The Winner Stands Alone Read Online Free PDF

to be worried; people never pay much attention to whats going on around
     them.
    Before leaving, he plants a kiss on the brow of the sleeping beauty and murmurs:
    As you see, I kept my promise. I didnt shoot.
    He takes a few steps
    
    
     and his head begins to ache terribly. This is perfectly normal: the blood is flooding the
     brain, an understandable reaction in someone who has just been under extreme tension.
    Despite the headache, he feels happy. Yes, he has done what he set out to do.
    He can do it. And hes happier still because he has freed the soul from that fragile body,
     freed a spirit incapable of defending herself against a bullying coward. If her
     relationship with her boyfriend had continued, the girl would have ended up depressed and
     anxious and devoid of all self-respect, and would have been even more under her boyfriends
     thumb.
    This had never been the case with Ewa. She had always been capa- ble of making her own
     decisions. He had given her both moral and fi- nancial support when she decided to open
     her haute-couture boutique; and she had been free to travel as much as she wanted. He had
     been an exemplary man and husband. And yet, she had made a mistake: she had been unable to
     understand his love or his forgiveness. He hoped, however, that she would receive these
     messages; after all, he had told her on the day she left that he would destroy whole
     worlds to get her back.
    He picks up the throwaway mobile phone he has just bought and on which he has entered the
     smallest possible amount of credit. He sends a text message.

The Winnder Stands Alone
    11:00
    
    
     AM
    It all began, they say, with an unknown nineteen-year-old posing in a bikini for
     photographers who had nothing better to do during the 1953 Cannes Festival. She
     immediately shot to stardom, and her name became legendary: Brigitte Bardot. And now
     others think they can do the same. No one understands the importance of being an actress;
     beauty is the only thing that counts.
    Thats why women with long legs and dyed hair, the bottle blondes of this world, travel
     hundreds or even thousands of miles to be in Cannes, even if only to spend the whole day
     on the beach, hoping to be seen, photographed, discovered. They want to escape from the
     trap that awaits all women: becoming a housewife, who makes supper for her husband every
     evening, takes the children to school every day, and tries to dig up some dirt on her
     neighbors monotonous lives so as to have something to gossip about with her friends. What
     these women want is fame, glory, and glamour, to be the envy of the other people who live
     in their town and of the boys and girls who always thought of them as ugly ducklings,
     unaware that they would one day grow up to be a swan or blossom into a flower coveted by
     everyone. They want a career in the world of dreams even if they have to borrow money to
     get silicone breast implants or to buy some newer, sexier outfits. Drama school? Forget
     it, good looks and the right contacts are all you need. The cinema can work miracles,
     always assuming, of course, you can ever break into that world. Anything to escape from the prison of the provincial city and
     the long, dreary, repetitive days. There are millions of people who dont mind that kind of
     life, and they should be left to live their lives as they see fit. However, if you come to
     the Festival you must leave fear at home and be prepared for anything: making spur-
     of-the-moment decisions, telling lies if necessary, pretending to be younger than you are,
     smiling at people you loathe, feigning an interest in people who bore you, saying, I love
     you without a thought for the consequences, or stabbing in the back the friend who once
     helped you out, but who has now become an undesirable rival. Dont let feelings of remorse
     or shame get in your way. The reward is worth any amount of sacrifice.
    Fame. Glory.