GOD

My name is God and I created the world.

Everything you see, everywhere you go, everything you sense, even what your sixth sense captures, was created by me.

I am God and I was born in Brazil, the holy place that exists beyond the frontiers of the world, beyond the perceptible lines that separate earth from heaven.

I am God, but I wasn’t born that way. I became God through a holy alchemy that transforms metal to pure gold.

Before me, you did not exist.

Before me, there was nothing. The universe was chaos.

Here is my story, the story of the creation of the universe.

GENESIS

At some point in my life, when I was still a young child, I found that life was too difficult to endure.

At that time I wasn’t God as people understand God.

I was a God to be, an esoteric concept, from an ancient spiritual school.

The fact that all men are mortal- and I used to be mortal- horrified me to the extent that I refused to live that reality.  I created my own world where I could live forever,  completely happily.

The world I created is the world that you know and the world in which you, and those who came before you, live.

I created you and everything around you.

A MANGER IN PORTO ALEGRE CITY

I was born to a poor family in Southern Brazil.

My parents had just enough money to cover the rent for a tiny apartment, buy enough clothes to cover ourselves, and to feed us once a day. My two older sisters and I attended school, but when my sisters were old enough, they dropped out and started working to help support the family.

That wasn’t the case with me. My parents allowed me to finish college and never asked me to work.  This was not just because I was a good student, but more so because of my divinity.

I was born with a mission.

I grew up without toys, ice cream, cartoons on TV, Santa Claus, cookies, birthday parties, or vacations in the mountains. But very early on, I found that I didn’t need those things.

When I was about five years old I discovered that I could create my own world.

My enemies called me Altist.  I feel sorry for them, the Pharisees.

They didn’t realize that I would become God.

THE HOLY TRANSFORMATION

But how did I become a God ?

There is no practical manual. Nobody teaches you to be God. You have to find your own way. You have to sacrifice yourself, to be enlightened through your own efforts. A supreme effort at that.  No ordinary attempt will do.  You have to die as a human and be reborn as God.

I was a very imaginative child.  At five years old I started writing stories.  People said that I had talent.

When I was eighteen, a creative director friend of my older sister invited me to work at an advertising agency.  Within a few months I was the golden child and made lots of coin, too.

Imagination was my strength.  Isolation was my main liability.

I didn’t have real friends. I knew a lot of people, but I didn’t acknowledge them. I shaped them in my mind to fit my version of the world.  And in my world, I am the boss and all reality should reflect that. My will be done.

GOD IN CRISIS

But that was not enough for me.  Brazil was too small for God. I liked the United States of America and wanted to live there.

In the United States most everybody is happy.

Those who aren’t find themselves that way because they choose to be different, to live on the edge, to be heroes.

I love the unhappy people because paradoxically, they know how to be happy.

They live the underground life.  They live on the road. They are beat nicks and rebels without a cause. They sing Billy Holiday and Janis Joplin tunes and die from overdoses. They suffer differently from the French intellectual existentialists. They suffer with happiness, hamburgers, hot dogs, Disneyworld and fries.

They don’t suffer in black and white, but in color.

Americans suffer with a huge amount of money in their bank accounts, too and this was priceless to me.

I know it, I saw it in the movies.

Beautiful and happy people, pristine streets, huge houses, luxury  cars, infinite highways, tall buildings, great clothes, fine restaurants, delicious food, sunny parks, unpolluted rivers, unbelievable lovers, silly TV shows with even sillier laugh tracks.

God bless America, land of the free, home of the brave, and now my home too.

America:  the dream of all dreams.

WHEN GOD BECAME AMERICAN

I moved to America.

The dream became reality, and the reality became the ultimate fantasy.

I was living the same scenarios of the films I loved.

On the street, in the offices, in the malls, in the shops, at the grocery store, everywhere, people spoke English.  And it was natural.

I lived in a big house, bought a luxury car, dated a beautiful woman with white teeth-   and a sweet white ass.  I watched football, drank horrible coffee, tended my own garden, cut my own grass, wore a baseball cap, went to church on Sunday, barbequed hamburgers and hot dogs, ate bacon and eggs with oat meal in the morning, and waved hello to my neighbors.

