Rebecca‘s Story

He felt her foot in his back. First he thought she was being naugthy, but then she started to hit him so hard. Too hard.

—Stop, Rebeca, please —said Duncan.

After a long second of silence, she stopped moving.

—I am not Rebecca —she said.

He hears her steps slowly going downstairs.

The mirror reflects his tired blue eyes. He can’t remember what exactly happened the night before, but it wasn’t something good.

He walks to the window and looks outside and feels the silence and solitude.

The autumn morning is waking up and he is alone in the house. She is not here. But, who is she, if she wasn’t Rebecca…?

He turns to the small toilette, and he discovers other man in the mirror. Who is he?… he has brown eyes. He is not himself.

“This nightmare is too long” , —thought Duncan, still in front of the mirror.

The man with the brown eyes is looking at him. Because it is not a nightmare. It is his alter ego. The bad one. The ugly and disgusting man who visits him time to time.

Duncan listens to Rebeca’s steps at the entrance, and breathes deeply.

—Say what you want, but don’t say “thank you” —Duncan hears Rebecca’s voice in his back.

—I wasn’t thinking to do that —answered the man.

The woman didn’t say a single word, but she thought: “What was he thinking, then?”.

Duncan mind went to another place, the place of the sins, the mysteries and the secrets.

Duncan saw the deception in her face. He felt miserable, but it was too late.

The sound of the door let him know that from that moment, he was alone with his fears and, worst, with the other man.

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Este cuento está dedicado a la profesora y escritora premiada, Rebecca Abrams, con quien tomé el curso “The drafts of story-telling“, en octubre de 2023 en la Universidad de Oxford, Inglaterra.