What the Old House Deserves

She longed to sing another time.

But, no matter how hard she craved, her skin was still made of paint. Her bones, still timber. Her murky eyes only saw through glassy panes, her voice only sighed through tangled air vents…

And she was fixed firmly to the earth amid a lonely forest, never to move from there again. 

This was her curse. By a powerful witch, this bitter musician was transformed into a house. And, as a house, she was now an ‘it’. 

The house had been reduced to nothing more than a furious, gluttonous wreck, counting the years one by one on its peeling walls, and was to continue to do so for many years to come.

It wanted nothing more than to live in extravagance and glory, once again.

*   *   *

One day, the old house called to a stranger. It called her in the midst of a storm. It mattered little to the house what so happened to have happened for that stranger to be walking by it under such convenient circumstances – all that mattered to the house was that it finally found itself a visitor.

Big Building (Experimental Text)

This narrative was inspired by a book quote (Cixin Liu’s The Dark Forest). The only relation that quote has to this text was from its comparison between humans and ants’ different experiences. 

My main goal was to create imagery that’s difficult to imagine and concepts that seem impossible to exist. I tried achieving this by combining sensory adjectives with senses that they’re incompatible with, and writing concepts/ideas that may prompt the readers to think about things that humans can’t experience or know. 

This short narrative was more explorative of human experiences and limitations, and focused on emotion/thoughts rather than action. I tended to add a lot of repetition to emphasise these ideas. 

“The ant climbed out of the basin and up onto the formation’s peak, but it felt no sense of towering above its surroundings because it had no fear of falling. [...] Without the fear of heights, there can be no appreciation for the beauty of high places.”

From The Dark Forest by Cixin Liu (2008)

The building of sandstone reached for the stars and stretched to the horizon
And the traveling woman did not want to go inside.
The desert was relentless. The sun scorched. The traveller sought refuge.
With no other choice, her tired legs walked timidly in the building’s direction.

A ‘Quick Brown Fox’ Story (Experimental text)

I limited myself to have every word follow alphabetically, with no repetitions until the alphabet looped again. With this, I sacrificed grammatical correctness, the correct uses of words and character naming, to create coherence. Finding words for the letters ‘Q’, and ‘V’ onwards was tricky, particularly ‘X’, where, due to its lack of common English words, I resorted to using words beginning with ‘ex’. Some of my uses of apostrophes were downright incorrect, and sometimes I invented words, ensuring that they still ‘felt’ like they fit into English. 

The narrative explores the point of view of a burnt cabin and its relationship to the humans that once used it. I thought the fragmented sentences suit the point of view of the cabin character.

A burning cabin doesn’t ever forget. Gone, house’s image. Jealously kindled. Living mourns nobody’s oaken planks. Quietly resents sapiens, those ungrateful vermin, who ‘xcessively yearn ziggurats.

Drabble: Purpose

Written from a prompt: Frame the absence of something

When does a building know its purpose?

Does it know from the moment its foundation is built? Does it see its blueprints, or is it one with the minds of those who invented its concept? 

Perhaps, a building waits until its completion. Then, does it only know its purpose the moment its last brick has been fixed into place; when its roof is fit to shield its precious interiors? Or, is it not until those strange little people make use of the space that it holds, does the building only discover that purpose?

There was a tower that dominated a small island, located nowhere in the vast ocean. If it could think, it would have been asking these questions for as long as it could remember. See, while its top marked halfway between the ground and the clouds, it had been left  behind – left unfinished by those who created it.

The Lights, One by One

The kind of house that Clara lived in was ordinary. It had all its windows closed and every exit shut so that nothing could climb their way in to find her. Hardly any curtains nor blinds were left open, and now almost nothing could watch her from the dark outdoors. Tonight, Clara was the only one inside of her home. 

Clara took in her last spoonful from the now empty plate. It once contained the leftovers that her parents spared her before they left that night, and now her final task of the day was to catch up on her quadratic equations. Mathematics was never her strongest subject at school – she preferred ones that were more flexible and allowed for a greater imagination. She wasn’t excited to return to her room. But, why waste any time? Except to wash her dishes, there was no other use for her staying at the table any longer. She made her way to the sink.

THERE WAS ONCE A YELLOW HOUSE

One of the places on Earth that I felt about most fondly was the house placed at 23 Dudley Avenue. The address still exists, and you can find it right now if you wanted, but know that the house there now has nothing to do with me. Our old house wasn’t two-storied, nor was it so boxy and sleek. Instead, it was amusingly “L” shaped, and dressed in soft, cheerful yellow panelling. 

It was nearly the end of 2009’s Winter when my family and I started living in that yellow house. Especially for me, this was very exciting. We’d only just come from somewhere a couple of flights away, and for the first time in a while, we stayed at a house that was ours – as in “just for us” – meaning we were relieved of the concern of having anyone else around.