My friends invited me to football games and I chanted along with them, “Let’s go Dolphins”.  When I observed myself doing that I thought, “God is American!”  And I cried tears of joy.  Not only had I become God, but I also lived in America.  I got a green card and then became citizen.

IS THERE SOMETHING BIGGER THAN GOD?

Must be.  I felt an emptiness. Being God was not enough. I needed more. I needed to speak without an accent. I needed to prefer beer to wine. I needed to change the color of my skin, to have blond hair, to ski in Colorado each season, to be about a foot taller, to learn how to throw a spiral.

I started drinking. Everyday.

At first it was every night.  Then it was every night and every afternoon. That became every night, every afternoon and every morning.

A friend of mine came to help me.  I was totally beaten up. I asked him for help.

He told me that I wasn’t God. I didn’t believe him, but he insisted. He told me that if I wanted to survive I’d have to allow that part of me to die.

I did it.  The God I used to be is now dead.  I was reborn a normal person. I am mortal.

I am not God. And it is not too bad.

ART DIRECTOR: MARCIA HERCHENHORN.

ILUSTRATOR: BARBARA STEIMBERG.

READ ALSO: Monday I”ll Kill myself, no more delay( a suicidal note).

http://befree2bfree.wordpress.com/2009/06/12/monday-i’ll-kill-myself-no-more-delay-a-suicidal-note/

ABOUT THE AUTHOR:

Antonio Costa Neto is freelancer writer and has worked in some of the most important ad agencies in Brazil and the United States. He now lives in Miami where he owns and operates a marketing consultant company. Throughout his career in advertising, he has won top international awards in the Cannes, London and New York festivals, as well as in the Clio Awards and many Latin American festivals. Antonio Costa Neto has written numerous plays and screen plays in Brazil.
Womb Wrecker Syndrome is his second book.Antonio holds a BA in philosophy and sociology from Universidade Federal do Rio Grande do Sul.

twitter:acostaneto

facebook: Antonio Costa Neto

The Bubble

Her name is Donna and she lives in a bubble with a wonderful view.

A view of the Eiffel Tower.

She has a young and handsome boyfriend who is 15 years younger than she is.

He is a French artist and his accent drives her crazy.

Every time he utters her name with declarations like “Je t’aime,” she is reminded of how happy and fortunate she is.

“Donna, Je t’aime,” the young lover whispers to her pleasure.

His name is Pierre. He just loves her.  He just can’t live without her.

Before the Bubble

She had been very sensitive. She was fragile. She had self-esteem issues.

She felt an emotional hole, something almost physical, a constant pressure on her solar plexus, and an immense necessity to escape.

She had been lost.  She had felt insecure.

She had ached to be loved, to be accepted.

She had always felt that she was different and never fit in with others.

With no friends, she had been completely isolated.

She didn’t even know how to go about making friends.

How could she carry on a conversation? Everything seemed superficial to her.

Not that she didn’t like to talk about day to day events, some superficial things, but it never felt right.

Her sense of inadequacy was self-defeating and overwhelming, as if she always had the wrong commentary to make, the wrong perception, the wrong idea.

But this was all in the past- before she had found the bubble with a majestic view of the Blue Ridge Mountains.

That’s the beauty of her bubble.

It offers a great view regardless of her location.

How everything changed

She has no idea how, but  she looked taller, skinnier, and much cuter.

She was rejuvenated.

She knew nobody could tell that she was 55. She appeared 30, maybe even younger.

She was smart, beautiful, and charming.

She was famous, too.  A talented, a prolific writer.

The bubble had changed her entire life.

All she had to do was…

The sofa

She has a lush sofa to luxuriate on by the window.  She sits by the bay window in the bubble overlooking the Swiss Alps, curled up with various lovers.  She has more than one to be sure, more than two, three.  She really doesn’t know how many lovers she has.

She has found that love is as limitless as the alpine vistas.

She spends her days and nights there, living her fantastic life, having hot sex, gazing out the window of her bubble in wonderment of the astonishing view of the Great Wall of China.

Everything she wanted was right there.  The view, the lovers.

All she had to do was crack open a bottle and poof!  The magic happened at once; and her body, her soul, her thoughts, her feelings, all wafted into the bubble.

