Augusto Larriva was leaving a meeting at the university to attend an activity of the Siervos de Cristo (Servants of Christ). As the person in charge of the publications of the movement, he had to meet the team in Sabana Grande[1], to promote the magazine of that month. He had already had a meeting with the tutor of his thesis to refine some points of it, he was going through all this hard and tiring work of doing a thesis. At the university meeting, he had not done very well because they made corrections that would cause alterations in his work, but he had no choice but to face it.
The meeting was to be at the «Iglesia de la Inmaculada Concepción de la Virgen (María Immaculate Conception Church of the Virgin Mary)» of Sabana Grande. In that church, it was where that team met every Wednesday to have their meeting.
The Servants of Christ is a secular Catholic association that has been in Venezuela for more than fifty years. It works by organizing all its members into "teams." These "teams" swarm throughout the Caracas area, to carry out "evangelizing work." From time to time these teams met to do prayer activities, the study of Catholic doctrine, preach among others. Although in practice all that was completely far from reality. He considered that everything had degenerated to simple social gatherings. Well, that was his opinion.
He left early and walked to the Ciudad Universitaria [2]station. He reached the turnstiles, put in his ticket, and walked to the platform. The annoying thing about the subway's line 2 is that the train took a long time to arrive. It was also the afternoon so most of the people were preparing to go home. Quite an uncomfortable and bumpy ride but I had to do it because I had a responsibility to promote the magazine.
While he was waiting, the place was filled with people who, like him, they're waiting for the subway...
Damn, what a bummer... well, I have no choice... He thought.
In the group of people, he observed the typical university fauna, the traditional warairas [3]with their dreadlocks, the occasional sifrino[4] making ridiculous things with his cell phone, and finally, the occasional kid from the poor neighborhoods or, as they say, a Tuki[5].
He thought about his role within the apostolic movement to which he belonged, within the Catholic Church and Christianity in general. He had converted to Christianity almost ten years ago and had been a member of the movement for almost eight. In the beginning, he had felt a strong love towards Christ, towards God. But now, after the time that had elapsed, I felt that the flame was gone, I could no longer find the meaning of all that. He was still faithful to the movement, to the church, but he could not find the answer to the questions he had, he was about to be there and nothing more.
He began to question the existence of God, the existence of Paradise, Damnation, among many other things. He had accepted the precepts of the Church as part of his life and his existence. That along with Jesus' sacrifice for humanity, so that he too could get to heaven, well ... that was the idea.
But lately, things had been going in a way that didn't give her any answers, coupled with problems with some members, especially with her friend Elsa.
She had been his mentor in the movement from the beginning. He was the first person he met there and he was the one who taught him all the rules and rudiments of the Servants of Christ. He came to have a strong and solid friendship but with time certain problems began to surface.
She is a woman with a very strong character and some half paranoid attitudes, that combined with certain limitations of his character caused disastrous results.
He began to feel a soft and imperceptible breeze on the platform that gradually grew...
It's already coming... That meant the train was already coming. They all began to crowd near the edge to get a good space to enter. That was the most complicated part since surely the train was full.
The Caracas fauna accumulated on the edge of the yellow line pushing each other. The train made an appearance entering like a rusty silver bolide, little by little it slowed down until it stopped covering the platform with its wagons.
The doors were opened, a few went out and the vast majority entered. The human swell struggled to mate, squeezing into the carriage, which turned into a giant sardine can.
There was no point in looking for a seat because at the next station he was going to get off. The train stood still for a moment there was a technical glitch. He waited for them to give some kind of notification through the loudspeakers but they didn't say anything. The doors were kept open, something that happened frequently. People with disgusting expressions prepared to wait.
Elsa had recruited him as a promotional assistant for the magazine. From time to time they met to carry out reports on how they were doing with their respective jobs. It had been interesting at first, but it degenerated into yet another pathetic job. He was sick of going all over the damn city promoting the magazine, of flatter people to get them to sign up for the damn magazine, he was tired of Elsa's damn screaming, and most of all he was stubborn from the Secretariat meetings.
The Secretariat was the highest institution in the Servants of Christ and was the center of power that was in charge of controlling, leading, and administering the entire movement. The problem is that those meetings were unbearable. Fortunately, Elsa was the one speaking and he was only limited to being a silent and tired spectator.
There was no answer to his problems, to his feeling of emptiness, only responsibilities that he had to fulfill if he wanted to "be in the Grace of God." He responded to those calls because that was what should bring him closer to God, but he was not getting anywhere, every night he asked for an answer but in the end, what he had was zero.
