Soulmates

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Angelica was shivering and hadn't notice the margins of the lake and the mountains, but I had paid attention to every detail and thought our surroundings looked similar to those of Lake Como or Garda. However, one crucial thing was missing: the several villages along the coast. As far as I could see, there were no traces of civilization anywhere.

After we walked about a mile and a quarter down the winding path, we finally reached the edge of the grove. About fifty yards away from that corridor of trees, we found a weird welcome sign. Our jaws dropped when we saw a square green sign with a male and a female silhouette. The images were drawn side by side and had one hand up, as if they were saying hello to us. That reminded me of the messages we sent to space last century…

“What does this mean?” Angelica had stopped suddenly and her muscles were tense. “Is someone waiting for us? Dammit, what's going on?”

We had to keep going to find out. We took a few more steps out of the grove. That's when we were able to admire the futuristic, majestic building erected at the bottom of a hill. It was a very large farmhouse with an exuberant garden and bushes. I started walking faster, pulling Angelica by the hand.

Once we approached the farmhouse, we stopped to admire it. The house was white and had a post-modern look with large stained-glass windows all over the place. It looked like a “V” with a flat base. There was a terrace on the concave part of it, with a splendid wooden porch. Next to it, there was a trapeze-shaped pool and everything was surrounded by orchids arranged in a complex design.

The construction material had actually called my attention. It wasn't cement or metal, and it reflected light in a weird way―at least a way I had never seen before, because it was luminescent. Does anyone live there?―I wondered.

We followed a path around the pool, crossed the terrace, and approached the entrance, where there were two openings. They were two common doors with a knob, one on the right and another one on the left, each displaying the corresponding silhouette of a man or a woman.

“Wrong door… It must be the bathroom,” I said.

“It's true…” Angelica couldn't help but laugh, and her face lit up to highlight her beauty. “I needed to go anyway. Excuse me.”

Unbelievable! She's about to go in through that door by herself. She's either going nuts, or she's under the influence of a mysterious force―I thought as I watched her acting so recklessly.

Angelica opened the door as naturally as possible and went in. After being shocked for a moment, I tried to follow her, but something unexpected happened: I wasn't able to go in. I tried to cross the threshold of that weird door, but it just didn't happen. A mysterious force did not allow me to take a step further. It was a repelling force, just like the one that occurs between two magnets when the polarities are charged the same. The more effort I made to go in, the stronger the force repelling me was.

I walked about fifteen feet backwards and ran towards the door with as much force as my body mass and speed could generate. Then I was thrown some six feet away from the door, which finally closed to separate me from Angelica. I pushed against the door with my shoulder, I kicked it, I pounded on it, but it was all in vain. What a strange material… It’s similar to wood, but much stronger—I thought as I saw I couldn’t really damage it. I wasn’t able to leave a single scratch on it.

“Angelica! Angelica!” I yelled her name to no avail. I was unable to communicate with my friend.

Then I tried the other door, the one displaying the male silhouette. I placed my shaky hand on the knob, turned it and crossed the threshold without any issues.

The wonders of that day never ceased to amaze me. I just stood there, admiring the beauty of that luxurious place. It was as if I had entered a castle of one thousand and one nights owned by an oil tycoon from Russia.

It had one gigantic, open room with designated areas. It was well furnished and practical, like those houses in the decoration magazines my wife likes so much. I was impressed by the large, relaxing Jacuzzi, the sauna, and complete gym with a stationary bike, treadmill and other multipurpose machines—all of them equipped with state-of-the-art holographic technology. There was an island in the kitchen, which seemed to have all modern appliances known to man, including self-cleaning technology—which I had never seen with my own eyes because I’ve always assumed it was something only rich people could afford. Then there was the multimedia center with the usual TVC system (TV + computer), in addition to some devices that, as an IT Consultant, I was ashamed to say I could not recognize. Apparently, that house had one single floor and high ceiling—160 feet high, actually. The walls inside and around the perimeter were transparent, made of a glass-like material that was abundant throughout the house.