She never ever drank alone.

If it so happened that Pierre was busy and could not visit, she could always pick up the phone and call her other close friends.

“Hi, it’s Donna…  I just wanted to tell you how much I love you.  I love you so much.  Have I ever told you that?  You’re such a good friend to me and I know you’d never let me down… What?  Have I have been drinking?  Well yeah, a little, why?”

She lives in a great bubble with a magnificent view of the Great Pyramid of Giza, the Hanging Gardens of Babylon, the Statue of Zeus at Olympia, the Temple of Artemis at Ephesus, the Mausoleum of Mausolus, the Colossus of Rhodes, the Lighthouse of Alexandria, and remarkably, she just started dating Brad Pitt.

ART  BY: PEDRO CAPPELETTI

READ ALSO: Monday I”ll Kill myself, no more delay( a suicidal note).

http://befree2bfree.wordpress.com/2009/06/12/monday-i’ll-kill-myself-no-more-delay-a-suicidal-note/

ABOUT THE AUTHOR:

Antonio Costa Neto is freelancer writer and has worked in some of the most important ad agencies in Brazil and the United States. He now lives in Miami where he owns and operates a marketing consultant company. Throughout his career in advertising, he has won top international awards in the Cannes, London and New York festivals, as well as in the Clio Awards and many Latin American festivals. Antonio Costa Neto has written numerous plays and screen plays in Brazil.
Womb Wrecker Syndrome is his second book.Antonio holds a BA in philosophy and sociology from Universidade Federal do Rio Grande do Sul.

twitter:acostaneto

facebook: Antonio Costa Neto

USE THE LINK BELOW TO LISTEN NINA SIMONE WHILE YOU READ

http://www.psychicbozo.com/files/Nina_Simon_Screamin-Jay_Hawkins__-_I_Put_A_Spell_On_You.MP3

She took the photograph of me and anointed it with sage honey.

She sprinkled red rose petals over the photo and misted the area with sweet perfume.

She had built a small altar over black river stones and adorned it with a lacy white G-string from her lingerie drawer.

She placed a small white porcelain plate decorated with hearts on the altar.

She lit a candle and, holding it over the plate, she prayed:

“Lord, from now on, I’ll be for him not one woman, but all the women of the world.”

She gave me her hand and her understanding.

Forgiving me for all my past behavior, she helped me to see that there was no right or wrong and fucked me as if she were betraying her husband. She prayed:

“Lord, make this man think of me alone and feel no desire for any other woman.”

She decorated her room with candles and flowers, prepared our bed as if it were a divine temple, kissed me as her legs looped around my waist, and pulled me inside her sacred chalice.

She gave me shelter in her generous womb, granting me all of the love I so desperately need.

And she prayed:

“Lord, grant that this man be mine, only mine.”

She told me that she loved me and that I was her only man.

She said that she admired my sensitivity, my kindness, my generosity, my power, my humility, my intelligence, my creativity, my masculinity, my talent, and my capacity to give her pleasure.

She prayed:

“Lord, please bring this man to believe in everything I say and give him wings, but shackle him just the same.”

She told me that in my presence she sensed the divine, and that every time I touch her she feels as if she comes to know the unknown.

She said that with me, she dies and is reborn.

She promised me that she would be my salvation every time I penetrate her, with passion and melancholy.

She prayed:

”God, give me another lover and compel the man before me to despise me.  Make him a slave of his own jealousy and bind him with a visceral necessity of affirmation, stripping him of all his self-esteem.”

She put a spell on me… ‘cause I am hers…  And I stopped doing the things I did… I ain’t lying.  No, I ain’t lying anymore. I know she couldn’t stand it… I was running around, looking to fill the void… looking for something I never understood… She couldn’t stand it ‘cause I put her down…  But the truth is that she put a spell on me… because I am hers…  I know she used to love me… but I know she doesn’t love me anymore…But I love her anyhow…and I don’t care…if she doesn’t want me.  I’m hers right now.  You heard me…she put a spell on me.

I’ll give my life to her ‘cause there is no use in being alone.

All I need is her love and her forgiveness.

I recognize my mistakes.

