The window lies open, the shutters creaking in the wind. I stand on the inside looking out; looking at the people who got to stand on the outside looking in.
On the right stands an old wooden table, its four legs barely supporting the heavy top. On it lay nothing more than scraps of the peeling dove-covered wallpaper. The once brilliant, pure white wings of the doves are now dull, their feathers yellowing. I watch as another scrap of wallpaper lethargically spirals down from the corner of the wall. Twisting, twisting, twisting on its way down. The doves on the paper had gotten another chance to fly again — Almost.
I glance back to the window. The glass had fallen out a long time ago, leaving just an empty frame. A gust of wind allows the lands outside to insufflate a whiff of my melancholic realm. Dust streams out of the window and onto the heads of the people milling below. They walk past me, my anguish shamelessly ignored.
I ponder upon the events of yesterday. It doesn’t take long to catalogue a timetable in my head. After all, I spend all my time in this room. The people outside have their world, I have mine. Mine just so happens to be 80 square feet.
I shift my body a bit, trying to inch into the faint sunlight. What good is light, if no one were there to see it? Is it still there? Am I still here? I certainly think I am.
I’m not gone, right?
Right?
Another scrap of doves falls onto my head. I pick it up and look into the dove’s eye. It stares hollowly back at me. I toss it to the side and walk over to the window.
Outside, people still stroll back and forth on the bustling city street below, pointing at shops and deep in conversation. How far away they seem now.
My room is a boat. A boat on the sea of sorrow. Without a navigator. No maps. No sails. Just floating — Aimlessly. I let the waves carry me wherever the currents pull.
Maybe I should start rowing. Rowing to find land.
Photo: qimono on Pixabay.com
