going back over something I wrote a while back. Decided to pick it up again now that I have some free time for the holidays.
"Mr.Timson dropped the last of his journals into his leather case. If Timson could boast of a friend who stood by his side through thick and thin, then it would be the leather case sitting unceremoniously on his desk. What can be ceremonious when the wear branding its leather outages its owner half its age? Its hide wore out. lavish red linings only red or lavish within impressions enslaved to a lonesome rot within dormant memories of its owner. Golden buttons dangle on whilst a handle clutches onto the body with all the might of an old man's gums clutching onto the remainder of his teeth. To the cynic: either too light or simply not at all! Perhaps, my perception whispers that at the slightest, faintest breeze, the teeth would fare better at holding up! The seams holding the leather would fare better than the nerves stringing Timson up.
Plenty of prying ears would gladly warm themselves at stories that would flow from such a friend had he a mouth to run and a tongue to spill. From broken hopes and gutted ambitions to warm and hearty drink-swayed laughs, to the company, a stale and dust-ridden floor congregates under cabinet desks. In Timson's case, he can thank whatever divine power watching over our transgressions, that carrying cases have neither tongues to talk nor ears to listen to. Sparing the humiliation that would have accompanied the early retirement 43 years too early.
Our friend finding himself in the company of an estranged sensation, bordering on foreign. Unique enough to be as alien as the illuminating gaze peering down from the moon's glare.
Misery? Sorrow? Despair? Something was churning in that vacant, shallow soul of his, Not quite able to put his finger on it. Weighing the options the momentous day offered. On the one hand, Timson would no longer find his early mornings or late nights crawling by at meetings overstaying their welcome. Akin to the relative that you're too kind-hearted to tell to begin packing, overindulging on your generosity. Leaving behind the daily spectacles of broken hopes. Playing out before his sight with all the crescendo such plays bring, accompanied by their whimpers and pleading. Followed by the argument filled with all the ear-pleasing glories and obscenities that escaped their desperation to fork in their own two cents. Gladly leaving those plays to whoever becomes unfortunate to take his place. A burden chained to the occupancy of the room many find considering a second home. A home away from home. Leaving within whatever tasks his occupation had forced itself to pocket his time. Finally able to burden his day not with the botherings of his labor, but with finding ways to fill the newly emerging vacancy in his time. No longer his briefcase suffocating itself on the trivial matters of the day's tasks. Only opening its grasp now to the belongings of its master upon the travels that it had envisioned within all those lonesome, quit hours the last 43 years had heralded under the desk.
Now, regrettably, we must pay attention to the other hand. For which, to Timsom, might as well have consisted of two left hands.
Upon his departure into retirement, he would find himself forced to give not only his attention but his full presence to Mrs. Timson, or as her friends would prefer, Margaret. Demanding not only all of it, but with the fullest vigor his old age would allow, and even then, having the will to demand more. If yesterday demanded Timson to share only the evening and the night with Margaret, he'll now find himself locked day in and day out with her. Molding the home of his own inheritance into a makeshift prison that stripped him of the solace his work had pitifully allowed. Confining him to her dictation, humiliating him in front of the many friends she welcomed into his home. At the expense of his own wallet be it at that. The gatherings themselves never came cheap. Expensive tastes acquire expensive crowds and what more do expensive crowds love if not to have fun without once opening their purse?
What would Timson do? What else could he do? He had no friends to visit. Most friendships forged in the past had mostly moved beyond the perimeters of his home. Some had moved past the borders of their memories forgetting each other's shared time. The others had been reluctantly made in the confines forced to be shared of the last decades of his work. They were less as friends and more as forced acquaintances. An unfortunate side effect in the pursuit of means to not starve nor go cold.
No relatives to visit him or to visit them. He grew up in the world the only heir to his family's name. Remaining the only living proof of the blood he inherited and whose elder age now threatening to sponge from this Earth. The relatives that were distant to him? They never wrote to him and nor did he to them. For all Timson knew, they were dead.
No hobbies to delve headfirst and drown within. Not finding time within himself to explore intrigues to catch his attention. Some would probably have argued, especially those unfortunate to name Timson their coworker, that his own job was his hobby. Along with his life, vacation, and leisure. Had even he had the will to explore a hobby, it would most certainly have been cut short by the nagging and teasing of Mrs. Timson. Questioning him for wasting their money on useless pursuits while wasting time. All the while in the company of her guests, dining and drinking on the offerings paid by Mr. Timson's savings.
Only attention outside the affairs of his work was shed on the couple's greeting and departure the mornings and nights had brought. Not stretching beyond a lingering second after the encounter Timsom rather much avoided with the first and only of his marriages.
Being as such, to the perspective of at least one, Mrs. Timson was an unbearable circle of Hell. One which Vrigil had taken great effort to avoid treading through along his journey accompanying Dante. Avoiding the slender old wench giving off neither love nor warmth whilst yielding no love for a cashier's register. Shedding a cold shadow on the hand she gave her vow while warming strangers and every passersby with affectionate glances. Holding no sanctity to any vow filling the growing lust for the attention of strangers and neglecting the gaze of one's own. No smile could warm her, nor a gift from your heart and soul could please the likes of her. The only warmth she devoured was the one radiating from the bank account of Timson's savings. Cusping his inheritance as her own, doing what she pleases whilst falling for tried and true methods of the female psyche to guilt men questioning her frivolous wants.
Occasionally feigning affection with the skeletal grasp slithering its way to Timson's palm. Its grasp cold in the summer, surpassing the coldness of her heart in the depths of early winter evenings. Mistakenly, you'll trail the hand to the arm, then up the body until you reach the spine-shivering face holding a glare devoid of any love. Nestled between the gaze, a beak that would humble the proudest of Ravens. After it mistakenly takes the clump of hair on her forehead for a self-warm nest.
Her culinary abilities provided the finest of meals only outdone by the cooking hands of a prison. Their sight, let alone the smell or even a timid taste, would be enough to drive the healthiest and most resilient of stomachs into an early grave. Leaving in her wake a trail of evenings and mornings victim to going on an empty stomach. Leaving our Timson no choice but to enjoy watching his wallet open itself for a meal accompanying his lonesome life. Such a price to pay to spare his stomach from the alchemist's mishmash of over and under-cooked dishes that may, or may not, have a little secret kicking him out from this world"
