The night before, Oscar went to bed without the slightest inkling of what would happen as he drifted off to a deep, peaceful sleep. Almost immediately after his conscious mind slipped away, he sat up on the edge of his bed, his bare feet resting on the carpet below, elbows on knees, head in hands, like a man trapped in his own thoughts, struggling to make sense of some distant predicament. Then he sighed, not in the manner of exhaustion or of resignation to a sleepless night. Rather, this was a sigh of desperation.
His university days, at long last, had ended, and now he was forced to join a loud, turbulent world with a seemingly infinite list of demands, requiring him to earn his living from now on. There was rent to pay, food to buy, and a heart to win. Above all else, he avoided the furniture factory, though not from disrespect for the familial ties to a dying cottage industry. No, he wished to make his own name, conquer this world on his own terms. Bending thin strips of wood and carving patterns on a spinning lathe might have been fine for his father and brother, but those were their lives, their aspirations, and his plans were far grander, though ill-defined.
He couldn't get the story out of his head. It played over and over, a looping picture show with no true ending, an absence he felt sure he could accommodate given enough time. His father stared at him, blank and dumb-stricken, when young Oscar proclaimed his love for literature and his intention to write a novel.
"Where's the money in that?" he had replied.
"There's money in printing. There's money in the appreciation of the thing. Do you know how much a publisher pays for something good?" He tried to explain, but his words fell on deaf ears. His father smirked and walked away.
He had a story. He had the desire and the motivation, but he found himself quite unable to take the plunge, to sit quietly and deconstruct his thoughts, then re-pave them in words. He was afraid of exposing himself. He was afraid that he wasn't good enough. What if Madeleine didn't like it? What then? She knew how much he wanted to do this, but would she be able to look him in the eye knowing that he was a purveyor of cheap, emotionless words?
There was so much doubt, but the words, bulging the seams of his attention span until he could think of nothing else, nothing but the story, so he trekked from the bedroom to the study, treading through the hall of the house his grandfather had left him. Something was waiting for him there, though--something he had never seen before. It was relatively small, occupying the same base area as his old Royal typewriter, but it was thin, sleek, and black, with a vertical screen like a sort of miniature monolith. Maybe it was something of Madeleine's, something she'd left behind the night before, but whatever it was, it was odd and in his way. He found that it was hinged and that the prostrate screen could be pushed down with a satisfying click, so with a careful grasp, he moved it to the nearest bookshelf, slid the typewriter forward from its resting spot against the wall, and sat at the desk. Finally, he found himself alone--alone with his thoughts and the instrument to free them.
But the words came slowly, the expected downpour little more than a trickle, a drizzling sleet at the prospect of a blizzard, and he felt somehow ashamed. Young Oscar Bruges wanted nothing more than to write, to proffer everything that he knew and desired to know, to make that shared commitment to exploring new frontiers and walking side by side with his peers and readers as they wandered strange new roads, both in imagination and substance. If only he could find the words.
Then he thought of Madeleine and how proud she would be--how proud she could be, and he realized that no longer was he doing this for himself. He was doing it for her. Everything for her. He pictured her face, olive-skinned and fair-featured, the smile poised on her thin lips, the biting words on the tip of her tongue. He thought of her, and he began to write. It seemed easy then, as if she was the key, his divine inspiration, his muse.
The story was about a man, as plain and ordinary as any other, going about an unfulfilled life like any other. It was about a man with the resolve to break free from his constraints and self-imposed exile from a happy existence. It was about a man that began a revolution.
Certainly it couldn't have been the most original plot. It was the sort of story he could imagine existing in the age of the Ancient Greeks about a man wanting more from his life. Time and time again it's been told, but somehow, he was sure, he had found a new way to tell it.
A scant few paragraphs were all he could manage for this night, so he abandoned the typewriter with every intention of returning in the morning, fresh and eager to press on. Pouring himself a glass of water, he wasn't sure he would get any sleep. Not tonight, at least, while so much still lay heavy on his mind.
A walk would do the trick, though, he thought. It would do him good to get some fresh air and clear away the congestion that threatened to swallow him whole. Unable to find his sneakers, he slid into the slippers that waited patiently by the foot of the bed and ignored the strange anomalies that seemed to populate his house. Surely they weren't all Madeleine's, but he decided not to concern himself with anything else at that moment.
The streets were still dark, but he knew the way well enough, hiking down the avenues, past the Johnsons' rose garden, the first blooms already rising from their thorny cages, and through the Taylors' yard and across the meadow, though he had trouble recognizing the large church that seemed to have popped up overnight. He shrugged it away, figuring some phantom of the sleepless night was toying with his senses.
The air was crisp, cool even in the dawning summer, and the park sat silently at the bottom of the hill like a hunter's baited trap, waiting for some pour animal to wander inside and find itself caught up in a flurry of soft, inviting grass and comfortable benches. He was alone, and he took to the winding path that disappeared off into the woods, into the very heart of his world, where he could think deep thoughts without worry of being overwhelmed and his darkest fears were siphoned away by the deeper shadows of trees and unseen forces. Had it not been so close to dawn, with a faint glow on the horizon shedding its reluctant first light, he would have been utterly lost in the darkness, left to wander that place for the rest of his life and beyond.
He thought about his story, or so he had convinced himself. The actual image in his head was of Madeleine, wearing that pale dress with black heels. It was a fine dress, as he often told her when she asked, and she always asked. He had been thinking about her quite a bit lately. He thought that he might ask her to marry him.
