HE STILL TURNS HIS HEAD AFTER A LADY

Uncle Ákos was almost eighty when he lost his thirty-year-old son, who committed suicide. The young man was unable to work his way through the biggest challenge of his life. Once, he accidentally ended up in a gay bar instead of a rock club with one of his bodies, where they were supposed to see a live rock concert, so he realized his undoubted attraction to his own s*x. At that time, he was newly married and only weeks away from the birth of his son. He got married due to the expectations of his parents, not to mention the social pressures which he proved to be too weak to stand strong against. The son of Uncle Ákos’d been struggling for years beforehand, only to come to terms with the very reason of his whole existence at that gay bar. In the blurry state of living his life, he never felt that he’d had anybody to discuss his real self with. His father, Uncle Ákos, after the tragedy, felt his overwhelming responsibility over losing his only son. For long, long years the elderly father couldn’t come to the terms of this unspeakable tragedy. He came to the point when he was able to put it to himself that happiness rooted deep down, somewhere along the line of unobserving of oneself in some freedom, in some liberty. Too late realization, he thought to himself and waited to pay the price of his mistake. Years after the tragedy he couldn’t say to himself whether he wanted to live any longer. He hated the fact that he had grown so old. He hoped for a different outcome. Something like, with his only child around him. Many times, the weird thought rushed through him, like someone in his advanced age only lives as long as the person doesn’t get bored of it all. His kind wife, Julia, was fifteen years younger than him. After the tragedy, like the cats, she just landed on her feet and although it was awfully hard for her too, but she managed to move on better than Uncle Ákos. She was running a popular flower shop in the neighborhood which kept her occupied well. She was able to come to the point where she could appreciate that they had a grandchild, and for some reason the creator or the lord wanted this for them. Not once had she quarreled with her resigned husband but it seemed impossible to get him on her side. She often just left it at that. Uncle Ákos, in this weird negligence, prepared himself for his own passing. He got to the point when he yearned for it more than for anything else, ever in his life. Two years after the tragedy, he started to go out a bit more again. When death made him wait for his turn longer than he expected. He went strolling the neighborhood again and started to make himself useful again by picking up a few things from the grocery store. ‘ Ó, My legs are still carrying me,’ he said to himself, while he kept on remembering the time that he spent with his son. He went to the flower shop and, after closing hour, with Julia, they walked home, mostly in a gloomy state. ‘ Hey, death is still making me wait, ‘ – he kept on talking to himself like this. ‘ Making me wait so painfully long. ‘ He noticed that he had started to do something with his life without giving it much consideration. That way he ended up going again to his favorite place to swim. While he’d been swimming his turns, he kept on thinking about how much he laughed with his son over of others. Sometimes he even felt that only two of them were on the same page and the rest of the world on the other. For example, once when the family went skiing together overseas, and Julia’s mother was with them too. They heard the old lady saying on her scratchy, high pitched tone, in the hotel lobby area, when she came across many national flags hanging on the wall and underneath the country names indicated, ‘ What kinda country is this United States? ‘ Needless to explain that the USA was written like the United States and the old lady just wouldn’t let it go. She was kind of outraged. Yes, Uncle Ákos thought to himself that the ‘ What kinda country is this United States? ‘ could only have been taken as a common phrase in their household with his dear, precious son. He thought that with his son’s death he would die inside too. Especially when in recent years, two of his lifelong best friends left him too. With those two, he went through longings after girls, later women, and never felt any resentment ever towards them. They knew that what they had couldn’t be put otherwise than the camaraderie of boys. But was it really the end of his will to live? Or could this recent move around bring him any surprising joy? ‘ Well, I still have to live a little, it seems. The lord is way too harsh on me, ‘ he said to himself on one sunny afternoon as he climbed out of the pool where he finished swimming. He looked up to find his towel as a very attractive lady passed him by. He turned his head after the lady without realizing it at that moment. After such a long time, he turned his head toward a lady again. He thought he was completely dead inside, and yet he turned his head after an attractive female. That is so unexpectedly outrageous, he thought. ‘ What is this shameful thirst that is coming to surface here? ‘ he asked himself rather angrily. ‘ What kinda country is this United States? Can I still love life after all of what has happened? ‘ He passed eighty and the darkest tragedy caught up on him and he turned his head after a lady.