Today I decided that I would leave the house with my best dress, cool hairdresser's hair, the smile of those who have nothing to lose, and I would have crossed you in a crowded shopping mall.
I decided that on the first ones I would pretend not to recognize you, letting my pride take over the reins of the situation, and then, when I would have been sure that your gaze was resting on me, I would have approached distractedly waiting for you to greet me.
I would have squared you from top to bottom with the most flat and arid expression that would have succeeded me, almost letting a hint of annoyance leak out.
You would have asked me how I am, how life goes, and I would have told you one of the stories I had patiently woven into my head, one of those that would have made my days look interesting and full of twists and turns.
Did I always have stories to tell, memories?
I decided that you would listen to me kidnapped, with a bit of envy and remorse in your gaze, and then you would have greeted me hastily phoneying that you had a commitment.
I would have stayed looking at you while you were standing in the crowd again, keeping intact the papier-mâché smile that I had shown up to that moment. I would have laughter of taste thinking that I had won myself, that you were finally not up to me.
I would have waited anxiously for the message that you would always have sent me the same evening, writing to me how much I missed you and how stupid I was to let myself go.
I decided that this would be exactly what happened when I slipped into a dress that I had no longer wanted to wear from the day we said goodbye.
I decided it because I had tired of wanting, dreaming and hoping for it. I decided that this would be the script of my day, without if and without but.
I already knew in memory the jokes, answers, looks and grimaces. Every detail.
That is why I decided that it would finally be a success today, even though it has obviously not happened.
I know the whole script, from the first to the last line, but the protagonist of that perfect scene never appears on the set.
While I was wandering for the umpteenth time in that shopping mall, of which I know every corner, while looking for your eyes among hundreds of identical eyes, I thought about how many stories I could tell you and how much I wanted you to listen to them until the end.
I am well aware that seeing you again really would make all my wall of lies, staged and pretended perfection collapse in a moment. The script would be in smoke even before the beginning of the scene, and I'd do nothing but shake under the unsustainable weight of memories.
It has never been a war to win, ours. It has never been even a film.
But for some reason I always wanted to be the strong one, for only once. I would have liked to have kept the memory of a time when I had been indifferent and carefree before you. I would have liked to see me shining. Only that.
But the encounters don't decide, the loves are not written in a script with indelible ink and even the clothes we have loved can end up mouldering at the bottom of a closet.
We can only begin to rewrite our own history. Our jokes, monologues, our scenes as protagonists. We can gradually transform ourselves into the solitary heroes of our journey.
One step at a time, however.
One dress at a time.
One memory at a time.
And a desire shattered at a time.