It was my fault, all my fault.

Now I know that one woman is enough, ‘cause she put a spell on me.

Just one woman is all I need, only one womb is enough to give me life.

I know she couldn’t stand it.

It was all my fault, but now I’m glad that she put a spell on me.

I’m her slave now, a perfect man…and I don’t care if she doesn’t love me, I love her anyhow.

She put a spell on me… oh Lord, bless that woman that I love.

ART BY ADRIANA TANGANELLI

ALSO READ: He had promised himself he would never have another drink.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR:

Antonio Costa Neto is freelancer writer and has worked in some of the most important ad agencies in Brazil and the United States. He now lives in Miami where he owns and operates a marketing consultant company. Throughout his career in advertising, he has won top international awards in the Cannes, London and New York festivals, as well as in the Clio Awards and many Latin American festivals. Antonio Costa Neto has written numerous plays and screen plays in Brazil.
Womb Wrecker Syndrome is his second book.

twitter:acostaneto

facebook: Antonio Costa Neto

One morning, as Josh Samsa was waking from anxious dreams, he discovered that he had changed into a huge stretch of dry desert.

It seems absurd that a person could become a thing such as this, an inanimate part of nature.

But it was real, as real as his anguish, as real as his despair and his feeling of solitude.

His body was a great extension of flowing sand, without head, limbs, torso, or stomach, without any parts that form a normal human body.

Josh was dry, as if his physical transformation were verily a metaphor of his inner state.

The only motility possible for him was an involuntary movement resulting from the wind that shifted part of his body, forming dunes of different sizes and shapes.

His mind, the part of his body where his thoughts should come from, had no definite place in his body.

Josh Samsa had no head.

His thoughts appeared in different areas of his body, contradicting each other in a sequence of association over which he had no control.

The fact that he didn’t have a head brought to him a surprising impression: his whole body was able to think.

He tried to form a picture in his mind of how the shape of his body should be and to direct his thoughts to a particular place that he would call head.

It was futile.  His effort resulted only in frustration.

His thoughts didn’t follow his commands and they arose sporadically in different localities with no pattern or logic.

After a few wretched moments of assessing the situation, despondency ensued.

He realized that he was powerless over his life and his destiny.

There was absolutely nothing he could do to escape from this condition.

He suffered woefully.

His anguish was material and different from his thoughts in that it did have a definite source.

He found that he possessed a center of gravity, located somewhere in the middle of the desert which he had become.

The condition he was experiencing was in fact an impression of himself.

For the first time, he perceived himself the way he truly was.  He was pure desolate anguish.

“I am a solitary man,” his thoughts echoed, “and as a cynic, I don’t believe in life or the things that some individuals consider reasons to live.  I want nothing.  I don’t believe in love or family.  I don’t have sexual desire or ambition.  I don’t want money or prestige, yet I deem myself superior to all human beings.”

Night fell and the temperature dropped below zero.

Josh could not move, did not feel.

He was a dry and cold desert now.

He felt more solitary than ever. Yet he wasn’t unhappy at this point.  He was simply indifferent.  He didn’t care to live, nor did he wish to die.

He understood that deserts are not supposed to have feelings and desires.

He accepted this reality perfunctorily.

This acceptance of his condition gave him a semblance of peace; and when he fell asleep in his dream, hope appeared like a desert rose in the sand.

The wind blew and repositioned his body, casting him to the air and redistributing him to different places to  form golden dunes.

Hope again. A hint of desire.

He visualized parts of himself traveling, flying over barren land to find an oasis.

At this oasis, he would glimpse his own image reflected in the water.

This image would reveal not a desert, but a joyful man full of energy, full of life with focus, plans, and clarity.

This man would be called Josh Samsa.

But it was just a recurrent dream, a mirage.

Every night, he dreamed that the desert he in fact was, saw an image of the man he wanted to be, reflected in the oasis waters.

But when he awoke, another reality superseded this fancy.

The next morning, as Josh Samsa was waking from anxious dreams, he discovered that he had changed into a huge stretch of dry desert.