Even the legendary magazine of the movement was boring to the bone. The articles were short, reactionary, and limited. More than a Catholic publication, it looked like a catalog for the sale of products and services. On a couple of occasions, he had sat down to read it and considered that all the articles were the same thing.
Little by little he was no longer convinced by all that Christ represented. It bothered him to go to mass, work in the movement, and his team meetings. He was no longer interested in going to heaven, or hell, or purgatory, all that did not matter to him. I was just ... tired. The alarm sounded indicating that they were going to close the doors...
Finally...
The doors closed, the train pulled away, the people inside reeling slightly at the sudden movement of the train that was speeding to the next station, just a couple of minutes away.
Many of those people were sweaty and smelly. He could barely breathe and was uncomfortable. Lately, he was getting the idea to be around people, for the simple fact that sometimes people were unpleasant.
The subway finally arrived at the destination station. Once on the platform, after a few seconds, the doors opened and the human surge invaded the station. He had to climb the platform on the upper floor to enter Line 1, which would take him to his destination, along with the other people.
The people huddled together like a herd of pigs led to the slaughterhouse, pushing each other. Being out of the car the atmosphere became a little more refreshing, I was a little apprehensive because it was well known that many skilled pickpockets took advantage of those heap and confusion of people to steal which forced him to be more careful.
For a few years ago he used pornography, masturbation, and sexual fantasies as a form of escape, a hobby like any other. But since he had been working in the Secretariat, taking care of the books of the movement, that had been exacerbated. For what reason? Well, simple, the tedium, the damn tedium that consumed him having to sink all that. That might certainly sound stupid, cheesy, and childish, true, but it was also the reality of things.
Many times, sitting in those endless and tedious meetings of the Secretariat, he imagined having sex with an actress, singer, or any sensual celebrity. At first, he took those meetings seriously, he felt that he had to give his contribution. But after a while, he simply stubborn because he felt that he was not doing anything so he decided to remain silent, not intervene, let his imagination run wild, and disconnect from what was around him.
Sometimes he imagined that he was in a Stripclub sitting at a bar and in front of him he had a beautiful girl who little by little was taking off her clothes. It was the most common suggestive situation he imagined, although of course there were other options.
The number of people climbing the stairs to Line 1 was such that they crowded together and a funnel effect formed. Everyone started to the crowd and they just couldn't move any further. They just stood still and moved forward little by little. He looked at that with some disgust...
My God, do I have to peel this tail?...
He prepared to study the crowd of beasts that stood before him. They all advanced slowly as they clumsily tried to breakthrough. He finally got tired and thought...
Ok, let's go the other way...
He turned and stepped out of the human swell, dodging passersby. Some people advanced like mindless zombies, others like hyperkinetic screaming madly. Using great skill and patience; he dodged all the people and lunged for the other exit.
The other exit was a couple of meters ahead and with wide steps. That meant that there was a space where people could circulate calmly and traffic jams did not occur. The storm surge flowed quickly up the stairs. Each of the users went at their own pace.
He needed to go to Sabana Grande and the stairs he had taken led to the platform in the opposite direction (west). Consequently, once he was up, he had to go to the other platform to get to his destination without problems.
To be able to change places, you would have to take the escalator to the upper level. There were the exit turnstiles and the other escalators that went down to the other side. He would walk to the other side and go down the stairs to get to the platform he needed. He walked patiently up the escalator as he watched all the other users absorbed in their tasks.
He crossed the upper level, passing near the turnstiles and taking the opposite stairs. He started down the stairs while patiently waiting. At that moment, he spotted in front of him a group of workmen coming up the opposite stairs. Unlike the other users, they came talking animatedly, almost shouting, dressed in their workers' uniforms, the vast majority overweight, dark-skinned, typical inhabitants of popular areas. They were chatting and joking with each other as they went up the escalators in the opposite direction from him.
Our hero while continuing to descend began to reflect...
God, now I'm going to go to another one of those boring meetings. What are they going to talk about today?... I hope they don't panic about the Santeros and that bullshit...
He remembered a meeting he had where everyone present had almost a panic attack, they did not shout or act hysterically, but the atmosphere felt heavy. He did not go crazy thanks to his extraordinary imagination which he used to make quite interesting dream trips. Remembering that made him smile.
He and the workers met face to face. He was distracted remembering those dream trips, among these was a crazy and uncontrolled Metal concert in the middle of Holy Mass that culminated with the emergence of a gigantic green dragon, another was a group meeting that became an extravagant party to the rhythm of Disco music.
