Everyday

 [This is a translation for a short story written originally in Portuguese on September of 2021.]

   For a week now I’ve been having this same dream, in which I wake up, have a cup of coffee and walk to this certain street. Through this street I only went once in my entire life, and doing so did not precede any momentous occasion, though I can accurately describe every building, the state of the asphalt, and the parked cars in that morning I experienced them more than a decade ago. The appearance of the exact four people that passed by me, I could put on paper right now, and in the dreams I can feel their presence just as I did in the past. At no other time within this past decade has such a vivid memory occurred to me, but now I am bound to it like a curse.

   At this moment it is impossible to tell if I’m dreaming or awake, for the taste of the bitter coffee still resides on my tongue, I can feel the wind cooling my face and the sweat inside the coat. And when my eyes finally open, my boots are on and I find myself lying on top of blankets, in an unmade bed that doesn’t smell like me, inside the same room I’ve seen every morning a thousand other times. The sour taste of stale coffee in my mouth makes me sure it’s not the first time I’ve woken up today, but then the alarm goes off and proves me wrong. There’s mud on my boots and I leave footprints on the clean hallway towards the kitchen, where my cup sits in the cupboard just the way I left it last night: clean, on the saucer, handle backwards, meticulously dry like all the other dishes in the house. The coffee maker is also dry; I turn it on and see the steam rising, illuminated by the icy light from the cloudy sky outside. The coffee tastes like everyday. I leave the house and take the same route as always towards mom’s restaurant, but come across the street somehow, the street of the dream. The same parked cars over the same asphalt, the same buildings, the same life from that morning ten years ago. I walk up the street without thinking. I am a soul trapped in an automaton body that goes up the street and towards the light, without fearing what’s at the end

   Suddenly, I’m back to bed. The smell of cheap soap from last night’s bath on my skin, as the only perfume I wear, exhaling from the uncovered parts of my winter gear. The bed I’d made yesterday with fresh clean sheets, rumpled by a previous use I don’t remember. Light is about to break through holes in the curtains, and in five minutes the alarm will wake me up for the day ahead. I cannot move. I try but my body won’t respond; a heaving soul, but the breathing calm. The smell of soap, the taste of stale coffee, the softness of clean sheets... everything is strange now. I am not me. The alarm rings and I turn it off, get up and smear the floor with mud still fresh on my boots. The cup’s handle turned backwards helps me differentiate it from the others; I put the water in the coffee maker, flip the switch and watch the steam rise. The coffee tastes like everyday. I leave the house and take the same route as always towards mom’s restaurant, but come across the street somehow, the street of the dream. The same parked cars over the same asphalt, the same buildings, the same life from that morning ten years ago. I walk up the street without thinking. In a sudden rush I rip off a glove and toss it aside. I don’t stop walking or pick up the glove, and all of a sudden I’m on the bed again. There’s an intruder in the house, I hear footsteps, the clatter of dishes and the coffee maker working. I’m terrified but I can’t move. I hear my own muffled moans coming out of that body like a loudspeaker. The alarm rings and I turn it off with my bare hand; the cold metal sends a shiver down my spine.

   I hear the sound of dirty boots making fresh mud footprints on the white ceramic. I hear the clatter of dishes, and the loud hum of the coffee maker producing steam that rise, illuminated by the icy light from the cloudy sky outside. I feel warm tears running down my face in an incessant stream. The heat of the cup burns my left hand. I leave towards mom’s restaurant.