Friday 2 March 2012

A Chest of Drawers

I seem to have gotten my fiction writing mojo back, yay! I'm very pleased :-). I'm less pleased about the fact I seem to have lost my reading mojo but, well, you can't have it all.

Something else I'm pleased with is this piece. I started off wanting to work more on description, particularly of a setting. I'd also been thinking about an analogy I used a while ago to describe what the spasticity in my quads is like at the very worst times. This seemed to take on a life of its own as I wrote but for better or worse is the end result. It needs a better title!

Day 44 of 100 days of writing

A Chest of Drawers

Over in a dark corner of a nondescript hall there stood a set of drawers. The drawers were dusty and had a neglected air about them. That was unsurprising for as busy as that house was with people continually going in and out, here there and everywhere, it was weeks since anyone had ventured into that corner.

The drawers weren't particularly special - cane drawers that appeared woven. Darker than the word cane would lead you to believe with a black metal frame. The unit is tall, reaching almost to the ceiling, with the option to add an extension on to give more storage. Nobody knows who bought the set, as far as anyone can remember its always been there. But whoever they were they must have been optimistic on the day they bought it as the extension found its way into their trolley. Half hidden in pieces underneath the unit it lies, never to be used.

The drawers themselves are very deep. It's difficult to see everything they contain without taking them out completely. And once you done that, finding what you wanted and several other lost things if you're lucky, it's even more difficult to put the drawer back in place. It's not unusual for there to be a gap in the unit for months, waiting for someone with the patience to make the multiple attempts needed to get it back in place.

Nothing special was kept in these drawers. They held the things people had forgotten about. Broken things they claimed they'd fix "soon" but never would. The "it might come in useful someday" items and those in the "it was too good an offer to pass up, I'm sure I'll find a use" category. Unloved, unwanted and unnecessary things.

Most of the drawers were unique in contents. Continue a mix of things you'd be unlikely to find in any other house across the land.

Except one.

The one that had pride of place. Place most often being the floor.

This was the drawer that appears in some way, shape or form in every house. It's the mess of wires. Old phone chargers, one for a camera and an unidentifiable USB cable. A laptop charger or two and - wait a minute - is that the electric hook up from that caravan we got rid of ten years ago? Controllers from a games console believed long gone and some headphones (broken of course) complete the mess.

It's impossible to count just how many leads are in that drawer. A veritable haven for old cables keeping them safe from the dreaded landfill. And a walk through the history of electrical goods for anyone taking the time to look through it properly. Which no one ever did, instead just tearing through it quickly looking for whatever needed before giving up in frustration.

The wires and cables have become a living, growing being you see. All wrapped round each other and tangled together. The older ones watching over the new and those that still worked guarding the fragile and broken ones.

If someone hunting through the drawer grabbed something and pulled hoping to find a way of unravelling the tangle they'd find it impossible. Pulling just caused them to tighten up even more and made more of a mess. Finding an actual end was a bit of a mission within itself. And even if a searcher did find an end it rarely did any good.

everyone who searched would end up frustrated and empty handed. This was a drawer who meant business. The cables, leads and wires were a family. And they were happy where they were. In a dusty chest of drawers in a neglected corner of an otherwise busy house.

They remained in that drawer for over forty years periodically welcoming new members. No one could ever separate them,

♥ Emma

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