Final Beats of a Lonely Heart

Tick, tick, tick.

The grandfather clock in the corner measured the final beats of a lonely heart. A wrinkled man rocked in the wooden chair, waiting in horror as the beats became wilder and more erratic. How many seconds left? Looking out the window, the sun upon his face, he watched as the world passed by, leaving him behind. Long ago he had forgotten his name, as there was no one to call him by it. No reason to remember it, really.

Tick. How many seconds left? He watched as a woman scurried past his dilapidated fence. He watched a group of teens gawk at the yard that had long since been strangled by weeds, daring one another to get closer. He watched as the human race passed by outside, terrified of the reaching shadow cast by his monstrous house. And inside he sat alone, wishing he could invite one of them in. Just one.

Tick. How many seconds left? He grasped for a fond memory as his heart constricted within his chest. So many stories he had. So much to tell, yet not a soul to listen. A smattering of half-coherent thoughts churned with his fear to create a deranged babble in his brain. Though his usefulness had long since abandoned him, his desire for purpose had not. He still had work to do. So much work to do.

“Just one more!” He said allowed to the walls.

Tick. How many seconds left? The world would not miss him. He smiled, filled with a rabid sort of delight as his breath came quick and short. With a final effort, he staggering to the window to draw close the heavy curtains, shutting out the sun. A good life he had lived. Such good work he had done. But here he died alone with only the souls of his past to keep him company.

With a final, teetering tock, the grandfather clock was silenced. And the house still creaked, and the mice still scurried and the rocker still swayed with the memories of a once sentient being. Outside the people still passed by hurriedly, the children still stared and the dogs still howled. It was an inconsequential death. The kind that is followed by a myriad of headache-inducing paperwork instead of a memorial to a life well lived.

Only one relative remained, a young man of some distant relation to whom the task fell to get the old man’s affairs in order. Though Frank did not know it, he bore a striking resemblance to the deceased, with his long face, terribly thin frame, and sinister expression. He stood before the house and looked on with a sigh. A skeletal fence twisted and sagged around the yard. What had once been a cobblestone path through the garden was now a mass of weeds, coiled together like writhing snakes, warning any who entered to turn back. Turn back! The front door stood agape; a yawning blackness beckoning those who saw it to enter. Enter! Frank stepped through the doorway with a mix of fear and excitement. Entombed within the ghastly walls and broken shutters was a look into the past. Memories of decades gone by, all blanketed by dust. A rectangle of sunlight sliced through the front room, catching particles that floated on a ghostly breeze. It had been long since the house had breathed.

Awakened from its slumber, dust rushed into Frank’s lungs, leaving him coughing and spluttering painfully. Cursing under his breath, he moved through the house, footprints in the dust following along behind. All was silent, but Frank felt as though he was accompanied as he passed from room to room.

And this is how it happened that Frank learned about the life of the old man: A presumptuously gargantuan desk sat quite out of place in the den. It was cluttered with the paraphernalia of a long life that was now forgotten.  A pile of things that pricked his curious mind and bid him to look. Look! And that is what Frank did, forgetting all else as his thoughts were consumed with what lay before him.

Seconds had abandoned this house. Minutes did not dwell here. Hours kept their distance. It was as if time stood still; no, it simply did not exist at all. Stale air was heavy and it hovered like a living thing, watching over Frank’s shoulder. Though the only sounds were those of a quite dead house, the imagination conjured up spectral sounds of fractured past lives. Beneath a pile of particularly dusty paperwork, Frank found a leather-bound book. Picking it up, he felt as though that is what had called him here. That is what had glued him to the chair for an unknown amount of time. With an uncontainable curiosity, he opened its well-used cover and let out a yelp. Not because what was inside was terrifying or unusual, but because it was quite familiar to him.  

And this is how it happened that Frank knew he was much like the old man: Inside were the barely legible scribbles of a deranged hand. Spidery, curling letters shifted into a lovely flowing font and then back to feverish scratches. Names were written down the length of the page, then scrawled sideways, upside down and one atop the other. He traced a finger across its beautiful pages, and he knew what they meant. Turning the leaf, he found a single phrase that pierced him. “Just one more. Just one more. Just one more.” It repeated chaotically throughout the book.

And this is how the nephew discovered the old man’s secret: With a violent onset of coughs, he upended his chair, crashing into the wall as papers flew about the room. Perhaps a comical situation in any other setting, but here it felt like the work of some unseen and insidious force. It happened that Frank's elbow had quite painfully punched through the wall.  Leather bound ledger still in hand, he did not move to stand. The walls. Those old walls. They had bones. Not the sort of bones that walls are usually made up of, with wood and plaster and nails. No, these were the sort that once made up the insides of a Homosapien. This filled Frank with a rabid sort of delight, and he knew why he was here. What hand had guided him to this discovery? What impulse and led him to this place? He now knew who he was and the work that had to be done.

Standing from his prostrate position he tucked the leather journal carefully beneath his arm. “Just one more.” He said allowed to the walls. With a great burden of purpose, he walked through the house that somehow felt like home. Tick, tick, tick. The grandfather clock in the corner tocked back to life and the house breathed once more. What luck that he had found someone like himself. What a piece of predestination that he should be the one to finish the old man’s work. So much work to do. Heart racing, smile wide, book in hand, he stepped out into the sunshine.