No sound comes from within the house except the tick, tick, tick of the grandfather clock that stands in the hall.
The house, if it can be called that, is a cottage really; only the thatched roof has far too many holes and is so mouldy and rotten you would not think anyone could live under it. Ivy covers the front side of the cottage, and rose vines another. The garden path is cracked with weeds growing over it. The front garden flower beds are ridden with yet more weeds and an odd tulip just going out of season. Red leaves drooping like splatters of blood among the green. The grass is uncut and growing near two feet tall. The vegetable patch, unused for so long had been the banqueting ground for slugs, snails and birds leaving nothing and no one to fertilise the soil that even weeds now refuse to grow in.
The door which would have once been sturdy flat panelled oak was now a green rotting corpse. The mahogany beams either side of the door were the only things keeping the it from crumbling away to nothing.
Behind the door in the hall where the grandfather clock stands making its steady beat of tick, tick, tick. The right hand side of the grandfather clock is black, crumbling and charred like it had been burnt. The door that leads off to the right goes into the kitchen and the door that goes off to the left leads into the living room where, on a once white settee, he sits.
His old wrinkled hands lie limp in his lap curled around a picture frame. His hands cover the faces of three of the people in the picture, the fourth is a young man beaming brightly at the camera. His eyes sparkle, not from the flash of the camera but out of sheer joy. Joy that would leave a twinkle in your eyes for the rest of your life. His bow tie droops lopsided off one shoulder and his shirt is untucked, creased material rolling off his thin frame. In his hand he clutches a piece of paper, though the words on it cannot be made out clearly due to the size of the photo. The silver photo frame is tarnished and covered with smudged fingerprints.
The man who sits on the settee bears no resemblance to the man in the picture. His face is wrinkled, around his eyes and the corners of his mouth bare the ghosts of laughter. His hair has grown long; unkempt it has become matted and dirty. A thick layer of grime covers his skin.
A new sound enters the house. It is the high pitched, whining drone of a fly. It clumsily enters the room in which the man sits, bashing against the walls. The man opens his eyes and watches, following the fly around the room.
His deep black eyes hold no joy, no twinkle from the past, only horror and grief cloud them, yellow and bloodshot.
The fly lands on his right hand; he grunts and swats it away sitting forward at the same time. He uses the same hand to rub his tired eyes before picking up the picture from his lap. He flinches as he manages to glance at the three other faces but quickly places the frame facedown on the side table.
He heaves himself off the settee, the white leather dented and deflated where he had been sitting moments before, yet it looks as though this is where he spends most of his life. Sitting. Alone.
He looks around the living room, used and reused dirty clothes lie on the floor in crumpled heaps. A bookshelf stands empty in one corner of the room, the books in an untidy pile on the floor beside it. A small, broken twelve inch black and white television is against the wall opposite the settee, shattered glass sprinkled like confetti around it. Newspapers yellowed with age, the edges of the pages curling are stacked high on the coffee table in the middle of the room. One newspaper lies open on the third page. A large gap reveals where an article should be, only now you can see straight through to the article on page five. A tossed aside piece of the past.
He is brought back to the present from wherever he has been in his mind by the grumbling of his stomach. He picks his way carefully through the mess on the floor before going out into the hall and standing, leaning against the wooden doorframe to the kitchen.
His tired eyes slowly scan the room before falling upon a white apron, draped over the back of a chair, covered with a thick layer of dust. Something that would never have been possible if its owner had been here to use it. Its lace hem makes it the most beautiful thing in the house; everything else holds a bad memory.
Or is just something there to survive.
Like the rifle that lies on the kitchen sideboard, cold, a bringer of death. He steps slowly towards it, his mind races with possibilities; life, food, protection, suicide? Yet deep down he knows he cannot, he has no courage to take his own life so that he might join those he loves. He is a coward.
He shakes this thought from his mind before gripping the rifle in his old, strong hands, and holding it close to his chest he walks over to the window. The window shines shafts of sunlight into the dark house. Dust swirls in and out of the light like a graceful dance. By the window there is a rocking chair into which he slowly lowers himself. It is probably the best kept piece of furniture in the house.
Silence but the tick, tick, tick, of the grandfather clock sounds through the house once more. He is careful, the rifle is rested on the windowsill, and his finger is on the trigger. Only his eyes move as he scans the back garden for any signs of life. The rustle of the wind through long grass can be heard ever so softly. It's calming.
Then he catches a sudden movement in the corner of his eye and with a swift, silent deadly movement and a loud BANG! A muffled thud.
He throws the rifle behind him as he stands running to the back door and throwing it open. Cool air rushes across his face and he stops momentarily to suck fresh air into his lungs before racing across the garden to where he know his kill is. He looks down and through the long grass he can see a tuft of bushy grey fur. He lifts the squirrel up by the tail. Its thin and scrawny but that doesn't matter. It's food.
Hey Guys! (Waves) Sorry this was never an intended story But I had to write a story for my English Lit. Class so... Originally it was written like this but my English Lit. Teacher has one with different names :) Sorry to be a pain but since I have the whole story anyways is it too much to ask for 5 reviews before the next update. It will be the same for all chapters. :) LOVE YOU GUYS!
Zogio xxx