It was an exceptionally cold Wednesday night. It was one of those cruel nights of November that made her face the harsh truth about the chilly air she is to befriend everyday for an unidentified period of time waiting for the bus to take her home. It was unnaturally dark as well. Was it the Cairene foggy night breeze? Was it the merciless flu blurring her vision? Was it a combination of both? She never knew.
It was not the alien and untimely chill that made that night so puzzling to her. It was not the mysterious dimness either. It was something else, something even more enigmatic. A feeling. An unfathomable feeling was hanging in the air. But it did not began there, at that crossroad. It began long ago. She recalls telling her friend she is searching for one face among the crowds. "Whose face is that?! Confess!", her friend asked teasingly. "I do not know. The features are quite lost to my imagination. Once- I remember- they have been there. But now they are lost. But I will certainly recognize that face when I find it. I will certainly do.", she answered her uncomfortable friend, rather annoyed at her belittling attitude.
That feeling, born a while ago, grew on that night. As the clock stroke eight, she started her usual preparation for leaving, saving her work on the flash, washing her mug, closing the window, and eventually dropping the flash at the desk of her Nun, childishly waiting for her end-of-the-day prize: "Have a nice evening!". But since that was Wednesday, there was also her end-of-the-week prize: "Have a nice weekend!". "Thank you", she smilingly replied. That was her usual reaction to such tragically irrelevant wishes. Thus, the daily routine was in process. Only that uncertain feeling was revolting against the dull order of the evening. Was it ominous? Was it promising? She never knew but the oppressive fact that her feeling had nothing definite about it. It was as vague as the fog of that night, yet as protruding as its chill.
As she held the metal knob and pulled the heavy gate, she started to have difficulty in breathing. The stupefying chill was intriguing with her exhausted body, her troubled mind and her heavy heart. She hugged her bundle of books so close and stepped forward. There, at the crossroad, she stood.. waiting for the bus.
That car.. that white car.. was the culmination of the drama of that night. It was a car.. like any other car, but as it passed slowly by her, she felt a shiver down her neck. It was not a familiar profile, that of the one in the car, but it stuck to her memory in a most strange way. The way it slowed down.. that u-turn.. the lights.. that profile.. they are all imposing on her memory. Why did she know it would come back? Why did she know it would come back again? She never knew. And probably, she will never know.
Since that Wednesday night, and whenever a white car passes by her, that shiver revisits her. It is not the same shiver, however. And sometimes, when she stands at the crossroad waiting for the bus, she recalls that night, shivers endlessly and all the cars on the road turn white, but it is not that white car, not that shiver, and certainly not that Wednesday night…
