The Dive and the Kiss
Ceres slowly climbed the stairs of the ten-meter platform. Each step echoed through the silent gymnasium like a gunshot in her chest. At the top, standing at the edge, she felt the cold concrete beneath her feet and the emptiness below calling to her.
She closed her eyes for a moment. And heard Theo’s voice in her memory:
"Hatred is energy too. It can be negative… but it is still energy. Use it. Stack it like steps. Forget the others. Feel the pain. Focus on the goal."
She slowly opened her eyes, took a deep breath, and looked down.
Theo was there, at the bottom of the pool, looking up at her. Serious. Motionless. As if disconnected from the world, simply… existing.
Ceres hesitated. She did not want to jump alone.
She called out, half-requesting:
— Theo… come up here.
He did not argue, did not think. On autopilot, he began climbing the stairs, as if some invisible force were pulling him toward her. Ceres did not take her eyes off him.
At the top, the two stood side by side, breathing heavily, feeling the wind cut across their wet skin. The silence between them was absolute.
Ceres extended her hand. Her fingers trembled slightly.
— Can we… be friends? — she murmured.
Theo looked at her for a long moment. He did not answer. He simply extended his hand as well, almost hypnotized.
Their fingers touched.
Vertigo came when they looked down — and in that instant, they both lost their balance.
They fell together.
The impact with the water was like a punch. The world turned green and murky. Theo’s body sank, heavy as marble, inert, eyes closed.
Ceres felt her heart race in panic. She dove after him, pulling him with all the strength she had until they reached the surface.
They emerged gasping. She held his face, her hands trembling, her eyes almost filling with tears.
— Wake up…! — she whispered nervously. — Theo… please…
His eyes opened, gasping for air. The two breathed in sync, drawing air from each other as though they were one.
And without knowing who had made the first move — or perhaps both at the same time — their lips met in an urgent, instinctive kiss, full of fear and relief.
For a moment, the entire pool disappeared around them.
There were only the two of them, breathing together, drowning in one another.
The kiss slowly broke apart, not by choice, but from the need to breathe.
Still gasping, they were too close, their eyes locked on each other.
Ceres’ hands held his face.
But Theo… Theo did not seem entirely there.
His eyes could not quite focus.
He breathed in sync with her, but it was only his body. His mind was somewhere else.
In the silence after the kiss, while water still dripped from the ends of his hair, Theo felt… empty.
A dull echo in his head.
Gene’s face, his friend, appeared clearly: standing in D Square, proud even beneath the death sentence, shouting blasphemies against Mãe Ceres.
The crowd booing, his voice choked but still defiant:
— I am not this mother’s son! I’d rather die free than live on my knees for food! Death to Mãe Ceres!
And then the dry crack of the shot.
Theo closed his eyes, still on autopilot, and repeated inside himself the mantra he always used when anger threatened to swallow everything:
"Hatred is energy too. Stack it. Stack it. Stack it. Use it to climb. Not to fall."
His hands found hers, still resting against his face.
He squeezed them. Hard. Almost hurting her.
But outwardly, he remained calm.
Always calm.
Like marble.
Ceres felt the tension in his fingers, his uneven breathing, his eyes closed as though he were fighting not to scream.
She did not pull away.
She knew what it was like.
She, too, stacked steps of hatred every day.
Theo finally opened his eyes.
That same coldness. That silent leadership she both envied and feared.
He slowly released her hands and swam toward the edge without looking back.
He climbed out of the water in silence, like someone carrying an invisible burden.
Ceres remained motionless, the taste of the kiss still on her lips, her hands still feeling the warmth of his face.
She knew it was not only about her.
She knew there was something heavier behind those eyes.
Something he would never say aloud.
But somehow, that only made her want to reach him even more.
Theo stopped at the edge, still feeling her touch on his face, her eyes fixed on his.
And then, without warning, he turned back toward her and kissed her again.
Hard.
Almost brutally.
Like an attack.
Ceres did not pull away.
She did not deny the desire.
Her mouth answered without fear, without shame.
