by Haidji
Cassandra was tired from her first night’s work in the condominium kitchen, the night before, to help prepare the candidates’ dinners.
She was thinking about the kitchen while she prepared her candidates with John, who had an especially good mood this day; waiting for the next day, it would be a rest day for him, he had the day off…but all this tension in time was making John a little bit depressed.
Rushing into perfection, he wanted his work to be appreciated, but to make them all look alike wasn’t always easy… ‘Imagine that on another day, a candidate wasn’t raised into the jumping list. Can you imagine?’ he muttered to himself. ‘He wasn’t raised! How much makeup he needed to make his face look smooth and pure like ivory? How much of my precious time and energy he took!’ Oh my God…he really needed a day off. The lack of respect for his work was making him feel cranky; he was a makeup artist, not a locksmith!
The game needed to start soon and much work was there to do: ‘We don’t have time to be cranky, John!’
‘I cannot even be cranky?
If I am happy and laugh too loud, or if I am sad and cry sometimes, I am bipolar! In this world, to laugh is to be a hysteric and to cry is to be a depressive! To laugh or cry isn’t normal anymore. Better I make up myself today, like the candidates…and no words will come out of my mouth until the sun goes down!’
The game needed to start soon and work was there to do, ‘We don’t have time to be cranky, John!’
Cassandra said, ‘your work is great, John! The best. They all will look like white piano ivory keys.’
‘As if piano keys would be round’, said John, ‘Perfect! They must be perfect!’
‘Now just make the Symbol between the eyebrows, John. Your day off is coming tomorrow. They are all perfect! You are a great artist!’
A shadow of a smile broke on John’s face.
Great artist! This made his mood better! His work was being recognized! And he looked at the next candidate and worked in silence for a while. Then he continued working and singing a melody of a song that a friend’s son had written, for a contest on Facebook.
With John rescued, at least for a while, before his next crisis, Cassandra wandered back to her own thoughts.
Cassandra remembered the night before, in the condominium kitchen…the food, there was something wrong with the food there.
Every tray had a number written on the bottom of the right side, and they always needed to make the same doses of food in each tray for each candidate.
The room was full and she saw candidate 2252. She was happy to see him alive, but he seemed so far away, like all the others, and he didn’t notice her or the others around him; they all were eating in silence, as would the room be the wake room of a cemetery.
There was a kind of sauce that was always the last thing they would make over the candidates’ plates. A transparent sauce that tasted like bitter vinegar: she tasted a drop of it, just a drop; she was always interested to improve her kitchen skills, she exclaimed to the kitchen workers around her, when she tasted the sauce. But there was also a note about one candidate, number 3507, that had an allergy to the sauce. So she decided to write under that note that candidate 2252 was also allergic, just in case he could be and also, because she thought nobody could really enjoy eating this meal with this vinegar sauce all over it.
Why a sauce that tastes like vinegar, over the food? Does this taste well? But there were no complaints about the sauce so, maybe, this was one of these fashionable things, like sushi once was, that she never understood herself, but that happens in the world.
Suddenly everybody loves the same food, even if years before they wouldn’t like it. In some parts of the world persons eat horses and snails, but vinegar sauce over everything? It was strange. Not everything is just bread and salad, where vinegar was great; something was strange inside this kitchen.
From her last evening’s thoughts she remembered only that she had a good night’s sleep, so she was probably just overtired, because she didn’t even remember her way back home, and she woke up in the morning on her bed, with her yesterday clothes on.
But this morning, she was late to work, she needed to go and calm John down, and she had no time to think about things. She had taken a quick shower, searched quickly for clean clothes, and run out the door.
The fourth Game day started with the beautiful Hostess sliding over the stadium platform, wearing her Alexander McQueen Shoes and beautiful Elen Danielle ‘Femme Fatale’ red dress, welcoming the public.
The first group of candidates came to the platform, already prepared for the game. It was the fourth day of jumping, the last day of the first step in the game before the day off, after which the second step of the Game would start.
Her voice overrode the combined voices of the bet sellers, the mob in the stadium, the Suicide Game t-shirt and souvenir sellers on the streets around, and the voices of the Hare Krishna group (who seemed to be murmuring a new mantra…‘we all gonna’…‘we all gonna…’)
‘Welcome to the last day of the first game step, thank you all for being here; at home, on the streets outside the Stadium, at your workplace, or wherever you are now, thanks for being here with me! Today I have 2000 more candidates, who will jump for you… and the first group is ready! Waiting for the signal. Let the countdown begin!’
And the counter started at 50, as she continued to speak.
‘Live from the Night Stadium, especially for you, the last day of this first step, for you, the new and unexpected
SUICIDE GAME!
The new game
The new mania
8000 candidates and
Only one will survive
Only one can win!
