passed since he finished college.

Martin was a guy with a perfect smile, showing perfect, robust teeth. Edi never knew how old he was. He seemed to be there on the concrete steps from the beginning of the world. Known and welcomed by all. Students, street vendors, trolley drivers. When he spoke to you, Martin's whites teeth mesmerized any audience. The perfect smile, always with a distinct air of nobility.

Dressed in a gray jacket, he used its deep pockets to keep his hands warm, stroking from time to time the fine paper cheek of a book especially whenever he wanted to convince someone to buy it from him.

He no longer recognized Edi. Martin’s green irises brushed by Edi’s image, as if assessing the scope of his stop near his literary shrine, trying to discern if he wanted to buy something that day at all.

When he saw Edi take off his backpack, he knew, as any other merchant would, to not to lose a potential customer. Suddenly, Martin’s face was lit:

“Edi ...if I’m not mistaken, right? Edi ... the architect...? It seems that despite living in the midst of a human urban settlement I still cannot ever forget a face."

“Martin”, Edi addressed the book seller, “I ... I need money urgently, understand?”

“I see that you are pale ... Are you sick? Where did that “bonne air” go, the one you had when you were waiting for Roxy to finish her classes?”

“Where did it go? I think in the Twilight Zone, Martin! Where I like to retire every evening in search of dreams ... “

Edi was talking to Martin but all this time he started feeling that discomfort, the one which usually starts the seizures.

"Lord," he murmured in his mind, "just do not let me have a crisis here, on Martin's art’s altar.”
Edi touched Martin’s right arm, but he could not hide his impending crisis in front of him. His arm became rigid. An imperceptible shiver made him support his back to the damp wall with plaster fallen off over the years, behind Martin’s books. He felt through the pores of the concrete behind him glimpses of a past in which he was happy and fully in control of his reactions, his behavior, and his life.

The fear of cracking in front of Martin infuriated him and as a result he started rummaging through the backpack. He heard Martin whispering in his ear, as if chiding:

“Edi, watch ... books ...! Books are not undergarments you throw in a dirty laundry baske.”
 
“I know, Martin! I knew it then, when you used to give Roxy lectures! The book ... the book is a sacred gift that we must leave it from generation to generation ... Forgive me, but I do not feel too good ...!”
 
“Does Roxy know?”

“Know what, Martin? That I sell her books? “

“No, Edi ... it's more than about books here ... “

“Then what? “

“Edi, you are talking to a man's who’s been through the ruthless fangs of time. Many footsteps have gone through my woods. People who were confident of their destiny ... who knew what they want from life ... “

“I do not understand ... “

“But men who are on the Bridge of Sighs with their lives hanging by a hair ... “

“Martin ...” edi’s voice trembling, mumbling, was that of a man who had lost all hope and had chosen one of the lowest range of octaves to fit life’s lowest diatonic semitone.

The book seller of life approached him, patted him on the shoulder in a superb gesture of encouragement, the one only humans are capable of on this earth.

“So, for that you need money, drugs ... “

“How did you figure it ... “

“ I am an old snake, crawling up the tree of life and I know human nature well . I love books, Edi. I live for them. Nothing else I did ever work in my life. I studied philology here, at the university. Only three years. I got involved with the wrong people at some point. In my days there was none of this white illusion. Other habits were forecast. Tobacco, cheap alcohol, the kind that burns your intestines. I went through the city brothels where syphilis and gonorrhea were the diseases with which each of us neighborhood boys, were proud. I had become a fallen angel, from the light columns up in the sky to black, fetid, lusty, mud of the depot. I remember the women at the depot now as they took me by the hand to show me the hidden pleasures of the world. A certain lady Paula was my teacher as I took my first steps into the world of men. Everything has dissipated with time. Only my passion of reading left. . So I came to sell books after I cleared the course meanders of my life.

“Martin, each man has his vulnerable point. Smokers try chewing up the cigarettes filter, to feel the taste of tar lining the coffin of their lungs. Inveterate alcoholics feel that enticing whiff of schnapps without which they can’t say good night. I ... I chose a different path ... I know it’s not the best, but each of us tries to find the best answer to the riddle of our lives”.
 
“Martin, Edi whispered in a faltering voice ... Martin, you need to get me my dose ... “
“Edi, are you crazy? Why do you think you can do that here ... in the middle of everything... What, God, you want to drag me down with you?

“Martin, my friend, in memory of those beautiful moments ... when I and Roxy ... “

“Memories, EDI, should be kept in family albums in secret boxes with letters, not clipped out loud on the street! In particular, memories do not have to justify such scenes! “

“You must help me ...! Look, here ‘s the rescue kit that I carry as a talisman ... Help me out, because my hands have become inert, and as an irony, the master puppeteer, does not want to pull the strings .”

To be continued...