The sound of water striking the edges disappeared behind their urgent breathing.
It was not a kiss.
It was a clash.
A duel disguised as desire.
He held her firmly by the nape, his fingers buried in her wet hair.
She did not pull away for even a second.
She did not whimper. She did not beg for mercy.
That only made him more confused, more furious… and more aroused.
Then he suddenly broke away, leaving her breathless in the water.
He climbed out of the pool without saying a word.
He did not look back.
He did not hear when Ceres, still trying to steady her breathing, murmured something to him.
Theo was strange.
Very strange.
Deep down, she knew: that kiss had not been only about her.
And he did not hide it.
As he walked toward the locker room, dry inside even though his body was still soaked, Theo thought:
"I want her. I really do. But I also want her to hate me for it. I want her to scream, to call me a monster. I want to see Mãe Ceres on her face and crush that name with my hands. I want revenge… but I want her too."
Except she had not screamed.
She had not rejected him.
And that disappointed him in a sickening way.
He felt that if she had only pulled away, if she had cried or spat in his face, he could have used that as fuel to keep hating.
But no.
She had liked it.
And deep down, he had loved it too.
Theo closed the locker room door behind him, leaned his forehead against the cold metal, and whispered bitterly:
— What the fuck am I doing…
Her taste was still on his lips.
And he hated how much it made him smile.
Ceres remained standing in the water, her chest rising and falling rapidly, her breathing uneven.
The surface trembled around her, but her mind was silent.
The heavy silence of someone who cannot tell whether she has won or lost.
Theo had already disappeared down the corridor, without a word, without a final glance.
She ran her fingers over her own lips, still feeling his taste, the brute force and restrained fury in that kiss.
And thought for a moment:
"He was going to consume me right there. I felt it. He wanted to. I wanted him to."
But he did not.
Not that time.
He was… strange.
Not merely quiet — strange.
As if his body were an animal acting on instinct while his soul wandered somewhere else.
As if something greater than his own pain lived inside him.
A silent creature that never stopped gnawing at the flesh from within.
That was never satisfied.
And that used Ceres as a flame to illuminate his personal hell.
She bit her lip, almost smiling.
Almost crying.
And whispered to herself:
— You won't consume me entirely, Theo… but I'll let you try.
She closed her eyes, feeling hatred and desire boiling together in her chest.
The water around her seemed warm, comforting, almost maternal.
Like Mãe Ceres.
Except she did not want protection.
She wanted to be devoured.
And if he was the one who would make her scream, then so be it.
Theo, in the dormitory, lay on his bunk staring at the ceiling. He thought about the stupid thing he had done.
But it wasn't exactly a stupid thing, was it?
He wanted to forget Gene, bury the guilt over the friend he himself had turned in because of the blasphemous graffiti against Mãe Ceres.
Deep down, he thought perhaps a new guilt could swallow the old one.
But no.
Ceres… that girl with short hair falling to her shoulders, a light fringe across her forehead, large blue eyes — blue enough to contain the entire sky — those eyes that hunted lying souls, but had not hunted his.
Had not hunted the liar he was.
And so, after thinking for so long, Theo fell asleep.
Then came the memory, clear as a stab:
Gene laughing with him in the courtyard, talking about the tapes he had managed to buy from Dru, paying with the makeshift brass coins only she knew how to mint.
And the times he had looked at Kat for the first time, like a boy dreaming too much.
Gene whispered:
— It's her… it's her…
Theo, always the calmer one, adjusted the collar of his military jacket and murmured:
— Go on… tell her…
Gene, trembling, stared at Kat from afar as though the entire world depended on that moment.
He saw Gene trembling, holding the newly purchased tapes like trophies. The brass coin still warm in his palm, his skin sweaty.
Theo watched him adjust the collar of his jacket with uncertain fingers, like someone preparing for an impossible battle.
There was Kat, sitting alone on the stone step of Block H, fiddling with a notebook covered in worn-out stickers.
Gene stood motionless, staring at her as though she were made of light.