On the other hand, the workers were joking with each other, when one of them turned and watched him go up the escalators, alone, smiling, and distracted. He addressed his companions making a malicious gesture that the others interpreted.
He was deep in thought when he heard a call to him:
- Hey!... Hey fella!
He reacted by searching for the voice and found himself face to face with the malicious subject. The workman looked him straight in the eye with a neutral expression. He gave the impression of being aggressive but you could tell that there were other intentions behind it. This person raised his right arm showing a strange object that he could not identify, thanks to the speed with which the whole situation passed. After showing it, he extended his arm forward pointing that metallic object at his face:
- Dude, you're dead... - he just said while pointing at his face. The metallic object was gleaming despite the dim lighting of the place. Everything happened very quickly, with no time to do much except process what little information I had at the time...
Pistol... aim a pistol... was the conclusion he drew in those nanoseconds.
His reaction was the most unexpected thing he could have done. He closed his eyes, an automatic, intuitive, and unexpected reaction. It was as if salvation from the dilemma he found himself in the world of dreams. He just closed his eyes and turned off, to call him somehow...
***
His whole life passed in front of him, a million thoughts surfaced in his head as if time had frozen, as if he were in limbo, floating aimlessly...
He has a gun and he's pointing it at me... I can't believe it, he's going to shoot me, I'm going to be killed, how could this have happened?...
The whole situation could be summed up as: "a person pulls out a gun on the escalator and decides to blow his brains out in front of at least a hundred people."...
But how are you going to do that? I mean... In front of all the people, many witnesses could point to you in the police investigation...
But immediately all those doubts were cut by the most important fact of all. His death, the simple fact that he was going to die and there was nothing about it he could do. Images he had seen of shootings in action movies came to mind. There, a character is always shot in the head and he is left with a macabre "grimace of surprise." Additionally, you can see the bullet hole in his forehead dripping blood and/or brains. But these were the most "conservative" cases because in other films they took the matter down to the level of Gore. There they showed things like heads exploding like sideburns while leaving a trail within a radius of two meters around them...
Gross...
Everything was happening so fast that all that was left was just amazement, surprise. Such a situation could certainly raise much deeper questions...
I'm going to die, I say... this is so... strange... other specific questions arose... What is going to become of my family?... He was not married, he had no children, he was just finishing university and as a good humanities student, his job opportunities were worryingly limited. It was an economic burden for his family, to which he did not contribute anything, in a macabre sense of the matter his death meant one less mouth to feed.
Although on the other hand, another matter was of the utmost importance...
Where am I going to go? Where will my soul rest for the rest of eternity?...
He had been a Christian since he was eighteen years old and at twenty-one, he had reached the Servants of Christ. It had arrived thanks to an invitation from an acquaintance, that had already been more than seven years ago. He remembered having started the road with an unusual joy, hope, amazement, amazement, but all that little by little was becoming opaque, fading, and dying. Instead, it was replaced by apathy, boredom, sarcasm, stubbornness, among other negative things.
If he was a good Christian he would go to heaven where God-Pope would be waiting for him. Where Jesus Christ or «Chucho», the name given to him by a colloquial, irreverent, and hilarious priest from Coro[6] that he had met in the first retreat he had in the movement, would receive him with open arms. Of course, if he misbehaved, he would inexorably rot in the flames of hell, where the Fallen Angel would be tormenting him with a trident. All this made him ask himself the fundamental question...
What is a good Christian?... could I be a good Christian? Will my soul be ready to go to the kingdom of heaven?...
He did not have the answer to that question, he was not certain of anything, if just believing in Jesus and accepting him as his savior was enough to go to heaven, then he was guaranteed. The bad news is that that was the evangelicals and as a member of the Catholic Church he had to have that faith full of works and fruits, to earn his position in Paradise...
But I don't follow all the rules...
He had not prayed for a long time because he was simply given a sovereign crab. He did not read the scriptures and worst of all, he was almost a slave to masturbation and pornography. The latter was because he was simply feeling deep boredom, he was sick of everyone, sick of the situation he was in, and sick of... the Servants of Christ. Masturbation and pornography served as a drug that helped him escape from the tedium of every day. The bad thing is that it was addictive and emotionally damaged him or at least that was what the Holy Church said.
This situation led to the habit of confessing very frequently to the priest, which ended in a couple of gentle reprimands. This whole situation had reached a point where he no longer cared at all. But that did not erase the fact that the Holy Church said that it was forbidden for what is sin...
Am I going to hell for it?... that question came to him in that instant.