I saw Angelica out of the corner of my eye and started to yell and jump up and down to get her attention, but she was too busy admiring the house, or maybe looking for something to wear. In such a well-decorated house, I’m sure you’ll find some fabric that suits your style. It would be nice to finally cover our naked bodies—I thought, looking for something as well.

The decoration followed a western style, so I knew I had to look through closets and drawers. Angelica went on in her pursuit on the other side of the wall and I decided to look through the furniture. Nothing… All closets and drawers were completely empty.

I went into a room that had a king-size bed, confirming that it was meant to be a bedroom. The closets were also empty and there weren’t even sheets or blankets to improvise a toga. Nothing at all… It was as if someone was conspiring against us, so that we would keep our Adam and Eve costumes.

The bed was made of wood boards and, on top of it, there was a mattress covered with a silky fabric, and two classic pillows made of synthetic rubber. There was another door in the room, and I saw Angelica suddenly coming in.

“Man! There’s only one bedroom with a double bed!”

“I’m glad you’re happy to see me, too. No need to throw a party, though,” I said ironically, after confirming that I wasn’t among her priorities.

None of us needed to be a brain surgeon in order to understand that nobody lived in that house. Angelica had searched all rooms and knew there was only one bedroom, which we’d have to share.

“So, it looks like nobody lives here…”

“Do you really think this house is completely empty and was put together specially for us?” I asked, flabbergasted.

Angelica turned her back to me, hiding her breasts and pubic area, but exposing other important physical attributes.

“Did you see the signs? I’ve started to suspect that’s the case, exactly.”

I hadn’t seen any signs, but maybe it had been my oversight, because I was too distracted looking for other things.

“Look at the walls. There are some drawings leading to the bedroom.”

“Say it, Angelica… What’s on your mind?”

She hesitated for a second before trying to express her thoughts in a confused, disorganized way, as if she herself were unsure of what she was saying, as if it were all a figment of her arbitrary female intuition.

“You know… This house… We’re both naked… There is only one path leading us here and nobody else around. Where are the owners? And, most importantly, where are we? These signs on the walls are everywhere…”

“What are you trying to say?”

“I’m not trying to say anything; it’s just a feeling. Maybe I’m wrong,” she shook her head.

Those half-formed sentences brought to mind the picture of a white canvas with a few fragmented brush strokes here and there, which didn’t allow me to see the complete picture.

I tried to go out the other door, the one in front of Angelica, but it happened again: that invisible force didn’t allow me to go any further.

This time, Angelica witnessed what was happening and panic set in her blue-greenish eyes. She went around the bed and tried to walk out of the same door, but had no issues doing so. She sighed in relief after being terrified at the idea of being stuck in that room with me forever. Then she tried to leave the bedroom through the door I had used, and this time she was the one affected by the repulsive force. Actually, it was as if someone had designed a confined area: I couldn’t go to Angelica’s side of the house and vice-versa. Still, I couldn’t understand the reason behind all that.

“Why can’t I go out? I can’t see anything in front of me that wouldn’t let me out!” Angelica yelled in fear.

I had a theory: it was some kind of force field, a technology we didn’t know about, one of those things we see in sci-fi movies. But, what is creating this force field? Is it magnetic force? No… We’re not made of ferromagnetic material, so it wouldn’t have any effect on us—I thought, trying to make the most of my knowledge in physics. I couldn’t come up with explanations as a theory physicist could, because I had only seen the basics in college. My intuition, combined with my wild imagination, was telling me that it could be a gravitational field. Who could have designed this technology, though? Could this be a top-secret military experiment? Or maybe a huge corporation is behind it… Then, again, it could be an alien nation! I was deeply immersed in my fantasies, trying to find an explanation, but it was only a theory so far.