Live from the Night Stadium
Nothing compares to what you'll see here
Nothing compares to what you'll watch
You have already chosen your candidate,
You have Made your bet
To be part of a
New and unexpected game
Now it’s time to let all be in the laps of the gods
And when the bell rings…it is time to jump for your life!
10…9…8…7…6…5…4…3…2…1!
And the jump bell rang out loudly
JUMP!’
And the first group jumped…
Cassandra was doing the makeup on the second group of the day. There were five makeup teams, each with two persons, each team to take care of forty candidates in a group, which made twenty candidates for each makeup artist.
Cassandra could swear that she made only nineteen, because she finished earlier than John, and this wasn’t usual. As she finished the makeup of her share of this second group, John was only just starting to take care of his last candidate from this second group.
She walked around for a few minutes wondering how she could have been so fast; but better was to count the candidates next time, so she could be sure.
The candidates went down to the elevators as the platform was rising with the winners of the last jump. The same elevators that carried the mini-vans that carried the losers’ bodies brought the next group of candidates to the ground to enter the platform.
Working on her next group, Cassandra counted the persons she needed to make up; 20, it was right, but she wasn’t faster than John. Did she have one candidate less in the last group? Were the other makeup teams stealing candidates?
She asked John about it.
‘No Cassandra’, said John. ‘The other teams steal only our work tools, because we are the best, they wouldn’t steal candidates. Don’t overreact! You probably miscounted. If they would like to prejudice us they would send us one candidate more, not steal one from us. Use your brain, girl!’
The Hostess’ voice announced the second group of this day.
‘Wow, the first group was great! Can the second group be better? They are all special! Watch with me! Are you ready? They are ready! Watch the counter…start at 50…and now…
Live
from the Night Stadium, especially for you, the last day of this first step, for you, now the unexpected
SUICIDE GAME!
The new game
The new mania
8000 candidates and
Only one will survive
Only one can win!
Live from the Night Stadium
Nothing compares to what you'll see here
Nothing compares to what you'll watch
You have already chosen your candidate,
You have Made your bet
To be part of a
New and unexpected game
Now it’s time to let all be in the laps of the gods
And when the bell rings…it is time to jump for your life!
10…9…8…7…6…5…4…3…2…1!
And the jump bell rang out loudly
JUMP!’
In the second group of the day, some candidates were missing. Number 6253 was one of the pregnant ones and was already sent home, but nobody noticed that were only 199 instead of 200 in the group that jumped. The same happened in the sixth, the last of the day’s group; 7011 and 7821 were also sent home.
But the crowd did not notice.
It was a stressful day also for the workers who removed the dead bodies from the sandy ground; they needed to bring more sand quickly and spread it over the now too many blood spots. It was good that the next day was a day off, because they also needed to do some repair work on the Stadium itself.
Only 688 survivors, on this fourth day. The Council was wondering why. It should have been more.
Cassandra was speaking with other makeup teams, and two others also had the impression that they had been faster in some groups, or maybe missed a candidate? Maybe they were just tired, and miscounted the candidates.
The beautiful Hostess proclaimed the end of the fourth day, with a new surprise…
‘I have a surprise for you! In one of the days of the next step, the winning group from the Facebook song contest organized by the teenagers, will sing live in the Stadium, before the Game starts! Yes, Life in a Wire will be here to sing for you! Rest tomorrow and enjoy your day, because you will need your rest, the second step is even better than the first one. More adrenaline, more surprises waiting here for you! Thank you for being here with me! Wherever you are, I will be here! Waiting for you, to show you…the second step of the Suicide Game!’
Life in a Wire’s video on YouTube already had over 1 million views. Their song ‘Suicide Game’ was the new hit…and it had also increased the SG t-shirts sales, now available not only at the Stadium, but also online.
Cassandra stopped quickly at Alessandra’s place.
To see how they were. They started to become real friends. In the middle of this weird game of life and death, she would stop there for a coffee, before she went to her work at the condominium. The small room, with the small garden, seemed like an oasis in the middle of the desert of the Stadium.
She asked Alessandra how she could keep the flowers in such good shape; her own flowers at home were always looking as would they prefer to be in the park across from her apartment on the other side of the street. Away from her.
Alessandra answered:
‘The flowers, I don’t know when they are thirsty; sometimes they drink a lot, other times the water stays and rots. Attracts insects and worms. You need to know them in their individuality, to know what they need. What they like, what they want from life. Sometimes I just follow my intuition and see if their leaves are bright or faded, like we make with human faces’.
Alessandra was still wondering where the baby came from; it was still a mystery for her and would maybe forever be a mystery. So, it was better not to speak to Cassandra about it, because she had no bracelet and the baby’s one was deactivated or broken, and they could not go out of there until the end of the game. Some stadium rules could not be broken.
