Day Five

I awoke to day five. There were the same walls, ceiling and floor of my tiny bedroom in my tiny flat. I had not paid them much attention but now I was forced to see them hour after annoying hour I recorgized little cracks that were forming and places where paint was pealing. Venturing slowly, tiredly down my flight of rickety stairs I looked into the kitchen and discovered that the dishes from earlier in the week still sat like a precarious castle upon my sink. In a day, two days max I would have no clean dishes left and would need to open the plastic stuff I had thought to buy before I had been sent into isolation. I considered making my bed as it had been uncomfortable to climb into last night. An unmade bed was the worst, but I no longer had the same enthusiasm as day one and day two and a little discomfort was just a continuation of the feeling of each day. Day three had been the beginnings of monotony and day four had been much worse. I noted my seat in the lounge room was starting to look like my shadow. Pay TV remote in hand I slunk into the waiting chair and looked forward to another day of oblivion. But the sudden discover of no power meant no television which then meant no binging. Orange was blank, so too the good of that Good Place. Time for plan B. Exercise, a run upstairs, into the bathroom with twenty pushups followed by a weird triceps thing my personal trainer had taught me last week, that time when I could still go outside. The time before my period of forced quarantine had been forced upon me. That make shift race track lasted about three laps before I tripped on the bottom step and kicked one of my two dining chairs into the kitchen table. The tower of bowls, plates and glasses suddenly wobbled. Then it toppled. Glass and crockery shatter and combine to create a cacophony of disaster that continues to reverberate in my mind’s memory long after the last shard settles. It is the end of exercise and the plans to later do the dishes. I now have a new mess, a far bigger mess that I put off cleaning up. My only thought is now I need to wear shoes. Back up those stairs I go, far slower this time. I steer my way toward the bedroom, my bedroom, knowing that those shoes I need are under my bed. As I get to the top step I hear a noise and I pause. It sounded as though my bed was just pushed along the floor. But that is impossible, I am isolated. I’ve been told to live alone. It was an order more than a suggestion, an order I’ve taken extremely seriously. I knew I was alone. I realized there should have been nobody in my bedroom, nobody in there to cause my bed to make that or any sound. Listening intently I tried to slow my breathing and my heart rate that had suddenly spiked. In the silence I heard the squeak of a spring and then the strange sound of a door quietly clicking shut. I strode purposefully across the gap between stair and door and threw it open.

“Ha!” I shouted, and then felt immediately foolish.

There was nothing there. There was no oddness about this plain room. It was the same simple space I’d left not long before. Then I saw it, my pillow on the floor. I was sure it had been on the bed this morning. Also what were those markings on the floor, scrapes that I was sure had not been there before. With shoes forgotten I eased my bed by the corner out the same distance as the markings showed. To my shock I discovered etched in the wall that had been revealed a tiny little door, oval in shape. It was closed at that moment but should it have opened I could have made my way through at a crawl. Where there should have been a door handle I discovered a whole, the knob was missing. I hesitated, wondering whether I should knock. My mind considered the usual queries, why would there be a tiny door near my bed? Who had just been in my room? Am I delirious? A pinch of my arm, painful, enabled me to dismiss potential delirium. The door must have been real. I tapped lightly upon it and then told myself to stop being an idiot. A second later there was a tap back. I knocked more firmly next and then stepped back as the door slowly opened a crack.

“Who… Who is it..?” asked a timid voice.

The voice seemed friendly so I responded.

“It’s me… How long have you been here?”

“For as long as you have, longer actually…”

“And who are you?” I asked, curious.

“I’m Tom, the house gnome.”

“And please do tell me Tom, what is beyond this little door.”

“Well me, beyond the door in the wall is MY home.”

I shoved on the door to push it open and gasped at what was revealed. A tiny forest, greenery as far as my eye could see. Such beauty, the sweet sounds and smells of natural wonderment. I got down on my haunches and made to crawl past Tom but then paused.

“I can’t go out there,” I said as I realized. “I’m house bound.”

“But you’ll still be home. My house is your house… mi casa su casa…” Tom urged.

So I crawled on through and discovered this world beyond my plain world. Tom showed me just how wonderful actually living a life can be.

When I crawled back through that door again, back into my own flat I was actually smiling. I knew the mess that awaited me in my kitchen, knew the monotony that still awaited me with well over a week to wait out. All of this was now made far easier though since I’d discovered the little door and my new friend Tom.