Theo approached without saying anything and, with a simple gesture — two fingers on Gene's collar, smoothing the fold and straightening it — said only:
— Go… talk to her. Don't wait for the world to end.
Gene took a deep breath, as though the words weighed tons, and murmured:
— It's her. It's her. It's always been her.
Theo watched with his arms crossed as his friend walked toward Kat, nearly tripping over his own feet.
She raised her blue eyes when he approached. She did not smile immediately.
But she did not look away.
Gene extended his hand hesitantly, almost childlike, and Theo, from a distance, felt proud.
A small pride, almost imperceptible, but one that throbbed in his chest.
Only now, lying on that bunk, everything hurt differently.
Every detail of that scene burned inside him.
His friend's courage only made his own cowardice clearer.
He had turned him in.
He had condemned him.
And even so, in his memory, Gene still extended his hand toward Kat as though life were worth living.
Theo closed his eyes on the bunk. The scene would not disappear.
He remembered Gene's broken breathing, his trembling hand extended toward Kat.
She looked at that hand for a moment too long.
Theo even thought she might laugh. That she might reject him.
But no.
Kat closed the notebook with a sharp snap. Her eyes — that same cruel blue Theo now saw in Ceres' eyes — locked onto Gene's.
And she asked, with cold calm:
— Why do you always look at me like that?
Gene swallowed hard. Lowered his eyes to his own boots, then raised his face and answered:
— Because… I know it's you. Even if I can't have you.
Kat did not smile. She did not touch him.
But she did not push him away either.
She stared at him until his hand slowly fell.
Then she murmured, too quietly for Theo to hear from there:
— Then stop looking and do something, idiot.
Gene did not touch her again.
He simply sat beside her on the step.
In silence.
Theo watched them talk quietly afterward.
And for the first time, Gene did not seem to be trembling.
For the first time… he seemed alive.
And now, lying on the bunk, Theo thought:
Why wasn't it me?
Why didn't I have the courage to be myself?
Why didn't I hold his hand? Why didn't I stand up to Mãe Ceres for him?
He wanted to believe that turning Gene in had been nothing more than another proof of loyalty to the City.
That he had simply followed the rules.
But the truth consuming him was simple:
He had only been afraid.
Afraid of being like Gene.
Afraid of not fitting into that perfect world.
And when he kissed Ceres that afternoon, with that brutal force, with that blind desire… it wasn't for her.
It was for Gene.
It was for the rebellion suffocated inside him, for his anger at himself, for the shame that not even Mãe Ceres could erase.
Deep down, Theo knew:
He wasn't kissing Ceres.
He was spitting in Mãe Ceres' face.
And that, as disgusting as it was, was the only thing that still made him feel alive.
In the silence of the dormitory, only the distant hum of the air filters and the breathing of the other boys filled the space.
Theo remained motionless on the bunk, arms behind his head, eyes open, fixed on the pale-gray ceiling.
And he thought of her.
He thought of the taste of Ceres' mouth.
He could not tell whether it was the taste of pool water or the salt of her own skin.
But he felt again the warmth of her face between his hands, felt again the vertigo when his lips found hers — as if all the hatred he had kept inside had finally found a way out.
It felt good.
It was wrong.
It was horrible.
And it felt good.
Theo closed his eyes, trying to push the thought away.
But the kiss returned whole, vivid, as though she were still there, at the edge of his bed, looking at him with those blue eyes that forgave no lie.
Why did I do that?
It was the question circling his mind, unanswered.
Maybe it was only to silence Gene's voice inside him.
Maybe it was only because he wanted to punish someone — punish the Mother, punish himself.
Or maybe it was simply because he wanted to feel, even if only for a moment, what it would be like to have someone beside him — even through hatred.
Theo took a deep breath.
And realized he wanted more.
More of that crooked kiss, more of that pain that blurred into desire.
More of Ceres.
It was a dirty thought, heavy and shameful.
But still, it was real.
When he finally fell asleep, he felt worse than when he had climbed the platform.
But also more alive than he had in a very long time.
