Chapter 1
Present time...
The airplane landed on time at the Tirana airport. The mesmerizing,
uncountable lights of the city and high-rises of America were now replaced
by the half-lit, half-asleep scene of my hometown. A young, curvy, blackhaired woman with a loud voice was trying to wake up her four- or fiveyear-old son, who seemed to be enjoying a lengthy, deep sleep. She was
speaking English to him.
“Honey, wake up. Grandma is waiting for you.”
The little boy, who looked almost disturbed that his sleep—or perhaps
his dream—was interrupted, was rubbing his eyes and looking around,
trying to figure out what was happening. People in a hurry were pulling out
their luggage, and it seemed, for a moment, that the long trip had shortened
their patience. As for myself, I was trying to be calm and control my
emotions and excitement—they felt like were going to explode at any
moment—thinking that everyone could notice. But the fact was that no one
was paying attention to me. It was simply in my subconscious; no one could
tell that my heart was about to jump outside my body. I pulled my luggage
down, almost tripping over it, and started dragging it through the tiny
corridor of the airplane. I felt lightheaded and, for a moment, thought that I
might have gotten sick from the ice-cold air that had been blowing from
everywhere. Every passenger except me had kept the air conditioning on
and I couldn’t understand why they weren’t bothered by it.
“Ema!”
“Toni, ah! I am finally here.”
Suddenly I found myself lifted a little into the air and wrapped up in
Toni’s muscular arms.
“I love you,” he whispered and kissed me directly on my lips. “How
was your trip, love? Are you tired?”
“Not bad at all, superman,” I teased him while instinctively touching his
arms.
Toni smiled, showing his white teeth and making a cute, apologetic
gesture, as if to say “It’s not my fault that that I’m that handsome.” We were
standing in the middle of the crowd and hadn’t taken our eyes off each
other. It was like we couldn’t get enough of exploring all the details of one
another’s features while everyone around us was in a hurry to get out of
there.
“You are so beautiful, my love. Do you know that?”
“No. It’s the first time I’m hearing it,” I said, smiling at him. “So are
you...” I continued with a lowered voice.
Toni put his hand around my shoulders and directed me toward the exit.
At this moment nothing existed for me anymore. I couldn’t see the people
around me; nothing mattered because, as far as I was concerned, the world
had only one person in it. His body odor, mixed with the scent of whatever
shampoo or cologne he used, added to the warm temperature that I was
feeling being welded to him, were all extremely attractive. It had given me
a feeling like I was drunk without drinking, if that’s how being drunk felt. I
wouldn’t know because I had never drank enough to get drunk in my life.
Maybe it was more like I was high instead but I had never done any kind of
drugs either. Somehow I now knew how it felt to be on those things. One
thing I knew for sure was that I wanted this feeling to last, if not forever, for
as long as possible. When we were finally in the parking lot, Toni kissed my
hair and thanked me for coming. He was having a hard time believing I was
there and I didn’t know why.
“Pinch me so I can believe that you’re here for real.”
“Where do you want me to start?” I asked, pinching his chest.
“I still can’t believe it,” he said, now protecting himself from me
because I was about to pinch him all over.
“How about now? Do you believe it now or will you have to wait until
after I turn you black and blue from pinching?”
“Oh, my sweetheart. Now I do. You made me the happiest man alive
today, Ema.”
He gave me a long kiss before we finally made it into his car.
“I hope you’re not disappointed by this face,” he said, pointing toward
himself. “Maybe it does not meet your expectations.”
“You just read my mind. What on earth I was thinking, for God’s sake?
To make a trip from the other side of the world only to see a face like that? I
must suffer the consequences now,” I said, trying to keep a straight face.
“Ha ha ha! Oh God, if you only knew how much I love you, Ema.”
We kissed again, from inside his car this time and for even longer.
“We have a long ride ahead and might hit some heavy traffic along the
way. You can rest a little, or maybe take a nap if you want. That might be
the only sleep you’ll get while you’re here the next few days,” Toni said,
looking over at me and giving me a wry smile.
“Are you planning to torture me or something? And would you tell me
where we’re going please?”
“Ah, I can’t. It’s a secret. Or to be more precise, it’s a surprise.”
“Why do I feel like a character in a sadistic horror movie?” I tried to
look worried but couldn’t keep the smile from my face.
“Ha, ha, I don’t know, my love, but one thing is for sure—your
imagination is wild.”
“I have to agree with that. My tendency is to be skeptical and think
about the dark side that people don’t show, even while believing in their
goodness and kindness.”
“For instance, you might suspect that I am a serial killer and that I might
take you somewhere far away, in a remote area, but using your seductive,
charming ways, you convince me to leave you alive, right? And then I let
you live day after day thanks to my change of heart.”