Although there was also the aspect of his triumphs, he wanted to be successful in life, in the things he did, he wanted to be able to buy a house, become independent from his parents, get a beautiful girl, get married, has children, the basics and now all of that was just going to pulverize into the air, just like his brains.
All his fantasies, desires, wishes, and imagination were simply going to turn into a disgusting bloody mass that was going to splash the escalators and drench the people who were around him. His corpse was to be left on the escalator with his face contorted in a grimace of terror and pain, his eyes wide and wild. The very scene of a Police Thriller...
My parents will see with horror my corpse in the morgue, God, poor people... Although curiously, on the other hand, I saw the situation with relief. He was no longer going to have to worry about how to solve the problems he had such as getting a good job, seeing how he could overcome his mental handicaps to become an "exemplary man", among a lot of other things.
Immediately a new reflective thought arose...
This doesn't make sense, why would my killer shoot me in the middle of the subway in a rush hour? Exactly in front of hundreds or perhaps thousands of people. How are you going to escape? Why didn't you wear a mask? How are you going to stop people from giving your description to the police? He was riding a bloody escalator in motion. Full of people, how is he going to escape?... I know that people are going to do absolutely nothing to stop him, but they are going to be very black to flee...
Now that he saw the situation, it didn't surprise him. Violence had overwhelmingly multiplied in Venezuela. Especially with the almighty red-red government, which held the reins of the nation, stealing how much money it had within its reach but not enough, hiring criminal gangs to terrorize people who opposed its designs. Although certainly this drama already existed in the nineties only that it was not as hostile as it is now.
News about ignominious acts that occurred throughout the national territory reached him all the time. Stories where all kinds of villains committed misdeeds without rhyme or reason. For example, the cumbersome murder of Mónica Spear [7]on a rough highway in the interior of the country or an episode of a person who was shot at a Wendy's in La Guaira[8], although recalling the matter did not remember if it was a Wendy's, Subway or McDonald's.
He had been mugged a couple of times, nothing serious, but he had never gotten to the point of having a deadly armed assault on him. He was going to die irretrievably and that at first felt quite... strange.
He recalled that before entering college, he had flirted with the idea of suicide. Because he felt that his life had no meaning, of course, that came to an end when he converted to Christianity, but in recent years everything had gone to hell. At that moment a new thought emerged...
Wait, they were pointing a gun at me... Where's the shot? Shouldn't I feel pain? Shouldn't I feel a strong impact on my forehead or face that pushes my head violently back?... Since I closed my eyes, nothing like that has happened...
Probably now would come the terrible pain of the shot, but for some reason, it seemed like a long time had passed. Well, the only way to find out was to get out of that kind of limbo into which he had fallen and return to reality. In short, he had to open his eyes...
***
He opened his eyes slowly, it was as if he had awakened from a very brief and deep sleep. It had only been a few seconds but he felt like an eternity. He was standing on the escalators, surrounded by people, in the Plaza Venezuela subway and was changing platforms to go to Sabana Grande for a meeting.
At that moment he heard the laughter that came to a couple of meters from where he was standing, it was the workers who were dying of laughter. One of them was lifting a metal object and waving it in the air, it had a shape similar to a pistol, but it was not:
- Hahahahaha!!!... did you see how he was scared?... - said one, the same one who had pointed the metal object at him.
The others laughed cheerfully. Luckily the ladder quickly pushed them aside, taking him to opposite ends. Then he finished realizing everything...
They played a joke on me, it wasn't a weapon... Everything was so fast that I got confused...
The escalator reached the upper floor where they were at the subway exit turnstiles, once there he walked in the opposite direction to take the subway in the opposite direction.
At that moment he simply dedicated himself to digest what had happened, how it had happened, and why it had happened. Everything had happened so fast that he did not have time to reflect, he did not have time to feel fear, sadness, anger, helplessness.
Surprisingly, he had come to have a bit of relief. His life had not been interesting, he had not managed to get a job commensurate with his career and his training, so he had ended the situation working as a telemarketer in an insurance company. The country had fallen into a spiral of political disorder and violence that was quite serious. All the analyzes indicated that there was no improvement in the situation and that everything was gradually going to get worse. But everything, in the end, had been a false alarm.
He got on the escalators that took him down to the other platform to take the subway to his destination...
Dick, what a shit... thank goodness I just limited myself to close my eyes, as if the only thing was to wait for death to come to me and I didn't start screaming or being startled. I really would have made a fool of the world and given those assholes more material to make fun of...
How exactly had that happened to him? How had he been ambushed by a group of idiots who wanted to be smart? The quickest and simplest answer would be that sometimes days come when you have to, period.