A sudden exhaustion overtook him, and the last thing he remembered before toppling to the ground was daylight intensifying all around him, a glow from a sun he couldn't see, and then nothing more.
His university days, at long last, had ended, and now he was forced to join a loud, turbulent world with a seemingly infinite list of demands, requiring him to earn his living from now on. There was rent to pay, food to buy, and a heart to win. Above all else, he avoided the furniture factory, though not from disrespect for the familial ties to a dying cottage industry. No, he wished to make his own name, conquer this world on his own terms. Bending thin strips of wood and carving patterns on a spinning lathe might have been fine for his father and brother, but those were their lives, their aspirations, and his plans were far grander, though ill-defined.
He couldn't get the story out of his head. It played over and over, a looping picture show with no true ending, an absence he felt sure he could accommodate given enough time. His father stared at him, blank and dumb-stricken, when young Oscar proclaimed his love for literature and his intention to write a novel.
"Where's the money in that?" he had replied.
"There's money in printing. There's money in the appreciation of the thing. Do you know how much a publisher pays for something good?" He tried to explain, but his words fell on deaf ears. His father smirked and walked away.
He had a story. He had the desire and the motivation, but he found himself quite unable to take the plunge, to sit quietly and deconstruct his thoughts, then re-pave them in words. He was afraid of exposing himself. He was afraid that he wasn't good enough. What if Madeleine didn't like it? What then? She knew how much he wanted to do this, but would she be able to look him in the eye knowing that he was a purveyor of cheap, emotionless words?
There was so much doubt, but the words, bulging the seams of his attention span until he could think of nothing else, nothing but the story, so he trekked from the bedroom to the study, treading through the hall of the house his grandfather had left him. Something was waiting for him there, though--something he had never seen before. It was relatively small, occupying the same base area as his old Royal typewriter, but it was thin, sleek, and black, with a vertical screen like a sort of miniature monolith. Maybe it was something of Madeleine's, something she'd left behind the night before, but whatever it was, it was odd and in his way. He found that it was hinged and that the prostrate screen could be pushed down with a satisfying click, so with a careful grasp, he moved it to the nearest bookshelf, slid the typewriter forward from its resting spot against the wall, and sat at the desk. Finally, he found himself alone--alone with his thoughts and the instrument to free them.
But the words came slowly, the expected downpour little more than a trickle, a drizzling sleet at the prospect of a blizzard, and he felt somehow ashamed. Young Oscar Bruges wanted nothing more than to write, to proffer everything that he knew and desired to know, to make that shared commitment to exploring new frontiers and walking side by side with his peers and readers as they wandered strange new roads, both in imagination and substance. If only he could find the words.
Then he thought of Madeleine and how proud she would be--how proud she could be, and he realized that no longer was he doing this for himself. He was doing it for her. Everything for her. He pictured her face, olive-skinned and fair-featured, the smile poised on her thin lips, the biting words on the tip of her tongue. He thought of her, and he began to write. It seemed easy then, as if she was the key, his divine inspiration, his muse.
The story was about a man, as plain and ordinary as any other, going about an unfulfilled life like any other. It was about a man with the resolve to break free from his constraints and self-imposed exile from a happy existence. It was about a man that began a revolution.
Certainly it couldn't have been the most original plot. It was the sort of story he could imagine existing in the age of the Ancient Greeks about a man wanting more from his life. Time and time again it's been told, but somehow, he was sure, he had found a new way to tell it.
A scant few paragraphs were all he could manage for this night, so he abandoned the typewriter with every intention of returning in the morning, fresh and eager to press on. Pouring himself a glass of water, he wasn't sure he would get any sleep. Not tonight, at least, while so much still lay heavy on his mind.
A walk would do the trick, though, he thought. It would do him good to get some fresh air and clear away the congestion that threatened to swallow him whole. Unable to find his sneakers, he slid into the slippers that waited patiently by the foot of the bed and ignored the strange anomalies that seemed to populate his house. Surely they weren't all Madeleine's, but he decided not to concern himself with anything else at that moment.
The streets were still dark, but he knew the way well enough, hiking down the avenues, past the Johnsons' rose garden, the first blooms already rising from their thorny cages, and through the Taylors' yard and across the meadow, though he had trouble recognizing the large church that seemed to have popped up overnight. He shrugged it away, figuring some phantom of the sleepless night was toying with his senses.
The air was crisp, cool even in the dawning summer, and the park sat silently at the bottom of the hill like a hunter's baited trap, waiting for some pour animal to wander inside and find itself caught up in a flurry of soft, inviting grass and comfortable benches. He was alone, and he took to the winding path that disappeared off into the woods, into the very heart of his world, where he could think deep thoughts without worry of being overwhelmed and his darkest fears were siphoned away by the deeper shadows of trees and unseen forces. Had it not been so close to dawn, with a faint glow on the horizon shedding its reluctant first light, he would have been utterly lost in the darkness, left to wander that place for the rest of his life and beyond.
He thought about his story, or so he had convinced himself. The actual image in his head was of Madeleine, wearing that pale dress with black heels. It was a fine dress, as he often told her when she asked, and she always asked. He had been thinking about her quite a bit lately. He thought that he might ask her to marry him.
A sudden exhaustion overtook him, and the last thing he remembered before toppling to the ground was daylight intensifying all around him, a glow from a sun he couldn't see, and then nothing more.
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