THE DECEIT OF TIME(Francys Wagner) I haven't visited you as much as I should have in the last few decades, Dad. Forgive me for that... My visits were brief, I just dropped by to say hello, to say ‘how are you?’ Sometimes, I stayed for a cup of tea...
Married life. My clients' problems as well as my own. There are days when all I want to do is get home, get in the bath, and relax. Get myself together so that the next day I'm intact, after all, my clients don't need to know that I've learnt, and am still learning, how to patch things up emotionally in order to get on with life... Looking back, I regret not spending more time with you, delaying appointments, putting aside my tasks, and dedicating more time to each other, like we used to do in the past.
But those were mere excuses—the truth runs deeper than that...
What I've felt all these years is that you've been taken away from me. Your time was for them. I don't know what to call how I've always felt about it.
There is no specific word for it. In a crude comparison, it's like someone borrowing an object from you, and when you ask for it back, it's damaged.
There's no way to fix, what do you call it? Anger? Indignation? Above the feeling of loss...
I missed this office of yours—the cluttered table strewn with paperwork and the faint scent of ink, the rhythmic clacking of your typewriter that once filled these walls with life. The aroma of coffee lingering from your morning brew, with the window bringing a hint of fresh air and the fragrance of flowers outside. Besides, there’s this hourglass, transporting me back to being the eight-year-old girl, feeling sad and withdrawn after just losing Mum.
Here, I felt safe...
The babysitter you hired struggled to understand me and would often get upset. It's not that I didn't like her, but I simply couldn't bear the thought of anyone replacing Mum. I felt exasperated because I couldn’t understand why you kept her in the house, why you didn't let Evelyn go...
How innocent I was, wasn't I, Dad?
I couldn't understand why Mum had gone to a beautiful place, as you said, and why I couldn't visit her there. You told me she could see me from where she was, but I couldn't see her. It didn't seem fair. Why couldn't we be together like we always were?
I remember your voice, hoarse with emotion, yet you stood firm for me. You tried to comfort me... Dad, I've given you a lot of work, and for that, I'm sorry. But I also want to thank you for being so kind, so patient, so loving. Thank you for setting up your office at home just so I could have you around longer.
You devoted yourself exclusively to me until I became a young woman. You stopped living your life for me. You were so handsome, any woman would want you, but you gave up on them... At least, apparently, didn’t you?
You understood in my silence that no one could replace Mum, who I had for such a short time... I missed her miserably my whole life, Dad, and I’m going to miss you just as much as her...
If only I could have made a deal with the hourglass. A Dorian Gray version, as bizarre as the original, just came to mind. The sand would age... What would that be like? Would it change colour? It doesn't matter... Maybe the sand would be weakened and wouldn't have the strength to pass to the other side, and time wouldn't pass for us...
You would be as in this portrait you kept on the wall with Mum, and me as a baby. You, so handsome, with your hair still black, your dark eyes not yet clouded with cataracts. I much prefer this version of you to the one in the coffin, out there, in the middle of the lounge—the nearly amorphous version, where the wrinkles of time have destroyed your beauty. Your old self, vanished.
I recall how I'd stand here for hours if you'd let me, turning, and turning the hourglass without realising that my life was slipping away.
My life, since I was born has had a pact with death, which steals our youth, our strength. But when we're young, we don't recognise that, do we? We think we are eternal, that we won't have an end.
Oh, perverse illusion. It's terrible when we comprehend, we were wrong... How it hurts to lose our loved ones along the way, and that one day we won't be here anymore, and someone will miss us...
I didn’t have friends, perhaps one or two at school, where I used to be so introspective. The other girls avoided talking to me. I was called weird, but they didn't know about my pain. I couldn't put it into words. I wanted to shout to the world, but who would understand me. My teacher would say I had to get over it.
As if it were that easy. Did she know what it was like to have a mum who would put me to bed every night, tell me stories. She would bathe me, wash, and style my hair, take me to the shop to buy ornaments, make dresses for me, bake the chocolate cake I loved, play with me in the garden, sit by the pool after swimming, and drink juice while enjoying the sun.
Probably not... So, she couldn't have known what I missed...
I'd rather stay at home, watching telly, or being with you in the office, or reading the books Mum read to me or the ones you had bought me...
Oh, Dad... How I miss those days of youth. You made me happy.
You would open a drawer on your table and magically produce chocolates, handing them to me. I would slowly savour them, watching the sand fall...
Some days we would walk in the park, throwing food to the geese, ducks, and birds. Pedalling on the lake. Picnics...
After an ice cream, you'd buy me some colourful balloons...
You taught me how to ride a bike. Played games with me...
So many memories, so many enjoyable moments....
That was the version I had of you for a long time until, in our teens, David, whom you hired to help you in the office, came into our lives.
The freckled, red-haired boy with almost transparent blue eyes through which I could clearly see his soul.
We had an immediate connection. You realised that.
He and I had so much in common. Both mum orphans, shy, born on the same day, two years older than me—29 February. A date that seems fictitious because, officially, we only have birthdays every four years.