All the workers already knew the girl and the baby, and thought that the baby was her own child; she was, probably, a lover of a married man, taking care alone of the fruit of the sin, hiding herself inside the Stadium, while a complicated divorce was happening.
Maybe a child of a higher member of the Stadium staff? Too much TV series’ in their minds, persons like to color life a little bit with gray tones, to make some shadows on it and make it more interesting.
If she would tell them that she had found the baby, they would think that she lied, and they would make her a kidnapper; so, the best was to be quiet and accept the rumors.
Don’t speak about it, but don’t deny it. The truth was too simple to be accepted. Nobody can just find a baby. She saw it as a kind of small miracle. And nobody understands miracles; they are mostly too simple to be understood.
Some of the workers felt friendship and compassion to her, poor young sinner, probably already regretting all she did…poor girl…. So they would bring them groceries, baby food and stop there for a small talk, before going off to their work. And maybe because it was good to see life, life starting in the middle of so much…dead stuff.
Cassandra rushed into work in the condominium kitchen. Because the next day would be a day off, they needed to prepare more meals for the candidates.
This night, Cassandra was so tired, so overwhelmed, that she started to feel worried about her candidate, who seemed, like all other candidates, not really aware of where he was, or what was going on around him.
As Cassandra finally reached her apartment that night, she was so exhausted and tired, so overwhelmed, that she needed a Red Bull, to calm down and fall asleep.
Chapter 12
Candidate 5151 – Bianca White
Bianca was around 20 years old, average size, blue eyes, and kind of shy sometimes, long golden brown hair.
She was beautiful, but she didn’t notice.
She was sad, but she never showed it.
She was the kind of sad beauty that attracts persons as would they feel the need to take care of her, or the need to attack or take advantage of her innocence and ingenuity. Because the pureness inside her heart, would never break, no matter what could happen in her life.
She was the first to appear at a party, and the last to leave it, and she was always invited.
Her preferred quotes included: ‘It wasn’t Aristotle that said Ces’t la vie, Carpe Diem, Veni Vidi Vici, let’s do it! Alea iacta est!!! No, it wasn’t!’ …And she would laugh loudly…‘It wasn’t! It was I!! Let’s jump into it!!!’
The present moment is the combination of future and past…so let’s live now and sometimes, sometimes let’s just forget about the rest!
Philosophers must have turned over inside their coffins by laughter or anger, because of the way she used their quotes, adding her own words, and creating new meanings and points of views about it.
‘Let’s live restless! Life is a tour! Enjoy your day, rest a little bit, and start again! Also in a restless life, you need a day off sometimes…’
She never drank anything alcoholic, and she was far away from drugs; so then, she was adorable exactly as she was.
Sometimes she liked to be a little bit crazy, in order not to get one hundred percent mad.
And she loved to dance…
This is how she should be, how she was outside and also in the image she saw of herself in the mirror of her dreams, and she lived intensely. Because being one hundred percent in the present moment, she could avoid thinking about the past or future and could keep her real self and all her pain away from all and everything around her. But not away from herself. She lived with her pain.
It was a Sunday and Bianca woke up and realized that it wasn’t a dream.
He really died. And now, she could speak about it.
It was a death like many other persons used to have in his generation, after a life with cigarettes and alcohol; he died because he did not have lungs anymore.
His lungs turned black, but his heart and soul were still at this moment darker than his lungs. His suffering wasn’t a consequence
of his sins, but a natural consequence of the way he treated his own body.
Contrary to the way that her family used to think about it, a disease doesn’t choose between good and bad persons, to catch them.
But now, it was too late to speak about it, because as the last action in his life, he died; but he took all of them, in a certain way, with him.
They were not interested anymore to hear her voice about the past, and there were no embraces, just offenses. It was a slap in her heart. And they would never, never understand what happened to her.
They all forgave him; they not only forgave him, they also sanctified him. All his sins were forgiven, merely because he suffered for two months in a hospital bed.
‘It was his past, his child traumas, alcohol’; they even mentioned ‘bad spirits around him that pursued him in his acts’. Mother and sisters had turned into strangers, for Bianca.
She did not suffer with his death, but she wasn’t happy about it; maybe she was a little bit relieved. And she remembered suddenly things that were locked inside her heart and even her memory for many years. He already abused her, as she was a small kid. Suddenly she remembered that. But once more, in her family, when you don’t speak about things, it was as if they would never exist. They didn’t want her to speak about it.
They suffered with his death and she—she suffered with their reaction to it.
All was unfounded.
He wasn’t a father. He was a psychopathic monster.
What about all we learn, about to be a correct person, if someone can be bad all lifelong and come to heaven, after suffering only two months? What about the good persons who suffer the two months too, and then die from the same disease? Where do they go? Does heaven have different sections? Nobody answered her this question.
And now, she felt like a transparent shadow of herself. As would she be less than the air they use to breathe.
