by Antonio Napoli

A fierce wind was blowing that evening.
Bakari and Jabari walked through the night of the savannah, along a moonlit path.
“It feels like a great storm spirit,” said Jabari, speaking of the wind.
“True, it could uproot a baobab,” Bakari admitted.

They reached a hut of wood and mud where they would spend the night.
This was their adventure: the adventure of two young friends.
The sky above them showed no sign of calming.

Bakari was the first to sit on a mat of woven fibers.
Meanwhile, Jabari pulled out an old palm oil lamp from a corner. He lit it.
It was their small fire against the immense and stormy darkness that engulfed the land.

“My grandfather,” Bakari said with pride, “found a treasure while digging a hole in the sacred grove of the ancestors.”
“Then how come you’re not rich?” asked Jabari, incredulous.
“I said he found it, not that he took it. He left it there, out of remorse.
That hole was meant for poor Mosi. Do you remember him?
He was ruined, and finding no one to help him—not even my grandfather—he took his own life, under an old acacia tree.
Now he rests forever on a wealth that is all his, even if it came too late.”

“My grandfather, on the other hand, buried a treasure,” said Jabari with a hint of melancholy.
“Then why did you remain poor?” asked Bakari. “I’ll tell you why: that miser of your grandfather never said where he hid it.”
“Let me explain. That treasure was my grandmother.
A loving and patient woman. The spirits of the ancestors will never forgive my harsh grandfather for what she forgave him in life.”

They talked a while longer, until the rain drove the wind away.
They lay down on beds of straw and slowly slipped into sleep.
When we fall asleep, the soul passes through a narrow passage,
and finds itself in a place without borders.

There, Bakari dreamed of Jabari’s grandfather.
And Jabari of Bakari’s.

In the morning, as they opened the door to the smell of wet earth,
they remembered the dream.

“Your grandfather told me that a true friend is never lost, not even in darkness,” said Bakari.
“Strange… yours told me the same thing,” replied Jabari.
They looked at each other, astonished. And shook hands.
Then they swore upon a stone that they would never be apart.

“If anyone wants to break the pact, he must return this stone to the other,” said Bakari, throwing it far away.

Years passed. They lost sight of one another.
When they met again, they were nearly old men.
And they didn’t recognize each other at once.

Bakari had become a sea captain.
His face was marked by time and the tempests of the ocean.
He was not a man for idle chatter.
His life was ruled by the sound of waves, the salty wind,
and the decisions dictated by the law of the sea.
His tall figure asked for no approval. His cold gaze said it all.

Jabari had become a Christian preacher.
He radiated a faith so strong it bordered on fanaticism.
His face was stern, and every word of his seemed to announce the Apocalypse.
His hands rose as if grasping something invisible,
and his voice evoked hellfire and final judgment.

When they found themselves in the same inn,
their encounter was a fleeting crossing of two shadows,
stretched and broken by the light of a swinging lamp.

No memory was kindled between them.
The floor creaked like a ship.
The captain sat apart, untouched by the glow of the flames.
The scent of salt he carried, and a copper staff with a coiled serpent figure,
drew the attention of the preacher.

Jabari approached and spoke without introduction.

“In the Old Testament, during the venomous journey through the desert,
those who looked upon Moses’ bronze serpent were healed of their bites.
In the New Testament, Christ on the cross takes its place.
But not all will be saved…”

The captain listened in silence, sipping his liquor.

The tension between the two men was palpable.
The captain, anchored to the sea.
The preacher, inhabited by visions of light and eternity.

Time in the inn seemed to slow.
Shadows danced like ghosts.
The preacher’s words blended with the captain’s silence,
like two worlds crossing for a moment, only to drift apart again.

The captain paused, as if something in the air felt familiar.
His impassive face did not move,
but his eyes—eyes that had seen more storms than the land could count—
seemed to probe the darkness.

Outside, a terrible wind raged.
The preacher’s voice became like the backwash of the tide.

“The Lord’s judgment is near,” he said gravely,
his face streaked by the flickering light.
“And the sea… the sea claims us.
Down in its depths sleep those who broke divine law.
The Leviathan lies dormant. But when it awakens…”

At that instant, the wind hurled a stone against the inn’s window.
The stone rolled a bit among the shards of glass
and stopped at Bakari’s feet.

The captain’s face tightened,
as if that blow had struck something the sea had long hidden.
He did not fear death.
But in that moment, he felt a clutch in his chest.
An invisible presence seemed to have invaded his domain.

The preacher looked at the floor,
as if he saw a familiar shadow.

Silence fell.
The air grew denser,
as if an invisible weight hung in the room.

A distant murmur—like an echo from the ocean’s depths—emerged.
An echo of memory.

“The sea does not forgive,” he murmured, trembling.
“And judgment will spare no one.”

“The sea…” whispered the captain, breaking the silence.
“The sea never leaves us. Just like true friendship.”

Bakari and Jabari, aged and grateful, embraced.
Then Bakari picked up the stone and hurled it into the endless night.