Today, I woke up in a box. A small box in which I fit nicely and not at all. My fingers wiggle and my toes curl. The movement of my breath reaches the edges, my lungs expanding as they fill with air.
I cannot see the box, for all is black. I am black, it is black, we blend as one. But we are not one. It traps me. It supresses the very essence of my being. I am nothing in this impossibly small box in which I cannot move.
You put me in here, I think. Your daily nitpicking, your unkindnesses, your infidelities. They have piled upon me until I cannot move beneath them. The weight of their lid supported by cruelness and beautifully complex Cabernet.
I can smell it. A single ray of hope, out of place in this void. A bouquet of cherries and chocolate and leather and just a tinge of apropos dark grey pencil lead. Is it here with me? In the box? Do you taunt me as well with my favorite smell? Maybe it is taste. My senses are blending to one here in the dark stillness of the box in which I woke.
Speech fails me. My ears hear naught, and my mouth remains still. There is nothing but the box, filled with the appearance of death and the smell of joyous life. Is there no way out?
No light.
No sound.
No movement.
No sense.
No life.
No pain.
No love.
Nothing.
Y pues nada.
I love that first paragraph - excellent imagery! The idea of a box "in which I fit nicely and not at all" is just spot on.
ReplyDeleteI think my favorite parts are the introductory description and the great use of smell in the second half, but the whole story has a nice flow to it.
ReplyDeleteOoo it's almost like a coffin. o__o Freaky but really great writing!
ReplyDeleteSad and far too common in real life. Intriguing that hope has a smell here; definitely not the obvious choice.
ReplyDeleteThe metaphor for emotional abuse here is so strong. And yet the sense that the speaker is still physically alive leaves the reader wanting to intervene and help somehow.
ReplyDeleteI read "A Clean, Well-Lighted Place" in high school and fell in love with it. I love that you invoked it here. I liked your little turns of phrase that made this seem really relateable. "You put me here, I think." Nice job with the prompt.
ReplyDeleteI am happy to see at least someone recognize and share my love of that story. Pulling it in came to me about half-way through when the Cabernet and the concept of drinking mingled with the dark. Thanks!
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