“Yes, something like that, my sultan. How did you turn this into a story
out of ‘One Thousand and One Night?”
We started laughing, then we kissed and stayed with our lips welded
together for a minute and our eyes on the road. I moved to my seat and,
while lying there comfortably, I enjoyed the scenery of the villages we were
leaving behind. Farms and land whose color had turned yellow and brown;
lonely trees who had lost most of their leaves; unhappy cows who were
chewing quietly on a few pieces of grass, which were hard to find that time
of year. On the side of the road, you couldn’t miss some farmers who
looked cold and who were dressed so lightly in old and faded clothes. Their
faces held deep wrinkles and their dry and damaged hands were the proof of
their hard life. They spent all day every day on the side of those roads,
getting covered with dust and sniffing the smoke of passing cars just to
make a buck selling their goods. It was the chestnut season and suddenly I
felt nostalgic for my childhood. I almost choked up in tears. Toni must have
noticed because he asked me if I ever thought how my life would have been
if I’d never left the country. I told him that I did think about that—quite
often in fact—and, since he thought I had such a vivid imagination, I had
truthfully built all those scenarios up in my mind about what I would have
done with my life if I had never escaped to the far Western world.
“Do you think you would have done the same thing, professionally?”
“I think so. What I do for a living is something I passionately love
doing. I feel that being a psychologist chose me more than I chose it. It suits
me, and I don’t know if I could do anything else better. Even though, in my
early years, I wanted to be a journalist. Unfortunately, in this country I was
never able to fulfill my dreams. I found everything I needed in my life in
America. Maybe things have changed around here these days and it’s better,
but for me the memories of my homeland are bittersweet...”
It is said that things happen for a reason. I would never have guessed
that one of the countries the company I worked for would choose to do
business with was Albania. Since I left many years ago without returning, I
was interestedly following the whole democratic progress of my country. It
was obvious that it was a long, endless road with a lot being done and a lot
more still to do. The company I worked for was supported by government
programs and private sponsors to help abused women around the world. In
some countries we would open centers with shelters for the ones who ran
away from their abusers, boyfriends, or pimps. Through those programs,
they would rehabilitate and earn the right to attend schools or courses in
America. During that kind of mission, I met Toni. The company he was
working for as an accountant and running all of their finances was one of
the biggest sponsors of this country. Toni’s background was as an engineer
and, when I met him, he was on the road to getting promoted to a director
of the company. During those two weeks of working next to him, I
intensively felt something good. I didn’t know what it was, but at least I felt
understood. He was a true gentleman and would never say anything
inappropriate or make comments and compliments like most of the other
guys do on that side of the planet. Actually, I was under the impression that
he was careful to hide some kind of shyness he felt while we were traveling
in the company’s van. He was trying to be polite and act naturally when we
were stuck together like sardines inside the van, overly packed with people
going to work. They didn’t seem to keep their distance and stayed so close
and smashed into me while Toni was trying to respect my space. One day
he got the courage to ask me out for lunch and some historic sightseeing.
We felt an instant connection and an immediate attraction despite the fact
that we had just met. A certain magnetism was inevitable once you noticed
a similar way of thinking or viewing life. We understood each other without
even saying a word, only by looking into each other’s eyes. When we
talked, we would finish each other’s sentences. I was drawn to him; his
honesty, his sincerity, his opinions, and his sense of humor were making me
fall for him uncontrollably. I would continue to laugh at his jokes even
when I was alone at my place. We could talk about anything together
without the need to be reserved or politically correct, and it felt good to be
ourselves. One time he mentioned that he felt like he’d known me his whole
life, and yet there wasn’t enough time in this life to get to know me. He said
that everything we were experiencing felt so familiar and I was either like
someone he had known before or had always been with him somehow. I
mentioned that we must have met in a different life. He smiled, admitting
that this theory has crossed his mind too and he asked me to give him some
idea of what eras we might have been together. I told him that I felt like we
had lived in Chicago during World War II, and we were filthy rich, big
manufacturers.
“No. I was a banker,” interrupted Toni, acting so serious, like I was
altering the true facts.
“You and your husband were factory owners because you were married
when I met you. But later, you left everything behind. It’s a very
complicated story, let’s leave it at that,” he continued, with that sense of
humor that allowed him to get away with pretty much anything. I got the
hint and pretended that it was a joke. He got very quiet for a few minutes
after that and asked me if it would be possible for us to continue our
friendship after I returned to America.
“I don’t mean to be rude and inconsiderate, Ema, but it would mean a
lot to me if we could stay in touch with each other. I must say that you are a
very special woman and one of the most interesting people I know.”
I wouldn’t have been able to say no even if I wanted to. I was already
hooked...
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