Angelica was a successful physician working in one of the most reputable hospitals in Florence. I usually enjoyed talking to her because she had incredible people skills. She was eloquent and knew how to carry on a conversation with a variety of arguments. She could improvise and portray herself as a politician, educator, business executive, or athlete, even though she was none of that. She followed her intuition but, at the same time, she was pragmatic. In sum: we agreed on many things because she would listen to me and, above all, I loved listening to her. We were great friends, even though now I was trying to imagine how our lives would have been in an alternate reality, as I let myself be carried by fantasies down a forbidden road.

I stopped to reflect on that day. I was only kidding myself, thinking I was living a nightmare, or that it had all been my imagination: the UFO, those rays, that strange place… Angelica and I, together… All those hours I spent inspecting every inch of that mysterious environment. It had been a day full of doubts and unanswered questions. However, the night soon came and darkness enveloped me once again. I was suddenly in a state of deep sleep.

The Second Day…

––

That feeling… Where am I? What am I doing? Is this a dream? My mind is empty, I can’t remember anything… Something hit meeeeeeee…

I quickly opened my eyes. I was drenched in sweat, as if it had been a muggy summer night. Then I quickly realized I wasn’t in my homeland, Reggio Emilia. And all that sweat hadn’t been caused by the humidity in the valley. It was actually the panic brought about by recent memories rushing into my mind once again.

That strange experience, when I was half asleep and half awake, was an kind of awareness I could not explain. It was as if my thoughts were out of focus and then started to take shape as my mind made great effort to constantly rearrange them, like the lens of an old analogic camera trying to focus on a moving object.

My vision started going back to normal and I became aware of my surroundings. This time I felt a warm, fuzzy feeling, something smooth to the touch placed right in front of me. I was barely waking up when I realized that Angelica and I were in an intimate, intriguing embrace—which was completely unintended.

Once again, I was the first one to wake up, and maybe I woke up more quickly due to my physical reaction to something I could not explain. I was hugging Angelica the same way my daughter hugs her Winnie the Pooh; the thing is that Angelica is no teddy bear, and teddy bears don’t have that disturbingly arousing feminine fragrance. As soon as I regained control of my muscles, my ethics forced me to break away from that pleasing contact and my sudden movements ended up waking her. Beautiful Angelica blushed when she realized what was going on.

I couldn’t avoid any remarks she wished to make, so I tried to organize my thoughts and exorcise my fears.

“This is the second time we fall asleep suddenly,” I started out the conversation. “I just can’t understand the purpose of it. I’m not trying to force a situation, and it’s too early to be sure, but those theories about aliens… Those abduction cases that are so talked about… Who put us in bed while we were both unconscious?”

I felt a shiver going down my spine at the thought of someone making our bodies do something involuntarily at night.

“You’re letting yourself be carried away by your imagination. It could have been a simple technology created by twenty-first century Homo sapiens. How about a colorless, odorless sleeping gas?”

“The thing is that you didn’t witness your dematerialization with your own eyes. You evaporated a few feet away from me when you were struck by that ray. And what was that strange aircraft? And what is this place? Did you take a look at the lake outside?”

“I did. So what?”

“There are no villages along the lake… I’ve never seen a more beautiful place completely void of buildings and human life. Not a single sign of civilization.”

Angelica didn’t want to admit it. Even though she was an open-minded woman, she refused to talk about aliens and abductions.

“You’re scaring me now… Please, just let me be. I have to find something to wear, ‘cause I’m tired of walking around like this.”

She went to her private area, the one only she had access to. I did exactly the same and went to my side of the house. I needed to find answers, and I needed to find them fast.

“I’ll look over here,” I told Angelica. “I want to leave this house and find out where we are.”

As I looked for something to wear, even though I had already searched the house the day before, I didn’t see anything else worth a second look besides those strange devices. I’ll worry about these gadgets later… I need to find higher ground to get a better view of this area, to try to understand where we are.

