1 Chapter I

Are you happy with what you have made from life?

A single bedroom apartment – clouded with the stench of insignificance and misfortune – occupying a shadowy corner in an apartment block is your safe cage. Confined to the door's width, and lit chiefly by a shy bulb, you reside here abandoned by your creator. As you walk in, to your left, a wardrobe forever closed begs for your acknowledgement, your desire. The closet covers more than it contains; dust, lice, spiders, all being accustomed visitors, leaching off its isolation beside you. The darkness suffocates, creeping into the cracks the wardrobe bares. If human, those cracks would become bruises, but it is a wardrobe, it takes the pain silently. Across to the other edge of the corridor, your narrow desk sits sentinel-like, gazing out of the opaque window with a single decaying rose mounted on its shallow plateau for company. The rose's petal's pink dulled to a now shy form, ashamed of age. The stem, curved under the weight of time, bows to the past.

Even your memories, traced in the paper, hide in fear. You keep them there, next to your desk, just out of view from passers-by. The lesser frame faces its older brother with regret, and away from you in disgust. Greyed from the sky, sloping domestic snow attempts to bring cataract to your repelled eyes. The larger one intimidates you, doesn't it? Far surpassing the size of its sibling, it is large enough to never escape your view. Everything you hate in a single frozen moment in time. They glare at you, all five of them. That man and woman in arms, that bond they split haunts you to this day. You said you loved them, they said they loved you. Both felt it was one-sided. You were right, obviously; one argument and you were deported to this hell; a bit extreme, don't you think? The babe they held in their deceiving arms was dear to you, was he not? A dog to a homeless man, or a lone child to a sterile mother. You loved him so very much, did you not? With enough care to put all personal goals and aspirations aside for his, right?

As you ponder, the flow of time forever moves on, its relentless torrent stripping another petal from the rose. The shaded-red petal glides by, floating across a feeble, helpless, aged woman, who had already started her futile battle against Father Time long ago; half metal, she remains separated from the others, confined to the left of the family portrait. Only a single boy, no older than a teenager, rebellious to the laws of this universe – a revolutionary, you could say – took a stand by her side. Who is that boy? You don't remember him, do you? The twisted petal concealing his face resembles his most certain features as well as anything.

Time stays its course, and so does the petal, now soaring towards the bulk of the house. It's about as barren as a desert, yet as choked as a landfill. Ahead, a singles bed rests in an awkward position against the wall with the pillows, descrying the door, stretching for the grey covers a tag away. An unidentifiable stain, a compound of sweat, cheap alcohol, remnant bodily excesses, encompasses its centre, so full it almost switched to the third dimension. To the left, an ancient, bulky, television remains static in the back-right corner of the room. It is always there, watching. You could reach for the power button, but you never do, why is that? Do you fear the loss of light in the room, or do you dread a restart? Could you bring yourself to admit that you are wrong, or will you remain trapped here, in the stream Time has chosen for you? The petal flittering about the room calls to you as it does to everyone else. "Press the button!" Yet you cannot fathom its voice or its speech patterns, for it is a petal, and you are deranged, obviously.

Turning further, a bathroom peeks through the gap between the door at you, if you happen to cross its vision. If the main room is your marriage, the bathroom is your affair; how often you run to it when you can't handle the stress of commitment. The one-way mirror door blocks your other secrets. If your lack of effort could drag your head even further, a kitchen waits for fulfilment: that spice of joy a bit of variety brings to life; the sweetness of care; even the bitterness of lime and grime would cheer it up. The fridge that greets you is like a new attic, large and empty. A couple webs break the consistent battalion of pot noodles and ready meals. It is all mass, no weight. A microwave fights to fill the space of an oven, the cupboards gaping open for feeding, like the brawny pair of bins beside them.

As it calls to you, it falls to the threadbare carpet. There it rests in front of you; your shadow looms over it, your aura plaguing the air. Yet the petal consoles you; it doesn't feel sick as most do looking at you; it ignores your tattered shoes and their stitched mouths that eat particles of dust as you mope around this place. It ignores every imperfection that drowns your spirit: the past ones, the present ones, and the ones you are yet to pick up.

Despite what the petal thinks, you are a junkyard of personalities.

The flora matter welcomes the embrace of your leathery hands and all your premature wrinkles and overdue bumps of pus. It's the first display of love you've received in years, since she stayed, and even further back to when you were still there, and they were still here. Tell me why you are rejecting it from your home. It showed nothing but affection, yet now you have discarded it from your window. You put your dormant sweat into pushing away what love you could have had. Did you want its creator to see its crumpled body, the body you raised? Then you retreat to your bed from the crime for the rush of escapism.

You desire an escape, a new life. That is what you want, and that is what your headpiece delivers. You preserve it like a trophy, your plastic pride and joy on the shelf. Gleaming silver, it guards your head, like an igloo, but cannot confirm the safety of what makes you. You yearn for it as if it could run away with a sudden shift of light, wrapping your eroding hands around the few centimetres of its chilling surface that you claim to warm. You lift it and place it on your head as your crown. You are no king; remember that as you leave me behind. Yes, you lie there, mimicking sleep, but you can't escape me forever, this is the only place you will return to, and I'll be waiting. The cushioning under the armour is comforting, isn't it? Don't lie, you are more content there than here.

There you lie in your bed, beneath a scratched sheet resembling a dirt-filled grave as you temporarily seek the comfort of temporary death. Tell me, what does death feel like? When Time comes to take you and I away, will you be prepared? I know I am. That's why you run? You sleep to avoid me. Why do you fear me? Is it because I am prepared for what you are not? Do not threat. I will always watch over you. Always.

As you lie and drift away, the world around you transforms to nothingness. You hide behind your headpiece as the petal you crushed comes back with force. You try to defy Time, but it always wins in the end. For each leaf you mangle with neglect, Father Time will send a thousand more to annihilate your morale. He will win; you will lose. Don't run from it. But you are adamant that you can. You lie there running from me. If only you weren't so contemptible, I might've left you too.

For now, you may leave. I am kind. I know I'll never hurt you as I know that someone else will. You are nothing to society. You are replaceable, and you are worthless. You are nothing to me. Now leave!