ART BY: LUIZ CAVALLI

ALSO READ: He had promised himself he would never have another drink.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR:

Antonio Costa Neto is freelancer writer and has worked in some of the most important ad agencies in Brazil and the United States. He now lives in Miami where he owns and operates a marketing consultant company. Throughout his career in advertising, he has won top international awards in the Cannes, London and New York festivals, as well as in the Clio Awards and many Latin American festivals. Antonio Costa Neto has written numerous plays and screen plays in Brazil.
Womb Wrecker Syndrome is his second book.

twitter:acostaneto

facebook: Antonio Costa Neto

When he touched her face he felt a strange pressure in his solar plexus.

For a second, this sensation seemed to suffocate him.

He often experienced seemingly disparate feelings.

With a blend of joy and sadness, memories from his childhood ebbed and flowed in his mind.

He had felt abandoned but it was OK.

For him, being abandoned was almost like dying, being purified and finally reborn.

He felt as if the earth were trembling.

His heart skipped a beat and he drew a deep breath to regain his heart’s rhythm.

She touched him, and peeled off his shirt.  Their mouths pressed together.

The sensation that he had experienced in his solar plexus traveled past his stomach and into his loins.

He didn’t feel abandoned now and he felt more powerful than ever had before.

She removed his pants and discarded them on the chair.

She kissed his face, his neck, his chest and slowly glided her hand in a caress of his upper body.

With a lingering kiss, she teased his tongue with hers.

There was something breathless about the sky.

A gust of wind swept across the room through the partially open window and chills fluttered across his bare skin.

The wind imparted a distinctive whistling tune.  A love song.

“Je t’aime, je t’aime

oh, oui je t’aime!

Moi non plus,

oh, mon amour…”

She shed her own clothes and they sank onto the bed.

She lay by his side.

He could die at that moment.

He was fulfilled and life and death were good.

Suddenly a rumble, then a roar, and then a siren.

He had been starving before , but his hunger was being sated.

The obscure obstacle that separates hunger from contentment is despair.

And he consumed with all his passion as if exacting revenge on his prior depleted condition.

He moved over her and kissed her lips.

Her mouth was soft and sweet.

He felt the effect of her kiss throughout his body.

With a wave of relief, the tension that he hadn’t even realized he was carrying had gone.

He felt lighter than ever.

Almost weightless.

In that moment there was also a change in tempo.

Every second was infinite.

The moment was eternal.

It made sense to him.

He continued kissing her as he descended the contours of her lovely body.

From her mouth to her neck, from her chest on to her belly until he found her fleshy mound.

Scent,  wetness, whisper, heaven, life, death, eternity, sensation, body, soul, generosity, pleasure, happiness, love.

He held her close, slid into the cat position and penetrated her body deeply, rocking back and forth in increasing rhythmic pressure.

“Je t’aime, je t’aime.

L’amour physique est sans issue.

Non! Maintenant viens!”

The wind outside blew stronger still.

The whistle had intensified to more like a distant wail.

Now there are  screams.

A man shouting.Pleasure, tension.

A woman screaming. Pleasure, pain.

Then again, the sweet perfume.

Whispers and cries, pleasure and pain, heaven and hell, war and peace, sin and pardon, give and take, body and soul, affection and violence, uttering of love and of insult, all of eternity in a single second.

They shifted position.

She guided him to the edge of the bed.

She knelt on the floor.

She placed her head between his legs where her mouth and tongue worked kindly on his body.

She devoted herself to satisfying a profound hunger.

She bowed on her knees.

He was in heaven.

The earth was moving.

Deep in the earth the rumbling continued.

Glass splintering and shattering. Fire bells. Madness.

Objects fell from desks and dressers, pictures fell from the walls, and resistance fell from their bodies, from their very souls in ecstasy.

Their whole world trembled and they knew that something colossal was coming.

Suddenly, there was an explosion and the floor appeared to have split.

The building was swaying and they had no control, no control over their bodies.

Fearful shrieks echoed from the collapsing stairwells outside, but amidst the fervor in their room the predominant cries of elation were all that resonated with them.