Theo's Thoughts
I remember that day very well, when I came into the world.
It was like slowly opening my eyes, still wrapped in the black half-light of my eyelids, trying to understand my senses one by one — light, sounds, smells.
And then, the first face I remember seeing.
It was my mother's.
She was beautiful.
Black hair, straight, falling like night.
Eyes as dark as mine, black as pitch.
Her name was Elzi.
We were in Pietà — the mothers' residence of Mãe Ceres.
Everything was white and marble.
The colors were soft, pastel, with details in blue and yellow.
Perhaps this is what the house of the gods looks like, I thought one day, a smell of home and shelter… although I already knew: this was the house of Mãe Ceres.
Pietà was a vast residence, filled with rooms for mothers and their babies.
There were rooms with educational toys — some resembling grenades, toy weapons, stuffed soldiers, a stuffed Mãe Ceres. Dice, wooden tools, balls, cloth animals.
It was a nursery that smelled like home.
The smell of clean clothes.
The smell of babies in someone's arms.
There was an indoor park too, with swings, little bridges, colorful ropes hanging from above.
And the cafeteria… how wonderful that food smelled.
There were dishes for every kind of child and baby, prepared by caring hands.
Almost all of them were women: mothers, wet nurses, mothers who had lost their own children during childbirth and now helped care for others.
They were always smiling, those women.
And it was in the park, when I was still very small, that I made my first friend.
Gene.
He had golden curls and squinting eyes, always somewhat nearsighted because he did not wear glasses yet.
We played together constantly, running across the white floor of Pietà.
Laughing, stumbling, falling, getting back up.
Back then, the world was still a clean marble playground.
And Mãe Ceres seemed to be nothing more than… a shining face on the wall.
Mãe Ceres was almost always there.
With that mystical, almost ethereal manner of hers.
How sweet she was… or seemed to be.
She always wore that flowing garment that covered her feet, so light it gave the impression that she floated across the cold marble of Pietà.
Her face was never seen — behind that oval mask, a glossy black shield where, as children, we could see our own distorted reflections.
Around the mask was a crown set with iridescent crystals that flickered in soft colors beneath the light.
Sometimes she would remain there, in the inner courtyard, surrounded by babies and mothers.
She looked like a living sculpture.
I remember well… the day she picked me up.
I felt the metallic cold of that black mask when I touched it.
Inside, I swear I saw a smile behind it.
And she said — her voice gentle, but immense, as though escape were impossible:
“My little ones… you are all mine.”
And everyone around us repeated the mantra.
Always the same:
“Mãe Ceres, who feeds us, who educates us, and who devours us.”
It was comforting… and frightening.
Gene, however, was the only one who did not seem to like her.
Whenever she approached with her dark mask, Gene shrank back, hiding behind me.
His golden curls trembling with fear.
Perhaps that rivalry with Mãe Ceres had been there since birth.
He had always had… something inside him.
Something that would not bend.
But there was Lucy — Gene's mother.
She was different from the other mothers.
I remember that while the others only saw Mãe Ceres during general meetings, Lucy received private visits from her.
They talked behind closed doors, for long minutes, sometimes hours.
Whenever she came out, Lucy was always pale, but forced a smile.
Everyone found it strange.
No one questioned it.
Lucy was sick.
Very sick.
Everyone in Pietà knew, but no one spoke about it aloud.
Her skin had already lost its color, her hair fell in thin strands, her voice trembled like a dry leaf.
They said it was cancer, but no one dared give the illness a name.
Mãe Ceres always came whenever the attacks struck.
Always alone, always at night.
She entered Lucy's room without saying a word.
She stayed inside for hours.
And Gene, just a boy, would sit at the edge of his mother's bed, holding her hand tightly.
One night, I walked down the corridor.
The door to Lucy's room was slightly open.
I did not have the courage to enter, but I stopped.
I peeked inside, holding my breath, as though I were committing a crime.
For a moment, I saw Gene standing there, eyes wide, looking upward…
And for the first time — Mãe Ceres without her mask.
