A Day to Make ‘Happiness’

Sifts of scattered dust filtered through the vacillating streams of pale daylight, dispersing through the hoary, ancient planks of wood in which bordered the windows from outside. Sodden in the softness of age, the lumber creaked and breathed sighs of the little life they had left, murmuring tales of their past throughout the threshold. An even elder man, sedentary to the confines of a rocking chair, held within his wizened palms the remains of a broken doll.

Around him were the disseminated and strewn shards of sallow porcelain, painted parts of a once flushed cheek and mellifluous cobalt eye faded by the toils of the sun and workings of time, among such clusters. They sat fruitlessly near his set feet, obstinate and obdurate to the thought of mobility. Though the chair rocked in steady intervals: back and forth, a pause, back and forth. It continued and continued, as if years of energy were within the workings of the woodwork itself, despite the rigidness of his legs.

He breathed, dust breaking from his lips, and wavering life pulsating throughout the room. Both fauna and flora shrank in the presence of the elder, returning to the outreaches of the corners and holes obscured by the little darkness. He shuttered his eyelids open, inhaled once more and exhaled, stroking the fragmented doll with the bristled, rough tip of a paintbrush quivering in his incapable fingers.

He swept the brush over the intact part of the child’s toy, his eyes, blind and unsullied, painting its face with existence and hope. As if done many times before, his movements were sure and intensive, reluctance unknowing to the resolute twitch of his fingers and rotation of his wrist.

It took decades to rein close to completing until at last his throbbing hands gave way to the pain, coercing his ability to work. He, after years of sleepless painting, fell into a deep slumber.

~

“They need you,” a voice from the depths of ebony hissed snidely.

The male woke at once, fixating his hands over the reduced figure of the doll within his hands. It was only a shard now.

He sighed and began to work at once.

Yes, this was his point.

His main purpose.

This pain, this fraction of what was left, this unfinished piece of prosperity…

He was meant to finish it.

The elder, once again, set to work within the inexorable tilts of the rocking chair and unwavering trembles of his hands as he held the brush. With a patience mankind could not comprehend, he yearned to paint the picture of amity and did so.

Though once again, with only a single stroke left to finish the shard, his hands gave way to weariness and could no longer finish what they had started. And thus, he fell into a redundant sleep once more.

It continued, as the rocking chair had, until reaching the size of a grain of sand. With a new tenacity and resolve to complete his task, he needed but one last caress from his worn brush. Though the beast from the depths took the grain before he could finish, affixing it to the gathering within his hour glass.

The immortal male, having nothing, wept tears of repentance and anguish, until the beast, with a complete assemblage of fragmentary particles, turned the glass and restarted the timer.

The elder became young once more, possessing an adeptly crafted doll, a fine brush with a lurid palette and guileless grin. His gaze was clouded, still, and legs, inept, though his hands were steady and deft.

“Would you like to help humanity?” The voice asked, lingering spite in its tone.

The male, without a tongue, smiled and, with great naivety, curtly nodded his head.

“Paint. Paint love, hope, prosperity, cheer, joy, luck, miracles, peace… Paint it all.”

The youthful boy, stared blankly into the expanse of the room.

He contemplated all of humanities treasures, their weaknesses, their losses, their hardships… Their will to continue. Their will to live. Their will to fight, despite the odds.

Ah, yes, that was their purpose.

To live on despite the struggles, to value their morals and opinions so intimately it remains a reason as for life, to love one another and murder one another, to sin and worship… To arduously push through to make ‘happiness’… It was what meant to be ‘human’.

Without a further reluctance, the male set to work, vigor and exuberance in his strokes.

Today, it seemed, would be another day.

A day to make ‘happiness’.

(Note: A small write made after a severe writer’s block. Although I am not all proud of such choppy writing, I do so hope most have found it somewhat enjoyable.)