The Big One hit Los Angeles in the middle of the night, but they didn’t care if they lived or died.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR:

Antonio Costa Neto is freelancer writer and has worked in some of the most important ad agencies in Brazil and the United States. He now lives in Miami where he owns and operates a marketing consultant company. Throughout his career in advertising, he has won top international awards in the Cannes, London and New York festivals, as well as in the Clio Awards and many Latin American festivals. Antonio Costa Neto has written numerous plays and screen plays in Brazil.
Womb Wrecker Syndrome is his second book.

twitter:acostaneto

facebook: Antonio Costa Neto

It was a sunny day when one of the 101 occupants of the prison was pronounced dead by lethal injection, sodium pentothal in combination with a paralytic agent.

There were 101 persons in the prison, but only one was a convict.

Strangely, all 100 of the guards looked exactly like the prisoner.  Envision 101 mirror images.

A strange ordinance in the bizarre city of Kundabuffer mandated that the prison always maintain 101 occupants and, from time to time, one was to die.

In so doing, was the perpetrator of a crime singled out or was one of the guards eliminated?

Nobody had ever known.

People in the town were not concerned with injustice or the guilt or innocence of the person being condemned so long as the prison maintained its 101 indwellers.

That is why after one man was executed, another was incarcerated forthwith.

No one knew the criteria for the replacement either- or if he had committed a crime at all.

This was an unusual precept, but a fundamental part of the tradition and culture of Kundabuffer City.

The restraining principle was based on another unorthodox criteria of the facility.  There would be no prison bars or cells, nothing to separate prisoner from guards.

The penitentiary, thus, effected 101 solitary cells within one large open space.

The prison guards were fully armed, but not with the traditional weapons one might expect.  Instead, numbing associative thoughts kept the prisoner from adequately planning an escape.  His churning, mechanical thoughts tended to override any trace of activity in his deadened mind.

This characterized more than prison guards and a detainee; they were slaves of their own imaginations, trapped by their own internal mechanisms, essentially prisoners unto themselves.

That was the originality of this prison.  There were no masters and no regulations or guidelines.  All attempts at cohesive thought were annulated by a barrage of fears and contradictory emotions.

There was  symbol on a ceiling in the courtyard which marked the phrase, “Know thyself”.

It was rumored in town that it was etched by the only convict who ever succeeded in escaping.

The key to escape lay within this message, but the veracity of the story behind this has never been confirmed.

Within the jail, the fact that remained unconfirmed was not the meaningfulness of the message, but the mere existence of the script.  Because their vacant eyes were trained toward the floor, the denizens of the prison failed to notice the words that were said to hold their very freedom.

Guards and prisoner alike were obsessively preoccupied with how the others perceived them: whether or not they were trusted, respected, considered smart, unique…  They even worried about their physical appearance.

Scuffles between them were common.  The paranoid sting of having been underestimated at one’s proper value lead to defensive crowing and provocative threats.

“Do you know who I am?”

The response ricocheted deep within their inner prison, never finding voice.  They were not physically isolated, but were distanced from each other mentally and emotionally.

The prison of Kundabuffer City.  A hell of a place to be.

READ ALSO:He had promised himself he would never have another drink.

ART DIRECTOR: MARCELO MACHADO

ABOUT THE AUTHOR:

Antonio Costa Neto is freelancer writer and has worked in some of the most important ad agencies in Brazil and the United States. He now lives in Miami where he owns and operates a marketing consultant company. Throughout his career in advertising, he has won top international awards in the Cannes, London and New York festivals, as well as in the Clio Awards and many Latin American festivals. Antonio Costa Neto has written numerous plays and screen plays in Brazil.
Womb Wrecker Syndrome is his second book.

twitter:acostaneto

facebook: Antonio Costa Neto

If you think that my English isn’t half bad for a non-native speaker and you’d like to improve your English pronunciation, conversation or writing, contact my English teacher and proof reading friend Kristin at TheEnglishTeacher@kleeonline.com.  You know me, I’m just a little spontaneous and sometimes I “add”-lib even after Kristin edits for me, so she is blameless for any tiny, tiny, small, small, small mistakes I might make!

ANTONIO

Kristin: My brilliant English teacher( in the middle)

She had a sweet dream and a bitter reality.

But she was a happy girl.  Her real life couldn’t vanquish her spirit.

On the contrary, it gave her strength.

The fighting started from the moment she woke up every day.

A necessary evil.

