CASSIOPEIA

Jehssyca F.

“Not tonight, baby”.

“Why?”

“Just look at the stars”.

“What the deal with the stars?”

“They are so beautiful tonight”.

“Yes, they are. And you look awesome as well”.

“Thanks. But let me go”.

“Ok, sorry. So tonight you want to look at the stars”.

“Yep”.

“Ok, let’s do it”.

“Look at them. What do you see there?”

“I see how small we are in this immensity. How lost we look”.

“You sound like you’re in love. ‘Small’, ‘immensity’ and ‘lost’ are passionate vocabulary”.

“I can’t help it. It’s Saturday night, I’m on a roof, looking at the stars with you. Give me a break”.

“Ain’t gonna work out tonight, baby. Let me go”.

“Okay. So you called me here only to make me look at the stars?”

“Otherwise you wouldn’t do so. Would you?”

 “No”.

“So unpathetic”.

“I’m sorry. I have other feelings for you tonight”.

“You can hold them for you. Tonight it’s me and the stars”.

“Wow. So what do I do? Should I just sit down here and watch you watching stars?”

“If you want to, at ease”. 

“Ok, I got it. I’m in trouble. Tell me, what did I do?”

“Nothing. Just there are a lot of stars up there and you’re worried about physical matters. Shame on you, boy”.

“Stars are physical things”.

“They are distant things too. I start liking it about them”.

“You don’t need to be rude. I just came here to have a great time with you and now you’re just bypassing me. I start thinking that it wasn’t that good coming here today. If you didn’t want my company, you just had to tell me”.

She looks him deeply.

“Hey. Don’t leave. I’m sorry, dear. I think I didn’t make my point. You’re right, it was rude. Just sit down here with me. Hold me now like this”.

“I definitely give up on trying figuring you out”.

“You should never have tried to do so. Hmm, do you remember when I asked you what you saw when we looked up to the skies?”

“Of course. You told me I was in love”.

“Yah. And you justified your obsession with carnal matters by reminding the fact that today is Saturday and you’re on a roof”.

“Ok, I must confess that our conversation tonight lacks for some coherence. But it’s you… so I’m accustomed with that”.

“Ha-ha. I’m serious. Look at the stars”.

“Oh, she’s serious now. But we are still on the roof looking at stars instead of being on the bedroom, making…”

“Focus, man! What do you see up there?”

“A lot of stars”.

“OOOOWNT. Wrong answer. Look at my finger. What do you see now?”

“Your ring”.

“Come on, man. Don’t make me take back to the ‘rude’ phase of this conversation”

“Oh, yeah. We left it behind. We don’t want it to come back. Ok, let me think… what I see… I’m sorry. I just see a lot of stars”.

“Are you sure? I don’t want to just give that away to you”.

“I’m totally sure. I give up”.

“There, man. Up those buildings. There’s a constellation”.

“‘A constellation’. I said ‘a lot of stars’ and you said my answer was wrong. Greetings, coherence”.

“‘A lot of stars’ is not a constellation. Look more carefully. What does it look like for you?”

“If I say ‘a lot of stars’ again, what does happen to my chances of come down with you to the bedroom still tonight?”

“You loser. Look carefully. Doesn’t it look like a human figure to you? Doesn’t it resemble a woman sitting down in an upside-down throne?”

“Oh, of course. A woman sitting down in an upside-down throne. It makes all the sense. I can see the color of her pantyhose”.

“Hey, that’s serious. Ancient Greeks had a legend for her”.

“Tell me about it, darling”.

“The name of that constellation is based on the history of an Ethiopian queen known by her vanity. She thought herself was more beautiful than the water nymphs, the daughters of Poseidon, the god of the seas, and he punished her. He made her a constellation at the sky, sitting on her throne… but upside-down.  It’s her punition for her vanity”.

“Cool”.

“Won’t you ask the name of the queen?”

“Oh, yah. What’s the name of the queen?”

“Her name was Cassiopeia”.

Silence.

“Wow. What a pity”.

     Suddenly she became serious.

“Dan. You’re gonna be a dad”.

Silence and cold wind.

“I don’t understand…”

“It’s simple. Let me put that in another way: we’re gone and through, Dan. It’s over”.

“But…”

“There’s no discussion, Dan. It’s the only decent thing we can do”.

“How could you know that?”

“Believe me, a nurse knows when things like that happen”.

“It can’t be possible”.

“Actually it can. And you know that”.

Silence once again.

“Just go away, Dan. Come back to your life. You’re disturbed. Just go and think about it a little. Later you might call me, if you want to”.

Dan left Jess with the stars. He was totally stunned. So many questions in his head… When? How? And the higher: why? Was him being punished? Fair enough. He wasn’t being a good husband. But how could a moment change a whole life? Oh, come on, he wasn’t fooling anyone. He was an expert at life-changing little moments. Jess was a proof of it. He was dead, he knew it. Finally his throne had been turned upside-down. He were about to pay high by his vanity. And he deserved that, he knew it.

He was dead.

He finally reached home. Silence. Dark.

Nobody in the living room. Empty kitchen.

The door of his bedroom was half open. He heard a tiny, low female crying.

“Dan, is it you?”, asked a female voice.

“What left of him”, he thought. “Yes, it’s me”, he answered out loud.

“Could you come here?”, the owner of the crying voice said.

“I’m coming”.

         He pushes the door.

         He looks at his bed.

         There she was, a large, strong woman sitting at the edge of the bed, giving her back to the door. Her trembling shoulders denounce her crying. When he came in, she turned her wet, dark eyes to him.

“I’m pregnant, Dan. We’re having a baby”.

         He couldn’t stand. He just fell at her feet and began crying insanely. She played with his dark hair with her long fingers.

“Isn’t it wonderful, darling?”

         He lifted up his head.

“I’m sorry, dear”.

“There’s no problem, Dan. Everything’s gonna be alright”.

She knew it all. She forgave everything.

         He also knew it. He went on crying. She was so strong. He was so weak. She was too good for him.

“If the baby is a girl”, Dan’s wife said, “her name’s gonna be Queen. Our Queen”.

         He crossed his wet look with hers.

“It’s a wonderful name. I love it”

She held his heavy head with her hands.

“I love you, Daniel”.

He couldn’t stand that anymore.

“I love you too… Cassiopeia”.

         At the same time, at some place of the city, Jess was still looking at the stars. And at some place, she knew – a god had just punished a vain woman, and a queen was just born.