WALKÜREN - THE THREE MARIAS Chapter Eight

 

WALKÜREN - THE THREE MARIAS

Chapter Eight

The night was cool... not too hot, not too cold. And Rosa decided to walk a little along the riverbank. There were no clouds in the sky, so the firmament seemed all embroidered with the precious stones that are the stars, framing a full and graceful moon. The moonlight, reflected on the waters of the river, gave the place a supernatural air. and that delighted the girl. Seeing that luminosity so different from usual, she began to imagine different skies and lands, where Carlinhos's dragon could certainly live as well as the mouse that ate Marquinho's moon... wow, she was still traveling in the stories that children told during their class. Since her first contact with the class, she decided to be as playful as possible, as she believed that it would be much simpler for the children to learn the first letters... which was to teach that battalion of children to read and write... but their method, at least so far, was bearing fruit. In addition, when she realized that one of her children had learning difficulties, she gave her special attention and in the end, everyone did well, including her. Her classes were always humorous... and the kids just loved it. And Rosa, during that time, collected good stories, which she replicated for the following classes...

Rosa decided to sit for a while on a fallen log. And, sitting where she was, she could watch the entire length of the rushing water. The "chuá-chuá" of the waters running through the riverbed made her dream with her eyes open... and it's not that, somewhat unintentionally, she felt like Alice, crossing the looking glass and going to visit an inverted world... Well, inverted might not be the right word... but, anyway, she suddenly found herself in another place that wasn't the same one she was in...

Like Alice in the story, she saw a white rabbit running along the riverbank and decided to follow it. Why? Well, it was already night and it wasn't very common for such a small animal to be running around... not at that time, at least. Furthermore, the animal ran on two feet, erect, as if it were a person. Rats, she had seen them walk that way before... rabbits, never... in fact, she thought the little mice were cute, picking up whatever it was with their little hands and then running away as if they were miniature human beings... now, rabbits? It was the first time she'd seen one acting this way... and at night, to boot. Well, the little teacher was curious... who knows if a good story might come out of there to tell her little students?

After walking for some time behind the little rabbit, she saw him enter the trunk of a tree. Well, she thought, game over... after all, if he got into her lair, she had no way of following him. But she decided to look at the tree anyway. And she found that... well, the passage in the trunk wasn't that small... she could go in if she wanted to. And she wanted. Even because what she saw when she looked into the tree was an endless path, and right up ahead, who was running? Of course it could only be the bunny, right? And so our Alice Tupiniquim went in pursuit of the non-Easter bunny...

The first thing she noticed, upon entering that different universe, is that, although it was night outside, it was clear inside... the light flooded the entire horizon. It wasn't that different from the outside world... it had trees, flowers, birds, insects... in the distance she heard a cicada singing... and at the same time, a little saci bird... but how could that be? If it was day, the saci bird couldn't sing... after all, its natural domain was the night, not the day... but it heard its song. And he remembered what his mother always told him... "when the little bird sati sings far away, it's a sign that it's close... and when we hear its song close by, it means it's far away"... not long ago felt at the time and still didn't do it... but as the bird's song seemed very close to her, that meant that the animal must be far away... funny... what would a saci bird look like? She had never seen one... she had already heard its song many times, but seeing it, even... she soon forgot about this bird, as she began to hear a wildebeest. Here is another bird that she has never seen live and in color... but she knew its song well. And so, she was walking, straight ahead, and listening to the most absurd sounds for the moment. And she ended up not knowing if it was day or night, nor if she was asleep or awake. What she was sure of was that the place was kind of pissed off...

Well, at least the Mad Hare and the Mad Rabbit didn't appear for her... it was just the little white rabbit, really. And she was already close to reaching him. Suddenly the animal began to move more slowly. Perhaps he was tired of the rush. Well, it made no difference to her, what she really wished was that she could reach that strange little animal... but, thinking about it... everything there was strange. Day instead of night, night birds singing out of turn... butterflies and moths flying side by side... yes, it was a strange place indeed. But, that's ok... what really mattered to Rosa was reaching the bunny... and she finally got it! And then, the surprise... it wasn't a real rabbit... it was a stuffed animal! But... how... what?... how was that possible? That was crazy… how could she chase a toy the entire length she walked? And an inanimate toy... how could it?! Yes, she was surprised, with the dummy inert in her hand... she just didn't know what to think...

Let's imagine the situation... you run after what you think is a little animal... in fact, it's a little animal... you go inside a tree... you discover that time is not the same as outside , from where you came from... you hear things you shouldn't hear... thinking about it, Rosa just listened, really... because, besides the butterflies and moths, she didn't see anything else, besides the little animal running... well, there she was, with the little animal in her arms, looking like a fool... but what happened, she thought... how did this animal end up here? And, thinking about it, what am I doing here, she asked herself... and, suddenly, everything around her was fading... the light was going out, like a candle reaching its end. .. and when she found herself... well, Rosa had dozed sitting up... she smiled... at least she wasn't crazy! But then, looking at her lap... the stuffed rabbit she had chased a little while ago... was there, without her knowing how such an object had come to her. She got up, picked up the toy, looked at it attentively, and didn't see anything strange about it... well, at least the children would have fun with the rabbit and the story she would tell about how it appeared.. .