THE NERVE
-A Requiem for the man who killed my wife-
“Anyway you don’t have the nerve to do it”, he said when I approached to him. “Really?”, I responded. “And why do you think I ain´t gonna do it?” added. The hill was full of nothing but silence; a terrible silence, which kept me really cold for some minutes. I thought that he wouldn’t have the brave to face me and stop the attack; but not only that, he made a really fast movement which I considered a punch. But it wasn’t. He only was trying to put away the gun in front of him.
In the failed act his mood was discovered. He was shaking of fear. “You don’t wanna do that”, he screamed again, by the time he walked back. And his shaking body was, now, too close to the edge. My memory, my hand, my gun, the sweat on his forehead, his eyes, and, in the other side, just in his back, the air that was tumbling hard, like calling him to the black grave of death.
I do not know why, but in that short time my head started to travel on time like it would have stopped and I could see everything in one second since the day before, when the cloudy day brought him to my house with his weapon to murder my wife and kid. I was saved because of the luck. My brother had asked me for some help in the barn so I wasn’t at home when I should be, I wasn’t at home by the time death had come for me in the hand of my coward killer.
Now revenge were gonna be mine. And what I enjoyed the most was the fear that I could smell coming from his eyes. Suddenly the atmosphere around me turned rear. Nothing seemed to be near me, only my gun, his body, the river down the edge of the hill, just behind him, and the feeling of goodness flowing freely inside me. I think that’s the only moment I will never forget for the rest of my life.
And the time had arrived. I wouldn’t expect no more. I was stronger than ever and nothing will end my thoughts. Patiently I pulled the trigger, but the bastard, just half second before, had fall trough the edge to the river. The damn-son-of-the-bitch offender will die but no through my hand.
I didn’t think twice, while he was going down like and apple from a tree I gave a step forward and pulled the trigger once and again and again and again, ´till the gun was empty, and so my soul. But my conscience and heart were calmed now. Above, I started to feel good again. Below, the river was colored in red, with a horrible picture of the body crashed on the wet rocks, murdered for me, before it touches its definitive grave.
Gustavo Lopez Tassara