We should age more slowly than other people, shouldn't we? But unfortunately, that's not the case.
Our names start with D—David, Diana. Five letters each.
You said if you'd had a son, you'd have called him David.
Diana was your choice. Among all its meanings—princess, goddess—I prefer the enlightened one.
David means the favourite...
A coincidence? Because you've always treated David as if he were your son. You liked him so much, because he worked hard and progressed in his profession, that you were happy when he and I started dating.
I remember how pleased you were when David and I got married.
Come to think of it, was it because you were passing on your responsibility for me to him?
I have a reason for that. A few years after I got married, you assumed your relationship with the woman who had been my nanny.
How so? I didn't understand at the time, I asked you, and you said that you and Evelyn had met again by chance...
But one doubt remains—actually, almost a certainty that has never been confirmed by either you or Evelyn. Haven't you been having an affair since she took care of me? I've never bought into this idea of a random encounter—you didn't frequent the same places or social circles... So, I can only imagine that the affair was a long-standing one. I'm sorry...
Well, that doesn't make any difference now. It’s past.
I think she made you happy; at least that's what you always let on. She even gave you a son. It's interesting how he chose not to pursue your traditional career path in bureaucratic accounting or any other field that offers financial stability. Instead, he identifies as an artist, specifically an actor...
The two stood side by side, when I arrived. It was exactly as I stepped inside the lounge that she started sobbing loudly. I found it exaggerated, pathetically dramatic, that didn't ring true... She was wearing sunglasses, I couldn’t see her eyes...
I suspect Evelyn thinks I don't like her. It's not true, but I can't say I do either.
I got used to it, I adapted, let's say. However, the child I was and who still lives somewhere inside me, always saw her as someone who wanted to take Mum's place. A usurper...
In the end, she's done it, hasn't she, Dad? She became your wife...
If it had happened when I was a child, I would probably have called her ‘stepmum’?
Your son looks like her. The round face, the curly hair, the furtive green eyes, as if he were suspicious of everything...
Not long ago, David and I went to see a play in which your son was performing... Giancarlo Guermond Junior. The name is pompous; however, it doesn’t match him as an actor. I don’t need to be a theatre critic to know that his performance was far from convincing. Not everyone can interpret Shakespeare's texts well; I think he needs to 'mature' his skills. What I do know is that talent cannot be bought...
David and I discussed this. I’m sure you’ve seen him as well, and you probably shared my opinion rather than being proud of him. However, you kept your thoughts to yourself.
Do you think I should talk to my half-brother. Should I, Dad?
Perhaps not. I don't want to hurt his ego. Best of luck to him...
You know, Dad, I have to go back to the lounge soon. They'll wonder what I've been doing here in your office for so long. They wouldn't understand that I can feel your presence in this room.
David knows I'm here. He understands me and respects my moment. I don't want to leave him there alone for too long. I know he doesn’t feel comfortable at events like this.
He's been my pillar. I'm grateful that he exists in my life.
You knew he was the one for me, didn't you, Dad? Thank you for that...
The house is full... Lots of people who cherished you—friends, clients, neighbours, even some relatives. But you know that, don't you, Dad?
Anyway, this melancholic atmosphere makes me a little depressed. I believe it’s because you're obliged to face the fatality, and you’re forced to realise that we're all vulnerable.
I intend to grow old. Me and David, grey-haired, walking down the street holding hands. Life didn't want me to have children, and I don't have time for that anymore.
Maybe it was better this way, I didn't have to sell them the false illusion that everything would be fine and leave them at last...
When I'm gone and I've already agreed with David that we'll go together, if possible, I won't leave anyone to cry for me, just as I cried for Mum and now for you...
I don't care about this house. If I could, I'd dismember this office and take it with me for as long as I live.
I recall that when I tired of staying inside, I'd go out to the balcony and look at the garden.
I would see Mum wearing gloves, planting in the beds, or watering the plants and flowers while humming. I'd look inside and see you concentrating on writing in the black-covered books.
This may sound poetic, but it was beautifully painful.
It was a world of my own. Where only the three of us could exist.
No-one else was allowed in...
Now I know that, desperately, it was my soul trying to create a consolation for my heart...
I'd glance at everything around me and watch the sand fall.
I don't know how you allowed me to take the hourglass outside. I think I was so distracted that I didn't even see it, or pretended not to...
What if it had broken? One less object, you might say...
As for the sand on the ground, time wouldn't stop passing.
Other things would prove that it continues...
Counting seconds, minutes, hours on the hands of a clock.
The days at sunrise and sunset.
The weeks when the moon changes...
The sand could be swept up, thrown in the garden.
It could be blown away by the rain, or the wind. Disappearing into time.
It would cease to exist, just like the time that has passed.
Playing with the hourglass now, staring at the minuscule grains of sand passing its three minutes, makes me feel how tiny I am in the eyes of the universe.
A pile of particles that one day will be ashes. Dust of the cosmos...
Someone who once dared to exist, lost in the vastness of my own existence...

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