Rain

I

It was raining. Pouring. The rain was coming down in cascades from the heavens, huge volumes of rainwater splattering on the pavement and the cobblestoned streets of Paris, running in small rivulets along the narrow depressions on the side of the roads, meandering their way towards God knows where. I had an umbrella, but it had long forfeited the fight with the water. It now lay reversed and useless on the sidewalk where I had discarded it. I couldn't even see a few feet in front of me, the rain was that intense. Like a blind man, I staggered around. Where had I been before this thundershower begun? Which street? Ah yes. The Rui Le'lle. From there, I take a right, and a left at the signal, and then walk on for a few hundred meters to get home. Yes, that was what Anna had told me. “ Don't lose your way Jacob. Be careful. You are very close. “ Fine then, I would walk on towards home. Never mind the rain, I just wanted to get to my destination. There was just one small problem. Which way was the right way? I had no idea which direction of the Le'lle I was facing in. I hadn't noted any shops or landmarks which would help me decide. Ok, let me walk along this way, and if I end up at a wide street, the Elysee, that was the right way. I remember that the other road joining the Le'lle was extremely narrow, just narrow enough for a small car to squeeze through.

Funny this. I've just realized something. Why aren't there any people on the streets? The thundershower had come down suddenly giving no indication of its arrival. They couldn't have all scurried off the streets into their cosy little homes with their nice raging fires. All the better. I was alone. Alone to do what I had to do. I shivered. It was cold. I staggered along the streets, confident that no cars would come this way in this rain and risk an accident, what with this reduced visibility. “ Reduced visibility “. Hah. I cannot even see my hands if I extend them in front of my face.

I shivered again. I needed something to take my mind off the freezing cold and the incessant pounding and splattering of the rain. The noise was playing havoc with my senses. Clickity Clack. Clickity Clack. Clack. Clack. It went on and on and on and on. I was beginning to feel an irrational irritation well up in me. No matter, soon, very soon, it would be over.

Anna, good old Anna. Even though we've been married fifty years, the attraction and the love hasn't gone down a bit. In fact, if anything, we were even more in love. I knew I was privileged to enjoy such a relationship. Everyday in the papers theres news of another divorce between a celebrity couple. Within a few days, the whole thing was forgotten. I never understood it, but then, I was from the older generation, where marriage vows actually meant something. I love that woman, I mused to myself. Even now I wished to be back home in her loving warm arms, have a bowl of her home made gruel by the fireside and talk. Talk late into the night. We talked about everything. I'm coming, Anna. I'm coming.

I glanced up, waking from my reverie. Yes, I was on the right track. I turned right and walked on. Very soon I will be with my Anna, I consoled myself. I will be out of this blighted rain and in the warmth that only one place can offer me. I took another left at the signal, and walked on. Only a few hundred meters now. My raincoat buttoned up, my shriveled up, wasted body huddled in it, I walked on.

After the tragedy, I had been devastated. I allowed nothing and no one to console me. Drink was my only companion, drug induced slumber my only pastime. From a fit fifty year old man, I turned into a thin, hallowed, wasted fifty three year old. I started wasting away, pining away for the one thing I valued above all else, which was now not available to me. Or wasn't it?

I remember that day well. It was the day when, for the first time, the idea flitted through my head. I dismissed it immediately, horrified by the turn that my thoughts were taking. But slowly, inexorably, I was pulled to the idea again. It was simple. So simple. Just a few seconds, and I would be where I wanted to be. Just a few seconds. The more I thought about it, the more confident I became about executing it. Only, there were several ways. Which was the best? I had spent considerable time searching for the answer. I think I had an idea now. I hated guns, and I did not know how to procure one anyway.

I was there. Looking up at the massive steel and iron girder edifice, I steeled myself to the job at hand, and approached the tiny elevator. No one attended the place nowadays. No security, no guards, nothing. The government, as money deprived as it was, did not even begin to have the resources to actively involve itself with the place. If someone wants to come see, let him. It is his problem. There is an elevator. What more can we do? Typical government attitude. Another thing I was to be rid of. My heart started pounding, not with fear, but with excitement and a sort of fierce joy that frightened me. Once the elevator started to ascend, I promised myself. Only some more time Jacob. Only some more time. Then I will be there.

There. I was at the top. As I looked around, the rain still coming down around me, I could see the city of Paris for miles around. This was the perfect place. The stage, the final step to the place I wanted to be, to the person I wanted to be with.

I walked over to the steel railing, and glanced down. I shuddered. A three hundred foot drop, straight down to the cobblestones below. It would be swift, and it would be painless. I hoped. I scribbled down a note to explain why I was doing this, although no explanation was needed to the people who truly knew me, and wedged it between two steel rails.

“ I'm coming Anna. “

And I jumped.

For a few seconds, I plummeted through the air like a stone, the air whistling around me as I went down. I did not know whether I was falling head-first or the other way around. I was too disoriented. And I did not care. So close. So close. And suddenly the stones rushed up to meet me, and to my tired, world weary eyes, they seemed to hold out loving arms, coaxing me into them, offering to rid me of all my troubles. I thought of Anna.













II



“ Sad affair. Poor guy was so screwed over with grief and anguish at his wife”, and he glanced down at a small slip of paper, “ Anna's death, more than, get this, three years back, that he jumps off the Eiffel Tower now. “

“ Sad. A bit weird. But I see this a lot of times, and yet whenever I see it again I get sad all over again. Bad affair, this. I will never understand why people commit suicide.“, said the Captain of the DGI, the French Police, to his close friend and colleague Al Pacquere.

“ Yeah. Neither can I. But then, god forbid, I haven't lost the one love in my life like this guy. Call up post and ask LC to send over an ambulance. “

“Suicide, Caucasian Male, mid-fifties at the Eiffel Tower. Name found in wallet : Jacob Rousseau. Make it quick. This is Captain Collet of the DGI speaking. ”, said the Captain into his cell phone. He was talking to the emergency medical service section of the La Chaliere Hospital.

“Let's get out of this rain. Bloody pouring. “

“ That's the best thing I've heard all day. “

And the Captain and the short Lieutenant of the DGI walked to their police car, away from the crowd that had appeared from nowhere surrounding the body of Jacob Rousseau, aged fifty-three, a shriveled body in a raincoat lying in a pool of blood, nothing more than a indistinguishable pile of blood, bones and flesh, no longer recognizable as a human being. No matter. He was happy. He had gone to meet his Anna.



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