Outside the house, it was about sixty-eight, seventy degrees. Judging by the position of the sun, it was a day in May or June, about eight in the morning. I couldn’t tell the exact time because I had lost my watch and my smartphone. A nice breeze was coming from the lake and it felt good on my skin, even the humidity in the air seemed ideal. I was surprised to find it all so comforting about that environment. The vegetation was certainly familiar. I recognized the trees and plants, even though I couldn’t name most of them.

I tried to find out where the house was in relation to what I had already seen in that environment. I was standing next to a hill with the oak grove to one side, adjacent to the lake. I wonder what is on the other side of the house.

I crossed the orchid garden arranged in small, colorful patterns, and went up a small hill after walking through a patch of grass. Less than a quarter mile away, I arrived at the top of the hill and could enjoy a panoramic view. On the other side of the hill, there was a large meadow, like that of the first hill, with a few trees here and there and sprinkled with small oak groves, like the one I had seen. I also identified some tamarack, chestnut trees, and other fruit trees.

Despite the seemingly anthropic landscape, as far as the eye could see, I didn’t find any man-made structures: no buildings, roads, or ancient ruins. Nothing at all. It was weird how that house seemed to have been built in the middle of nowhere, in a completely secluded place. I was sure we weren’t in Veneto or Lombardy, two of the most populated areas in Italy, crowded with rural dwellings all over the place. There was no sign of the typical medieval villages Italians are so proud of.

Pay attention to the details—I obsessively kept repeating to myself. Where could you be? Maybe it’s a less inhabited corner of the world. I have this weird, disturbing feeling… I couldn’t put my finger on it, but it was different from how I felt when I first woke up at the shore—then, again, I had probably been too distracted the day before. It was… absolute silence. I let it go for the time being, because maybe I could be wrong.

It seemed like a good idea to walk along the lake and do some exploring until I could reach the mountains. Maybe I wouldn’t find anything, but I could climb up and see more of the area. However, I soon realized my predicament. I’m naked—no clothes, no shoes… Maybe I’d have to walk tens of miles, and that goes without saying that I’d need to carry food and water. How could I survive such a trip? No, that wasn’t the right time to start a new adventure. I better go back to the house. If there’s logic behind it all and we’re here for a special reason, I’ll find out sooner or later.

I sat in the terrace, on a comfortable wicker recliner with soft pillows. I watched as the sun came up and let my thoughts run free like bloodhounds tracking something down. I can’t believe they brought us here to die of hunger and thirst. That thought went on and on in my mind.

I got up from the chair and paced the terrace next to the pool, like a fly going in circles within a room. I knew I’d be able to find clues somewhere about who built that house, whoever was there before us, or even who had kidnapped us.

In the meantime, I would have done anything to get my hands on some cappuccino, maybe a nice piece of erbazzone. My stomach kept reminding me of my basic human urges. It had been at least thirteen hours since we had arrived at that place, and there would soon be some serious consequences. Besides, there was the possibility that we’d have to live with our current birthday suits.

At that moment, I had already given up the idea of wandering far away from the house, so there was no other alternative but to look inside once again. Maybe I went past a pantry without noticing, maybe there’s some coffee… I can already feel that annoying headache setting in due to lack of caffeine. I ended up confirming that there was nothing to eat in the kitchen.

I was happy to find a large bathroom in a corner of the house, though. It was one of those functional, comfortable full bathrooms with a bathtub and shower stall. Dammit, toothbrush and toothpaste are nowhere to be found… There isn’t even any toilet paper! Well, at least I can try to have some privacy with these opaque walls.

I reflected on what Angelica had said, about those symbols she had seen on the walls leading to the bedroom, but all walls around the perimeter were just huge see-through glass. I touched one of them to check the nature of that luminescent material that allowed the ideal amount of light in. When I made contact with the wall, something unexpected took place: the glass started to show stylized animations that consisted of lighten-up paths and several arrows that were easy to understand right away. But these are not mere instructions…

They were indications similar to those we see in the windshield of our vehicles thanks to something we call CarOS—an operating system for automobiles. Blue lines were predominant and led to the bedroom, while the green lines led to another area of the house.