The Garden’s entrance

by Gioia Marchegiani

My father has never smoked.
Therefore, when one day he was presented with a precious onyx cigarette case, he decided to give it to me.
I was a bit disappointed. What should I do with it? But he smiled under his pale moustache and told me he was sure that I was the right person for that object.
It was very heavy and I struggled to carry it to my room, where I put it on a corner of my table, close to the window. I didn’t pay attention to it and went out to play in the garden.
He remained there for a lot of time, until it was covered with a thin layer of dust, that I blew away on a rainy day when I was forced to stay at home.
Locked in my room, sitting at the table, against the light of the pane that was crying rain, I started
to turn it on itself.
“What a strange shape for a cigarette case!” I said to myself while trying to understand how I could open it, until a finger touched something that would reveal every mystery.
A small metal button that, when pressed, released a note and then another one and another one again, while six small doors slowly started to open.
“A carillon!” I exclaimed.
My eyes opened wide together with my smile, attracted by a white and intense light coming from the centre of the carillon that invited me in.
It was a matter of moments and I was ravished. So, while the rain beat the panes like a metronome, accompanying the melody of the carillon and the small doors shut behind my back, I found myself inside a garden.
From that day on, I just needed to press that small button every time I wished to reach my Garden.
My Secret.