With pain and hope, she fought for her dream.

She fought for what she believed would be but a brief moment in her life.  And she was a strong believer.

She was strong, both physically and mentally.

She had strong and beautiful legs.

And a strong and beautiful heart.

She recorded her entire life in her black and white composition book.

Day after day she meted out her story, like the punishing blows of a brawler.

Her words crashed and collided onto the pages.  This would be a fight to remember, she was certain.

She fought with all her might every single time she stepped into the ring.

She realized that in order to win, she must move with power and grace as well as character.

She was acutely aware that very important people were present.  They attentively observed her dramatic skills.

Famous producers, directors, actors and actresses, all there in the heart of Las Vegas, following her every move.

Every one of them eyeing her, she walked with the slow and deliberate rhythm of a superstar.

She sashayed with grace and energy.

Her feet danced around the ring.

Finally, arms raised high in the air after the match, she was seen as a great fighter.  This was her fantasy.  She was on cloud nine.

Those worthies were taking notice of her now.  Just as she had always dreamed they would.

She was charming, sexy, talented.

She knew that she would be bigger than Stallone, even bigger than Cat Woman, bigger than any fighter- real or imaginary.

Round one, round two, round three.

The way she beamed, the way she sauntered from round to round wasn’t something that just anyone could do.

One had to be special to pull off what she did.

People told her that she had a gift.

She had a bitter reality and a sweet secret.  She dreamed of being a famous actress.

Every time she stepped into the ring, she hoped that just one of those influential people in the audience would recognize her talent.  Beyond her ability to hop into the ring in high heels while toting the poster for the next round.

Her name was Chloe.  She was a ringside girl.   And she was fighting for her dreams, waiting for her moment to be discovered as the next world class actress.

READ ALSO: Monday I”ll Kill myself, no more delay( a suicidal note).

ABOUT THE AUTHOR:

Antonio Costa Neto is freelancer writer and has worked in some of the most important ad agencies in Brazil and the United States. He now lives in Miami where he owns and operates a marketing consultant company. Throughout his career in advertising, he has won top international awards in the Cannes, London and New York festivals, as well as in the Clio Awards and many Latin American festivals. Antonio Costa Neto has written numerous plays and screen plays in Brazil.
Womb Wrecker Syndrome is his second book.Antonio holds a BA in philosophy and sociology from Universidade Federal do Rio Grande do Sul.

twitter:acostaneto

facebook: Antonio Costa Neto

ART BY CHARLOTTERIE.

Tuesday.

Today is Tuesday.  It’s 9 AM.

I made a radical decision.

I’ll put an end to my boring life.

Too many problems, too much frustration

and almost no rewards.

I am a loser, I have to admit.

But how do I kill myself?

It cannot be anything bloody.

I don’t own a gun.

A knife is out of the question; it falls into

the blood category.

Jumping from a window would be great if I didn’t live on the

first floor.

Car accident?

No.

Cross US 1 at 6 PM with my eyes closed?

No.

I know what I’ll do.

I’ll hang myself.

It’s fast, effective and a little romantic, at least to me.

But I don’t have any rope.

I’ll buy some tomorrow. I’ll kill myself tomorrow.

Wednesday.

It is 6 PM and I haven’t killed myself yet.

I bought some rope, found the perfect spot in the house,

wrote a suicide note, had my hair cut,

cleaned and trimmed my nails,

and paid all my bills. But something unexpected happened.

My grandmother called and told me that tomorrow morning,

she’s coming over to make breakfast for me.

I don’t want her to find me dead. She’d have a heart attack.

That just wouldn’t be fair.

I’ll have to put my suicide off.

I’ll kill myself Thursday night.

Thursday.

My grandmother just left. She prepared a great breakfast

for me.

It got me thinking back to when I was a happy little kid.

I had a great childhood. Lots of love, lots of fun.

It was when I got to high school that everything

started going wrong.

From then on, my life was miserable.

Just thinking about that depresses me.

I am so down, so sad.

I don’t have the energy to kill myself right now.

I’ll do it tomorrow. Definitely.

Friday

For some reason I woke up happy today.

Well, happy is not exactly the word.

It’s more like energetic.

