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His dilapidated house brought an air of helplessness. The
sickening linger of old tobacco hanging in the air could
almost be seen; an aged grey, relieved impatiently like silk
through the purse of his chapped lips. Cracked walls,
adorned with peeling paint kept him enclosed in this
cage of illness. His eyes had become glassy as his stare got
lost into horizon. Hands grappling onto nothing.
Air.
He couldn’t even breathe anymore. Even it seemed tainted.
But he wouldn’t know. He didn’t care.
‘
I watched the boy.
He was so lively; full of vitality.
Curious to the world around him, an abundance of life
and ambition. He said he wanted to help people; a doctor.
Bright kid.
He’d grown before my eyes.
Lucy… Matilda… Elizabeth…
He’d so much love to give.
That he saved none for himself.
I’d watched the people around him dwindle into oblivion.
One by one.
Lucy… Matilda… Elizabeth… Little John… Father…
Mother.
I’d watched him light countless cigarettes, with the stub
of the first; repeating until there was nothing to be heard
but the distant sounds of painful heaving. Yet he’d never
know when to stop.
Rinse and repeat he’d think.
He never cared.
‘
I watched the man.
He’d thought himself as one who’d been blessed with
reckless vigour; desensitised to the sufferings around him.
He was tough they’d all say. A man of steel; impenetrable.
So much, that he had begun to believe them. It was all
he’d ever known.
He was a man who’d seem to be pungent with the scent of
diesel fuel and tobacco. A man whose hair lay limp, to the
Echoes In
My Mind
11