Rainy Night Wall and Wanted Poster

The rain wouldn't stop, like the final looping track of a cheap record – hoarse, stubborn, carrying a sense of weary fatalism. I was killing time in the old bookstore downstairs from my apartment building, the air thick with the mingled scent of musty paper and cheap coffee. The owner, a taciturn old man, was always behind the counter reading well-worn philosophy books, as if not even the apocalypse could disturb his rendezvous with Kant or Nietzsche.

A new notice was posted on the wall. The paper was coarse, the print quality reminiscent of an underground publication from the eighties. The title screamed in bold black characters: "WANTED". Below were three blurry black-and-white photos – two men and a woman, Western faces, expressions stiff, looking like they'd been torn from some long-forgotten family album. Below the photos, their "crimes" were listed in small print – endangering national security, sounding like lines from an old movie. The reward amount, however, was specific: a long string of zeros, enough to buy this old bookstore, owner's outdated philosophies included.

I stared at the woman's photo for a long time. Couldn't say why, but those eyes seemed familiar, like I'd seen them somewhere before. Not a specific memory, more like a feeling – like hearing an old song by chance, the melody vaguely familiar, but being unable to recall the title or where I first heard it. Her gaze was empty, yet seemed to hold some bottomless secret, as if she were standing at the edge of a deep well, poised to fall in at any moment.

“You interested in this too?” The owner had appeared behind me sometime without my noticing, his voice like a rusty hinge. “Lately, quite a few people have been looking at it. But really,” he shrugged, retreating back into his philosophical fortress, “what does this kind of thing have to do with ordinary folks like us?”

What does it have to do with ordinary folks like us? Probably nothing. Like whether the dollar and euro will form a new pattern, or which brand of sanitary napkin some celebrity uses – just noise from another parallel universe. I picked up a book with a giant beetle on the cover, paid, and left the bookstore. The rain was still falling, not heavily, but enough to leave one's mood thoroughly damp.

At the little bar I usually went to at night, whiskey on the rocks, condensation beaded on the glass. The bartender wiped the counter as usual, occasionally glancing up at the silent sports game on TV. John Coltrane's saxophone drifted through the air, lazy and melancholic. I sipped my whiskey, the ice cubes clinking softly in the glass.

A man in a trench coat sat down in the seat next to mine, ordered the same whiskey, then turned to me abruptly. "Hey," he said, his voice a bit hoarse, "Have you ever lost something important?"

I paused for a moment, unsure how to answer. Lost something? Maybe. Keys, a wallet, some woman's phone number, and some vaguer things, like dreams or youth, that sort of stuff. But that didn't seem to be what he was asking about.

"I think I lost a cat," the man continued, talking more to himself, his gaze distant. "Or maybe not a cat. Anyway, something furry, warm, something that purred. But now it's gone. Can't find it anywhere." He took out a photo and pushed it towards me. "Seen her?"

The photo was of the woman from the wanted poster. Clearer than on the notice, even showing a faint, almost imperceptible smile. Those eyes, still like deep wells. "She's my..." The man paused, his Adam's apple bobbed, as if about to utter some forbidden word, but finally just shook his head. "Never mind. If you've seen her, or someone who looks like her, let me know." He downed his drink in one gulp, left a crumpled bill on the counter, and disappeared into the rain.

Only the bartender and I were left in the bar, along with Coltrane's saxophone. The photo remained on the counter, the woman's eyes staring up at the ceiling. I suddenly felt a chill, not from the air conditioning, but a coldness rising from deep within my spine. What the hell was this? Some real-life black comedy? Or just some kind of cheap prank?

I pocketed the photo and left the bar. The rain seemed to have lessened slightly, but the sky remained overcast, like a giant slab of lead. The streets were empty, neon lights reflecting hazy halos on the wet pavement. I felt countless eyes watching me from the shadows – from behind windows, from parked cars, from every dark corner. The faces from the wanted notice seemed to have come alive, becoming part of the city, part of the air itself.

Back at my apartment, I found a small note slipped under the door. On it, a single line printed in block letters: "Stay away from any wells." No signature, no reason, like a warning from another dimension. I placed it next to the photo and lit a cigarette.

Through the swirling smoke, I seemed to see the three wanted "agents" – if they really were agents – also on some similar rainy night, smoking cigarettes, drinking cheap whiskey, wondering what exactly they had lost. Maybe their identities, maybe their country, maybe just an imaginary cat.

This world is like a giant, malfunctioning bureaucracy where everyone is assigned a nonsensical role, scurrying around in a play they don't understand. Wanted posters, national security, dollars and euros, sanitary napkins – these words rain down like drops, illogical, yet constructing what we call 'reality'. And I, an anonymous spectator, or perhaps an extra who stumbled onto the wrong set, clutching a woman's photo and a note about 'wells', stand in the endless rainy night, not knowing which way to go.

Maybe the man in the trench coat was right. We're all looking for something we've lost. Maybe it's a cat, maybe it's a long-forgotten feeling. We just never figure out exactly what it is, or when and where we lost it. Like that wanted notice on the wall, it poses questions but never provides answers. We can only keep walking in the rain, listening to the sound like a cheap record, waiting for the next baffling clue, or for a clear sky that may never come.