Procrastination

They were green, I swear. No tiny antennas, small silver costumes, nor little colorful lights. Just green. They had huge claws instead of hands, and instead of mouth, jaws that smiled with a crazed beast’s ferocity. “You’re late”, they murmured the day when I saw them standing at my door’s threshold (they cannot come in if you don’t invite them), and the stench of this statement was spread all over the house, and it was impregnated on the walls, on every furniture and in every book. Since then, every morning they stand there, waiting for seeing me go out or come in, and whispering their sentence. “You’re late”, they say, and their mouths get wider, so fiercely rueful that I have to control myself to avoid falling prey of a weak moment, and invite them to enter. I just glance at them, passing by, close the door and try to avoid inhaling too deeply the smell that their jaws have left in every corner. I drink a cup of tea, watch a movie, read a book and try to concentrate in any idea, but the smell is always there, reminding me of them. “You’re late”. I hardly go out now. I have chosen the confinement to these rooms and my daily routines. Sometimes, in the middle of a reading, or when I try to close my eyes at nights, I feel a smooth anguish coming down from my chest and I think: “I’m late”. Horrified, I get up and peer at through the window. They’re still at the door, immovable, waiting for me. Sometimes the telephone rings, but I refuse to pick it up, since I heard their familiar throaty pantings, frighteningly distorted, murmuring through the line to me: “You’re late”. The stench still remains in my mouth. And the anguish turns increasingly onerous. Must I give up? Go out and ask them to come in? “You’re late”. And explain them, and beg them… And satiate their savage hungry once for all.