Probably those guys, those tukis, would be bursting with laughter at the fact that they managed to tease him. Luckily he was able to dodge the situation sneakily and escape quickly, preventing them from doing anything else. Now that everything was cleared up and over, the only thing he could do was feel stupid, although certainly none of that had been his fault, they had simply ambushed him...
Almighty God, why are there so many morons in the world?...
That was a question that corresponded to this type of specific situation. The average Venezuelan has a very marked sense of humor, only that unfortunately that is mixed with the almost absolute lack of a sense of civility, illiteracy, rudeness, and with the attitude «of more invested than a drawer and more out of a balcony»[9]. All that combination of factors makes this kind of thing happen. Taken into an entirely religious sphere, the answer is simple...
It's simple, it all started with the apple on the tree. The man fell into temptation and sinned, as a consequence, he was expelled... After that Cain and Abel came and all terms of going to hell...
Yes... that was the world he had to live in, he could do absolutely nothing but rather just adapt and survive. He had friends who told him he must be aggressive, more violent, more predatory, an alpha male, and all that sort of thing. But the detail is that he was not good at that. Probably the key would be to be doing stupid things on the street like those guys to be successful in life.
What a problem life was, having to deal with these kinds of things every day, being with one problem all the time and then jumping to another. Certainly, a small part of him would have liked the gun to have been real and to put an end to all his troubles in one fell swoop. But of course, that was quite a reflection that he made a couple of seconds just a moment ago...
Wow, amazing... I was on the verge of... At that moment he stopped in his tracks because after the conclusion he had the matter, he was not sure whether to classify it that way... death?... That left him thinking in a confused way as he walked towards the escalator to go down to the other side of the platform.
[1] Sabana Grande - An area in the center-east of Caracas is characterized by having a large boulevard that is well-traveled by the population of the city. Your name means "Great Savanna" in spanish.
[2]Ciudad Universitaria - Subway station that takes its name from the location where it is located. Next to the University City of the U.C.V. The principal college in Venezuela.
[3] Waraira - It is the nickname used in Venezuela to call the Hippies. They are people who sell handicrafts, souvenirs, and cheap handmade jewelry. They are characterized by having a dirty appearance and having a lifestyle similar to those of the Hippies.
[4] Sifrino - Said of a person, who ostentatiously belongs or pretends to belong to a wealthy social class. A person who has and shows material and fashionable goods, but has a low spiritual and intellectual level, that is, is "empty" or is "null." A person with high economic and social level, with striking physical and economic attributes, generally with a way of speaking with idioms, anglicisms and elements of cultured language and a particular modulation that consists of lengthening certain syllables while opening and closing the jaw and lips making a vowel sound indefinite and the "che" sound like she. It is a term that is generally derogatory in Venezuela.
[5] Tuki - These are an urban clan with a mixture of fashions that was born in Caracas whose origin is unknown. However, it is called that way to people with the appearance of thugs, with marginal clothing, and are poorly educated. It is associated with drug use, violence, crime, and, above all, a marginal language.
[6] Coro - A coastal city located in northwestern Venezuela. It is the capital of the western state of Falcón. It is famous for its dunes that form on the coast.
[7] Mónica Spear - (1984-2014) was a Venezuelan actress, model,
philanthropist, and beauty queen, winner of the 2004 Miss Venezuela pageant, known for her starring roles in various Venezuelan soap operas. Represented Venezuela in the Miss Universe 2005 pageant which took place in Bangkok, Thailand, positioning herself as the fourth finalist. On the night of January 6, 2014, and while they were moving along a highway in the interior of the country, their vehicle crashed. While the vehicle was towed by a tow truck, criminals arrived at the scene and shot her and her husband to death. Fortunately, the authorities acted quickly and arrested and convicted those responsible. This was a very notorious case in Venezuela at that time and it was a wake-up call to the crime and violence situation in the country. Those problems continue today.
[8] La Guaira - A city located on the north coast of Venezuela, in the Vargas state. It is located one hour (depending on traffic) from Caracas. The city is located just behind the Avila hill and is a regular vacation spot for many Caracas residents.
[9] of more invested than a drawer and more out of a balcony - This is a direct translation of the sentence in Spanish: «más metido que una gabeta y más salido que un balcón». This is a common Venezuelan saying, which refers to very outgoing people. They are people who have a very haughty, intrepid, and nosy attitude. As a result, they are all over the place, getting into where they are not called and interacting excessively (and sometimes inappropriately) with others, including strangers.