Dear Typewriter
Dear typewriter.
How are you?
I am guessing that you are fine since you are still as excited as you were yesterday, as you were the day my mother gifted you to me.
Your click-clack sound rings out pure, not smeared or tainted by the world outside.
But just like yesterday, and like five years before that, my fingers are making feeble efforts to push you down. I beat at you with the same frustration and anger that I feel.
My boss snapped at me again today.
It was for the smallest thing. I forgot to tuck my shirt in after I visited the restroom, but that wasn't my fault either.
He made several remarks about how lazy, old, and terrible I was. He even told me I was a failure and asked me to quit the job.
I wish I could, but how will I eat? I can barely make do with the meager amount I am currently being paid. If I lose my job, I may even have to lose you.
You wouldn't want that, would you?
Your click-clack sound tells of your answers.
So, I have to remain there. Allowing him to batter me with his words.
I feel a bit of me die every single day.
At forty, with no kids or wife, I have only you.
I am tired. So tired.
Maybe I should just end it all.
I bow my head and weep, and you receive my tears in your careful hands.
After I could no longer go on crying, I moved to pick up the paper that contained another one of my musings and throw it into the basket where several others had been dumped.
I stop, startled, as I stare at the four words on the paper.
You will be fine.
2024, Please Save My Pillow.
2024 waved its huge arms at me as mine remained folded. Yet, I had no option but to step into it. I could not afford to be swept away by the rivers of 2023.
Mother would be mad if that happened, given that I am her only daughter. I am the only one she can share her girly gists and conversations with.
My brothers—three troublesome and annoying ones—would not understand a dime of what she was saying, no matter how many times she tried to have her conversations with them.
As I carefully made my way towards the open 2024, one leg in and one leg hanging outside, standing just at the threshold of the year and staring at it with all my fear and trepidation shooting from my eyes, I quietly whispered,
"2024, please don't let me sink my pillows into the rivers of my tears. Please. Just that one thing is what I wish for."
HE GOT A GIFT
"Fey, it is Christmas today."
I turned on the torn wrapper I had laid on the floor and glanced into the tired eyes of my brother. He sat on the bare floor with his legs crossed. His ten-year-old body looked like a beaten-down forty-year-old's. I am sure I looked worse than he did.
I looked around and noticed that it was still dark. Several other people were clustered around, some asleep, others sitting and staring into space. The putrid scent of alcohol and cigarettes clung to the air like a leech, refusing to come off.
“Why are you awake?” I asked, returning my gaze to my brother.
“Because it is Christmas.”
“Okay?”
He remained silent, obviously lacking an answer to my obvious question. His inability to answer must have upset him, because the next thing I saw was tears in his eyes.
I climbed to a sitting position and looked at him worriedly.
“What is wrong?”
He refused to answer, instead giving the tears permission to fall. I stayed there, glued to the floor, staring at the only family member I have in the entire world.
“Okay, okay,” I said, trying to pacify him. “Merry Christmas.”
He turned to me and smiled. I smiled back in return.
“Today will be different," he said. “It is Christmas.”
We had spent the last ten Christmases together, and it had never been different, so I wondered what he thought was going to be different about the day. It wasn’t until later, when his body was laid down into the cold ground, that I realized just how different that Christmas was.
Finally, he was free. He got a gift.
“Merry Christmas,” I whispered, trying in vain to hold back the tears.