Scared of the World

I woke up to light shining right into my eyes almost blinding me, I squinted at the light and rolled out of bed yawing. I checked the time on the clock above my dresser and cursed. It was late, really late. I was supposed to be up almost an hour ago. My readings had shown that people who woke up late most days had a high risk of dying earlier that people who woke up around six or seven. Blast these daylight savings! They were messing up my routine, though at least they were better than having an alarm clock! I had heard that alarms were dangerous because sharp noises waking you up could cause you to have heart attacks. One thing was for certain and that was that I DID NOT want a heart attack. I was sure they would hurt.

I dressed in my usual grey woolen flowing dress, I had ordered in special clothes that had no dye in them because the dye in clothes could make you get cancer by seeping into your skin. They were flowing because tight constricting clothes could cause skin problems. 

What happened next was my usual morning schedule,

1. I ate breakfast, eggs on thick brown bread. My other meal choice which was a kale salad. I normally ate kale salad because bread in general was unhealthy, but if I did side with bread, (as I did today) I stayed with brown bread, my readings showed that white bread could cause diabetes, heart attacks and obesity. I ate eggs because it was apparently very good for your body.
2. Then I did my morning clean up. (which took around 3 hours, right on schedule) Some people might have found my cleaning way over the top and excessive. But I did not, and besides, I hadn't talked to another person in ages! I always made sure that my house was painstakingly clean, not a piece of dust to be found in even the tiniest of corners. I had studied in depth about how dust can affect your health and there was no way I wanted to be found with lung disease because I had a dusty house and couldn’t be bothered to use my time to clean.
3. Then came my writing time and I sat down and started to type. I hated being outside, even though I lived in the suburbs there seemed so much noise everywhere, so most of the time I stayed in doors in my little clean house. Ever since my mother and father had died in the Peru earthquake in 2007 when I was only 18, I had decided that at any moment there might be an earthquake like the one that killed my parents, so I stayed inside and never left. But I had no parents and no income so I had to work and I did that by writing, I wrote short stories, books of every kind, and to my surprise people liked them and so that then became my profession.

After about 2 hours of writing I looked up to see the clock read 2:00, good I thought, by delivery should come in exactly 3 minutes. You see every week at exactly 2:03 a box of food that I had ordered online from the local food shop came and dropped food at my door. I thanked heaven that there was food delivery or I would have had to go outside myself and get it, and that could never happen, anything could be out there, feral dogs, earthquakes, kidnappers, suicidal maniacs, babies, I shuddered to think beyond that point. And the food delivery never failed me, they always arrived at exactly 2:03.

Except that when the clock struck the designated time there was no sign of the truck and the usual 30 year old man who delivered it. That's when my panic set in, I quickly calmed myself, he wouldn't be dead if he only arrived one minute late! But as the minutes ticked past, images began to flood my brain, he could have been mauled by a dog, he had been stabbed in the back by a robber wanting his money! I began to hyperventilate, oh this was bad, this was very very bad! The clock struck 2:10 and I almost started to cry, I rushed over to the phone and started calling the supermarket number when the doorbell rang. I quickly hit the end call button and rushed to the door, and to my utter relief a delivery man stood with my box of food in hand. 

But that's when I paused, one thing was certain and that was that I did not want to go outside, not even to get that box of groceries. I knew my fear was most probably irrational but I couldn't help it. And that is why I paused, because I wondered weather to let the young man into the house. And yes, he was a young man, he was not the same 30 year old man with the large brown beard and the one earring in his left ear but a young man around 24 or 25, which explained his tardiness. But I really did not want to go outside, so what should I do!? 

I moved towards the door, inching closer and peeped through the slit hole in the door, he was still waiting there looking at the door and seeming a little concerned, I bit my lip, wavering between opening the door or not. And that's when he rang the door again and my reflexes without consulting me opened the white plastered front door. 

“Hello Miss” he looked down at his paper and read, “Miss Emily Smith.”

I felt a little like the air had been knocked out of me for some reason and only nodded and gestured for him to come inside. When he walked in he froze for a minute looking around my pristine kitchen and newly scrubbed wooden floor, he gave a long low whistle,

“Wow,” he gave a little self deprecating smile, “makes me seem like a heathen! Where would you like me to put the groceries?” 

I pointed over to the bench and to my surprise he offered to help me stack the food into the fridge and cupboard, I was so flustered I had half a mind to say ‘no thanks, I like to have the food exactly in the places where they belong and I am sure that someone like you wouldn't understand.’ I thanked my lucky star instead I said, “um… yeah sure.”

And so for the next 30 minutes we stacked my food into the cupboards in awkward silence, or at least on my part, he spent the whole time chatting about work and his house and his cats. I came to learn his name was Jax, quite an odd name if you ask me but seemed to fit him pretty well,

We worked in silence a while before he spoke again,

“So, why do need to have food delivered to you house, can’t you pick it up yourself?”

I stared at him for a minute, I knew perfectly well that he was being prying, even if I hadn’t left my house in years didn’t mean I was stupid, but Jax seemed perfectly chill like it was perfectly normal to invade someones house and ask them insistent questions about their personal life! But the odd thing was that I didn’t exactly feel annoyed or angry, I felt kind of intrigued. But still it didn’t mean I was going to tell him anything!

“I don’t like going outside, I haven't been out for ages.”

Jax just stared at me, I felt like hitting my head, stupid stupid stupid, man I was so stupid! What was wrong with me today!

But then he said, “why not?” 

“Um… I am kind of scared of a lot of things, like earthquakes, dogs, murderers, people in general etc, etc.”

“When was the last time you have been outside?”

I bit my lip thinking, “ahh, around 4 years, I guess.”

To my surprise he did not look thunderstruck or like I was a crazy psychopath, he just shrugged,

“How do you know it has not changed, I mean the world is amazing! Sure, things might go wrong and some people might not be perfect, but there are so many good things out there, so many amazing people and colour, so much colour! I don’t understand how anyone can stay away! Would you like me to show you?”

He held his hand out and I stared at it a while, thinking, but I couldn’t think straight, and without my consent words shot out of my mouth,

“Sure, I mean, yes I would like that” I looked up at his face and smiled, then I took his hand and he led me outside. I stopped just before stepping down from the front step and paused. I looked around at the bright sunlight of afternoon, the street glowed gold from the light and everything for the first time in so long, ever since my parents had died, looked beautiful and full of promise.