Are you awake ?

Deborah Tavares

Kah Inácio

It was the third time that week and his family had already suggested he should see a doctor. Why? He was not sick and wasn’t feeling sick… Actually, he had never felt so good. He would daily work out; he had joined a more than perfect diet; he was being praised at work; he was dating someone. That’s what most people would call a divine manifestation of happiness.

Despite his apparently well-adjusted life, there was a tragic secret which everybody in the family was dying to keep: Rudolph was a sleepwalker. And again, most people would say it is not a problem at all. Except for one of those little creepy details: he used to kill someone every time he sleepwalked. And worse: someone very close to him.

Mr. Kyle, Rudolph’s father discovered the body of the grandma in the backyard a few months before. It took him ages to finally understand that Rudolph wasn’t a psychopath (although, deep down, he was afraid of his son, and since everything turned into a nightmare, he started to sleep uneasy and with a gun under the pillow). Rudolph suffered without suffering - he never had a clue about all the events that took place during his sleepwalking. He was a killer – a good kind; very polite, by the way. The curse was in the fact that no one knew when there would be another death or who would be the victim. Rudolph was the silent embodiment of Pandora's Box...

Here we find the extremes of this funny and fantastic story: Rudolph did not know what was happening and his father had no idea how to explain it to him. After too much persuasion, Rudolph went to the doctor (even misunderstanding all that fuss) and got the expected result: sleepwalking. The doctor prescribed some medicine, which had a great effect in the first few weeks; even Mr. Kyle was sleeping quieter, but still he hesitated to tell the truth to Rudolph.
After a regular day, Rudolph took his medicine and did go to sleep. However, that night he had a weird dream - he dreamed of killing his aunt. He woke up confused and did not say anything to anyone. Some time ago, he had already dreamed of killing his grandmother and burying her in the backyard. And he had no idea it was his subconscious coming out. Damn, he SO did not want to be there. The nightmares went on until he couldn't stand anymore and decided to tell his father what was happening. Mr. Kyle heard all the facts and finally told the whole truth about who was the real culprit of some murders within the family.
Rudolph was inconsolable, took his car and drove around town all day. He returned home at night, ate something and decided to sleep without taking his medication. Little did he know that his own death was decreed. He fell asleep quickly, as a baby, and in the next morning, Mr. Kyle found his son strangled by the window. Rudolph was his own victim... The Pandora's Box was closed then.