I feel like a walk in the park, getting out, communing with

nature, seeing people and even getting some exercise.

If this feeling lasts until the end of the day, I’ll have

to kill myself on Saturday.

There is no point of dying when you are happy.

It’ll be Saturday, for sure.

No more delays.

Saturday

Today is the finals game, basketball season.

The LA Lakers vs. Orlando Magic .

I don’t know how I could have forgotten.

If there were only one reason for me to live,

it would be basketball.

I just love it.

I went to all the Heat games this season, here in Miami

and all over the country.

I am neither a Lakers nor an Orlando fan, but if I missed

the finals it would be kind of weird.

I am crazy about basketball.

I watched all the games, all the programs,

all the interviews.

I even have a bunch of autographs and pictures

of all the players.

I’ll consider watching this game my last wish. No guilt.

Eternal life can wait for me.

And then Sunday I’ll kill myself.

Sunday

I was eating my last meal and proofreading my farewell note

when I remembered that my family was coming to town today.

They arrive at 8 this morning.

They’re bringing me a Heat shirt with the number three

on the back.

Number three is for Dwayne Wade, my favorite player.

We are going to church, and afterwards we’ll have

a family lunch.

My mom wants me to watch the new Oliver Stone movie with her

later in the afternoon.

It’s called W.

I’ll be back home by early evening.

I don’t feel comfortable killing myself after dark, though.

I think that if one has to die, it should be in the daytime,

with sunlight.

I know it’s a little superstitious, but I’m afraid that

if I die at night I’ll go to hell.

I don’t want that to happen.

The whole reason I want to die is to put an end to my hell,

the hell that is my life.  Hell sucks.

I’d like to spend eternity in purgatory, at least.

That’s why I’ll kill myself on Monday for sure.

Monday is the perfect day to start a whole new life.

Monday and that’s it. I give you my word.

READ ALSO : MY NAME IS GOD. http://befree2bfree.wordpress.com

ART BY  NEWTON BENTO

ABOUT THE AUTHOR:

Antonio Costa Neto is freelancer writer and has worked in some of the most important ad agencies in Brazil and the United States. He now lives in Miami where he owns and operates a marketing consultant company. Throughout his career in advertising, he has won top international awards in the Cannes, London and New York festivals, as well as in the Clio Awards and many Latin American festivals. Antonio Costa Neto has written numerous plays and screen plays in Brazil.
Womb Wrecker Syndrome is his second book. Antonio holds a BA in philosophy and sociology from Universidade Federal do Rio Grande do Sul.

twitter:acostaneto

facebook: Antonio Costa Neto

He woke up with a tremendous hangover and made a definitive decision to never have another drink again.

He was totally convinced that alcohol caused him immense harm, not only to his body, but also to his soul.

Not to mention that his relationship with his kids and his wife were going nowhere, just like his professional situation.

He had lost his job two years ago and never got another one.

In part, it was because he didn’t want another job.

In part, he simply could not follow orders.

With the loss of his job, and without having received any salary for two years, he was financially broken.

He now felt that his family was falling apart as well.

That is why he decided never to drink again.

But he made this decision at 10 in the morning, while suffering from a tremendous hangover, headache, nausea and unbearable anguish.

At 6 PM the same day he changed his mind.

After a horrible, melancholy day of dark thoughts and a looming pessimism over his future, a wonderful idea crossed his mind and a beautiful, warm feeling gave him some hope.

He thought that maybe it wasn’t the end yet.

He thought that maybe his situation was just a bad phase.

In one instant he felt like the good old Francisco again.

Smart, creative, sharp, a happy man with a great sense of humor, destined to be a winner and loved by everyone.

Those thoughts and feelings were stronger than everything else.

They were proof that life is supposed to be lived with intensity, without fear.

And in his case, particularly his case being a such talented man, he could not be taken over by cheap thoughts and feelings.

Happiness, he thought, is for those who dare, for those who seek heaven, for those who take risks, for those who believe in something greater than the mundane, for those who have courage.

Then he went to a bar and ordered a vodka, straight up.

After the first vodka, he couldn’t remember what happened.

Next morning he woke up with a tremendous hangover and  made a definitive decision to never have another drink again.