10.

“And what is it like to have a father?” Aurora asked curiously from behind him.

“What do you mean? You have a father,” Virindia replied, surprised.

“I mean a real one. Destiny just comes and tells me things and then leaves,” the disappointment was clear in the girl’s voice.

“Well, it’s comforting to know someone cares for you,” Virindia answered, and they both fell silent before he continued. “At least Destiny talks to you; Mother Earth only responds to me occasionally,” Virindia murmured, annoyed.

“I suppose after all, we’re not so special to them,” Aurora concluded, and they continued walking in silence.

“Maybe not, but I owe everything to my mother and I’m sure she cares about me,” Virindia said, turning to look at Aurora. He thought he had never seen eyes so bright, so deep, as if the galaxy opened before him in them. They were so full and yet so empty at the same time that it was uncomfortable to look into them.

Those eyes that held the secrets of the universe knew more than they should and kept silent more than they wanted.

“Why are you following me?” Virindia asked, stopping and approaching her.

“Why do you obey a force that created you without giving explanations, that uses you and offers no greater reward than existence?” the girl asked. “I don’t know about you, but I don’t like my destiny. It’s useless to try to change it, but it’s frustrating to be a spectator. Maybe that’s why they created us, so we could watch more closely, to steal our eyes.”

“What do you mean?”

“We are only the selfish instinct of our creators not to disappear, not to stop being spectators. Does your mother do anything besides speak? Because my father only asks me to lie again and again. I’m just his little messenger dove, used when he needs me,” the girl exclaimed, frustrated.

“You can’t dare call them selfish. They gave us everything. What you walk on was created by them, what you think is thanks to them, what you eat was given by them, even your insecurities are the fruit of their ingenuity.”

“You are, above all, terribly naive, Homiterra,” Aurora said as she kept walking.

“And you know everything?” Virindia asked, annoyed.

“No, probably even our parents don’t know everything, but I know more than you… without a doubt,” she answered with mocking laughter.

Virindia decided to ignore the nonsense said by his new companion.