I did not see.
I could not see her face.
But Gene did.
And his blue eyes filled with a strange terror, mixed with restrained hatred.
I heard only one sentence echo from the room, spoken in Mãe Ceres' calm voice:
“My daughter…”
She was saying it to Lucy.
My daughter.
The door slowly closed before my eyes.
And it never opened for me again.
Theo wakes in the present, on the bunk.
His heart racing, his throat dry, his fingers gripping the sheets as though it were a nightmare he could not escape.
The same phrase echoed in his mind, the same revelation that now seemed heavier than everything he had ever carried in his chest:
Gene… is Mãe Ceres' grandson.
The greatest secret of all.
The core of Ceres' ideology split in two.
The hidden tragedy of the very system that had raised them.
And then he remembered Gene's face that day — when he saw behind the mask.
A face Theo had never seen.
A secret that perhaps even Gene himself could not carry.
Theo turned over on the bunk, trying to find a position that might ease the weight in his chest.
Nothing helped.
The pillow damp with sweat, his short breathing, the memory clinging to his mind like rust.
He had been only five years old that night.
Five years old.
But the memory was still as alive as a cut.
The cold corridor of Pietà, the silence of the mothers caring for their babies, the toys scattered across the floor.
And the door…
That half-open door.
Small, curious, not really understanding the world, he only wanted to know if Lucy was going to be all right.
After all, Gene always seemed so sad around her.
Theo peeked through a crack — that was all.
Just enough to mark a soul.
Lucy, pale and thin, could barely breathe in the bed.
Gene, sitting beside her, holding her little hand.
And beside her…
Mãe Ceres.
But without the mask.
Not that black oval mask they recited in the mantra.
She was… bare-faced.
And Theo did not see.
He could not see.
The crack was too narrow.
But Gene saw.
Gene saw.
And the hatred in his eyes burned as fiercely as the fear.
Theo only heard the sentence that changed everything:
“My daughter…”
Quietly, almost sweetly, spoken by that marble voice.
To Lucy.
Not to Gene.
To Lucy.
It was enough to know —
Gene was Mãe Ceres' grandson.
The blood of divinity ran through him.
The blood of oppressors.
Or martyrs?
Theo never knew which.
And that memory still hurt like the first cut.
Now, at seventeen, kissing Ceres — the short-haired girl with the white streak in her fringe, with those enormous blue eyes that hunted lying souls — Theo only wanted to rid himself of the weight.
But nothing changed.
Not even the sweetness of the kiss.
Not even the way she did not pull away from him.
Perhaps, he thought, somewhere between sleep and waking, he was only using Ceres.
Kissing her as revenge against that other Mother.
Kissing her as punishment for his own hatred.
But deep down, deep down…
He loved that she did not scream.
That she did not pull away.
That she wanted him too.
Perhaps because only Ceres — the girl — was capable of looking at the liar he was…
…and not turning away.
The pillow was Theo's executioner.
Heavy.
Merciless.
It was into it that he buried his face night after night to suffocate the tears that would not fall.
He would take this secret to his grave.
It was Mãe Ceres' secret.
And nothing and no one could know.
He loved her.
He loved Mãe Ceres.
But she — the woman herself — was about to execute her own grandson in her own name.
And Theo, deep inside, repeated:
Unfortunately, Mãe Ceres… he deserved it.
You do not curse the Mother.
You do not blaspheme against the Mother.
You do not spit into the dish that gave you life.
And Gene spat.
He spat at the divinity that created him, fed him, rocked him in Pietà.
He spat at her, and now, burn in D Square, you damn fool.
Burn!
Burn so everyone can see that the Mother still performs miracles.
Because nothing is holier than sacrificing the lamb who did not know how to be grateful.
And nothing would prove that Mãe Ceres worked more than seeing him, Gene, burning in the public square as an example.
The ungrateful son.
The traitorous grandson.
The miracle burning in the public square to keep faith alive.
And Theo suffocated into the pillow.
The executioner and the accomplice.
The altar of his hatred and his devotion.