It was the early 90s. Albania was collapsing from within, like an old building that had carried the weight of history on its shoulders for too long. The factories closed one after another. The tall industrial chimneys stopped blowing smoke. The machinery was covered in dust. People were left without work. Without income. Without a future.
Many of them left. They fled to Greece, to Italy, to any country where life seemed to still hold a chance.
But at the gate of the Laç Chemical-Metallurgical Combine, only one man remained.
The watchman. His name was Zef.
He was a quiet man, with gray hair and hands made strong by years of work. He had once seen this place alive, filled with the noise of machines, the shouts of workers, the heat of the furnaces and the smell of chemicals. Now everything was silence. A silence that carried weight.
At night, when darkness covered the plants and the few lights of the town turned on in the distance, Zef made his usual rounds.
His footsteps echoed on the empty asphalt.
The rusted machinery looked like huge metal skeletons sleeping in the dark. But one night, something happened.
As he passed by the Superphosphate Plant, he heard a voice.
A man’s voice.
“ENElsa… Elsaaaa…”
The voice spread through the long corridors of the factory like a distant echo. The voice, like a bird, flapped its wings against the ironwork of the site, but even though the moonlight guided it out, it stayed there, even though the collisions caused it pain.
Zef stopped.
His heart beat a little faster.
Then, as if from the depths of a dream, came a soft reply:
“My love… I’m here…”
And then…
Laughter.
Quick breaths. Like two people embracing after a long time.
Zef raised his flashlight and lit up the corridor. Nothing. Only cold walls and dead machinery. But the voices continued.
He saw nothing… but before his eyes, the kisses and breaths of the two lovers seemed so real, as if he were breathing right along with them.
The next night it happened again.
“ENElsa…”
“ENI’m here… my love…!”
Zef reported it to the management. Then to the police.
They only laughed.
“ENDon’t drink so much raki at night, Zef.”
He said no more.
But the voices continued for weeks on end.
Zef had his own wounds, too.
His two sons had left for Italy. Just like so many others. Because that was the only path to survival.
One evening he was sitting in the deep armchair his sons had sent him from Milan. The armchair looked like a strange luxury in his simple room.
There was a cup of coffee on the table. The television was showing the news. Suddenly, the anchor started a report from Milan.
“ENA strange accident occurred on the city streets today…” The cameras showed the dramatic scene.
Zef pushed the armchair back and stood up. His two sons appeared before his eyes. He realized his knees were giving way.
A young man walking down the street appeared on the screen. People were running all around. A car had hit him.
But what the doctors said was even stranger.
“ENAccording to the doctors, his body had been without a soul for some time…”
The anchor continued:
“ENThe young man was an immigrant from Albania. From the industrial town of Laç.”
Zef felt a chill down his spine. His hand trembled. From the jolt to the table, the coffee had spilled and created a black shadow on the white tablecloth. It had taken the shape of pain.
The anchor told his story.
He had come to Italy to work. In Albania he had left his family, his sister, but also his love. A girl. Elsa. At night, when he slept, his soul returned to Laç.
It flew over the sea. It crossed mountains. And it entered the corridors of the plant where they had worked together. Elsa was waiting for him there. They embraced. They laughed. They kissed, just like they used to.
Like before the world collapsed. One morning, something changed. His soul did not return to Milan. His body waited for it. Time passed. The hour for work drew near. His world fought within him. Work demanded his arms. His soul demanded love.
Finally, he got up. Like a sleepwalker. Soulless. He walked down the street. He did not see. He did not hear. His soul was still in the corridors of the plant. It was running to where he had loved for the first time.
Suddenly, people screamed. A car hit him. His body slammed onto the asphalt. But he felt no pain. Because a body without a soul does not hurt.
The doctors later said:
“ENHe had died before the impact.”
The body was merely matter.
The cup of coffee on Zef’s table had gone cold. It had spilled and was leaning on its handle, like an old man holding a cane because his legs cannot hold him. A dramatic scene.
Zef was trembling.
When the anchor mentioned the young man’s name, Zef raised his head. And suddenly he understood.
He recognized the voice. It was the voice he heard every night in the factory.
“ENElsa… Elsaaaa…”
Zef got up at once. He could no longer stay in the house. He opened the door and went out into the cold night. The road to the combine was empty. But in his ears, the voices continued.
“ENElsa…”
“ENI’m here… my love…!”
When he entered the corridors of the factory, for the first time he did not just hear the voices. He saw the faces, too. Two young people embracing in the pale moonlight that came in through the broken windows.
Zef stopped. He realized something. He was not just the watchman of a dead factory.
He was the keeper of memories. The keeper of the loves that had been born there. The keeper of the voices of the people who had fled across the world, but who had left their souls in these corridors. The combine was empty. But not dead. Inside it lived hundreds of unextinguished loves. Hundreds of interrupted lives. Hundreds of souls that returned at night to the place where they had been happy.
Zef realized that his job was more important than he had thought. He was not guarding walls. He was not guarding rusted machinery. He was guarding the memory of a lost world.
The Laç Combine had become a silent museum of human life and love.
And in its corridors, every night, two voices continued to be heard:
“ENElsa…”
“ENI’m here… my love…!”
BY PILO ZYBA
