Bullet in Pillow

“Now you know a secret of mine, why don’t you tell me one of yours?” she looked at me with her round smiley face and continued “You seem always reserved, I trust you but you do not put your trust in me”. I hummed and hawed, and tried to think of something that qualified as a secret to tell her but I failed. I cleared my throat and said I did not have secrets and my life was an open book. I did not know if I sounded convincing to her or not. I hoped I did. She added “I hope revealing my secret would not let you look down upon me”. I affirmed her I would not.

We were sitting, that evening, in an almost empty brasserie. Lights were dim and the two coffees on our table were half finished.

I felt for moments that it must have been heart warming to trust someone. That relaxing feeling of lying the head on a comfortable pillow and be ready to sleep. A clean-scented warm fuzzy pillow. But I also wondered if revealing her secrets to me reflected her inability to bear her burden alone more than her trust in me. Few days earlier she gave me a letter related to her secret and asked me to send it by fax for her because she did not want to take the risk by sending it from her home. She was not a cautious person, I thought. Was she right in putting her trust in me? She did not know that I copied the letter and kept it in my drawer before giving her back the original the following day. What was my motive in doing so? I really did not know but what I knew was that I should not have done it.

Fast forward to many years later and by the time I completely forgot about the letter I found the copy in an old dusty box of books and papers. I tore it up.

I wanted to get the conversation out of its serious mood so I asked her “Suppose I might have a secret, can you guess what it could be?” She looked amused and embarrassed for seconds and said “I do not know, tell me at least in which direction should I go and guess?” Every direction was open was my reply. She kept silent for few minutes, and sounded hesitant and a little embarrassed again when she said “I do not know”. She gazed at me, laughed nervously and repeated: I do not know.