A Home

A man was looking for a home. A nice home. One he could see himself living in, comfortable and at peace. Not that where he was living now was all that bad. It wasn’t. But it wasn’t a home, per se. Just a place where he slept, shat and ate. And the rent was monumental.

No. He needed someplace cheaper and nicer. And from there, a search.

He felt like a reverse Goldilocks. The first place he went to see, after scouring all the ads and listings, was almost perfect. Cozy one-bedroom, top-floor apartment with a grand view of the riverside. Comfy furnishings, with enough space to stretch his legs and walk around and think when he needed to take a breather from staring at a screen too long for work. He would’ve made an offer right then and there, but prior experience and common sense told him not to narrow his options and keep looking. Besides, this one wouldn’t be vacated and available for a couple more months so he still had time.

The second was like the first, although he wasn’t as sure. A two-bedroom with nice amenities from what he could see, despite not having freedom to look around. The current tenants were there at the viewing, which did not make him feel comfortable snooping around someone’s home while they stood at the side, gleamy-eyed. So he chocked this one in the maybe column, definitely below the first, and scheduled a third place that caught his notice.

This last felt almost like a prison, with the kitchen bleeding into the living room bleeding into the bedroom, the windows staring out into the street as people passed, able to look in at any time as though he were a gorilla in a cage. He didn’t like to have that much exposure, unable to lounge however he wanted without being spied on. There was a garage added as the cherry on top; a 4x4 cell of three concrete slab walls and a dust-covered door to roll up. He thought it bad enough to imprison himself, let alone some motor vehicle that represented freedom locked away in a miniscule space where it probably couldn’t even fit.

After that, he set his sights back again on the first place, and would decide to make an offer when the time was right. That was enough to keep him floating on cloud nine for a while.

Still, two months was a long time to wait, and he found himself second-guessing the decision each succeeding day. What if he was being too hasty? What if he had blindly gone for the first option out of wanderlust and let some other, more worthy place pass him by? What if the apartment wasn’t as good as he remembered?

This last paranoid thought sent him into a tailspin, and it didn’t take long before he called the letting agent for another viewing. Just to get my bearings straight and plan ahead for when I move in, he said.

That sort of determined language got them excited. I’m sure we can arrange something with the tenant in the coming days, she replied back.

And with that, they scheduled a time and date and he arrived there fifteen minutes early.

Over the search, he had figured out the basic elements of these viewings. The tenant and agent would arrange an ideal period when the tenant would be out, leaving the agent to manage the viewing as the prospective buyer took the place in at their own leisure. This required a lot of trust between the agency and the current tenant.

He gave it fifteen minutes because that was enough breathing room – barring any last-minute returns for a forgotten essential such as a wallet or keys – for the tenant to abscond the premises and make leeway for the agent’s appointment.

This, along with blind faith, was the window he exploited to tour his new home.

Arriving at the site, he rode the elevator from the lobby to the top floor, the hallway there empty and quiet with the last door on the right calling to him as though it was meant to be and not from memory at his only other visit before.

This, at being faced with the shut apartment, was the absolute test with which he determined if fate would grant him this home or not.

He turned the handle. and the door opened for him.

It was all there, just as he remembered. Just as he saw in his dreams. The wooden, lacquered floors. The coat closet off to the side from the front, hung with stylish garments of leathers and wools (where he took just the briefest of sniffs to have that homely scent). The tiled bathroom with its underfloor heating, the waterfall shower and spacious, wall-lined mirror with deified light shining down. The carpeted bedroom with its makeup-topped dresser and window looking out at the trailing river which disappeared into the horizon. With the curtains closed, the shade in the room gave an image of late dusk where one could lie down at any time and doze off. The kitchenette and living room, where he could imagine setting up a curved OLED TV and watching it from the L-shaped couch, sprawled and hugging one of those monogrammed cushions, not believing his luck and good will. Leading on finally to the balcony, high enough where a jump would end things permanently, but why would he do that when he lived in such a place?

He noticed a few dings and notes from his phone. The letting agent calling and texting, wondering where he was, down there in the breezy cold while he was up there surveying his new kingdom.

He left her ignored and went back into the bedroom with its night-as-day shadows, took off his shoes and laid down, closing his eyes to better picture and manifest his home.

The next time he opened them, the faint blue of moonlight was seeping in from the corners of the blinds. He couldn’t remember the last time he had gotten a good couple of hours of restful shuteye. Naps were a luxury afforded only to the old and young and meek; wasted on them, he thought, not appreciating what they had. The idea of no one coming to rouse him never entering his mind – why would it? – the notion not able to fully form into an articulate thought before he closed his eyes again.

It was in the sheer dark of night when he awoke, his socked feet under the covers at the end of the bed unseen until he wiggled them and his sight adjusted. There was still faint light streaming in but from a source across the window: a crack underneath the bedroom door, the hallway outside lit sometime during his sojourn. He knew what waited for him out there, and only smiled, its ramifications temporary.

He swept the covers off and sprang to his feet, vivacious and well-rested, and opened the door wide as if it were a king emerging. Who he saw first was the girl, leaning closest to the door for any sound or sense of movement, arms crossed and brightly doe-eyed, whatever conviction there had been to confront the violent invader rendered moot upon the sight of him. The ease and comfort with which he usurped her home in blatant defiance of societal norms and basic human decency, but he showed her those did not apply to the law of the land beyond some fancy, surface-level words. Kill and be killed, he had said.

With her were two burly men who also wavered at his confident assertion, the plan to toss this intruder of their sister/daughter/friend’s home off the balcony completely slipped from the mind as he sidled past them without a word, through the front door which opened again and left ajar for them to witness him get in the elevator and disappear for the time being.

It was not until he was inside and going down that he realized he had forgotten his shoes.