Write a short prose narrative that engages with the concepts of either ‘home’ or ‘homeland’ in 2000 words:
‘An Elderly Home Burnt To Cinders’, he reflected in his notebook whilst waiting for the foundation owner to show up. The reception was a dull white room with three plastic chairs that were probably planted there for convenience rather than comfort. As he gazed into the room thinking, he heard an echo of an approaching click-clack entering the reception. “The owner is still busy wrapping things up. Why don’t you have a look at our facilities whilst you wait?” said the woman stepping aside and leading him inside the facility without pausing. The corridor behind the reception was dim and cold and filled with doors with numbers and names on both sides. Its ceiling was low and yellow, stricken with a dried leakage. The lower half of its walls were covered with dark wooden planks and the other half with wallpapers that seemed to have been green once. “This was the new wing”, pointed the woman after a long silence as they reached the end of the corridor, “and that is the cafeteria”, she announced as she opened the door ushering him in and inviting a heavy smell of Chloride permeated with dampness and the odours of old food into the corridor. Despite the attack on his nostrils, he welcomed the open room and the cheap white neons reflected on the greyish tiles. “Here, our residents feel at home, recuperate, socialise and talk about ancient wars and romances…”. “Do you know when I will be able to see him, mam?” he interrupted her. She raised both eyebrows and looked at him as if noticing him for the first time. “Why don’t we go and wait for him at his office?” she ruptured mechanically and headed outside.
The office was in a building separated from the residential wing by a thicket and a gated garden. It was the most significant building in the cluster, with an Elizabethan façade, a marble vestibule, and a colonnade in its main hallway. They passed by the main entrance but accessed the building from a smaller side door. “Here, make yourself comfortable”, said the woman, then left the office without waiting for a reply. He looked up and around the office in bedazzlement, wondering how and where he could make himself comfortable. Despite the dimness of the room, he spotted a chimney and a brown leather chair with an attached ottoman. As he drew closer to the chimney, he noticed a painting of a lush landscape with nymphs like figures dancing light-heartedly. “I see that you have found the pride of this foundation,” said a deep sure voice from the other side of the room. “this is Elysium, the heroes’ final home and where the name of our foundation comes from.”
“God, when did you….”
“Apologies, I didn’t mean to startle you. Michelle told me that you were searching for me; it has been a very long night. Pray, how can I help you?”. The young man, dumb stricken, gazed towards the voice and addressed the shadow at the other side of the room. “I am from the local parish; I came here to pay my respect and to document what happened.”
“Yes, yes. I have asked that of the vicar earlier. Have you had a chance to look around?”
“Yes, I did, thanks to your assistant. It is as impressive as I have been told. May I trouble you, sir, to what do I owe today’s summon?
“As you are aware, my family is the custodian of this place. We occupied it for generations. It is our home, you see. But some time ago, we decided to share our blessings with the community and created the foundation of Elysium, but unfortunately, part of the legacy was lost today. The old wing got utterly destroyed, and a lot of people lost their homes. Have you had the chance to investigate the fire yet?
“No, sir, not yet.”
“Good, Good. There is no need. We have concluded that the fire was man-made.”
“Man-made, sir?”
“Yes. It seems that it was done on purpose: an act of vandalism, one might say.”
‘An Elderly Home, Sabotaged?’ wrote the man in his notebook.
“But we have yet to capture the culprit. What I don’t understand is why would anyone set their home ablaze? This place is heaven for them. Most of these old cynics are undeserving and delusional. We have paid our debt to the world, and this is how we get rewarded! Nobody believes in our cause anymore. Are you writing this down? I urge you please write: The Heavens, Betrayed! Yes, yes. With an exclamation mark. Good, good. That is more suitable.”
“It is indeed suitable, sir. I will share the report with you before I get back.”
“Now, that is a good lad,” the owner said when Michelle barged into the room.
“What is it now, Michelle,” asked the owner.
“Everybody from the old wing is safe and present except for Luc!” She replied.
“That old fool! It seems that our night’s toil is yet to be concluded. Dispatch everybody immediately!” He shouted hurriedly before addressing the young man, “you need not trouble yourself with this; we will find him. He is our oldest resident and not of my time. He was admitted here during the days of my father, I dare say, but one cannot be certain; no records were kept from that time. I beg your pardon, lad, but we have to adjourn our session. You know the way, I presume?”
With the session adjourned and respects paid, the young man left the main building and headed towards the old wing. Outside, the morning chill was fading, and the birds were yawning and shaking off the troubled night when the young man heard a quivering sob that filled his heart with melted passions and propelled him towards the source.
“Who goes there?” he announced as he walked by the thicket on his way back. The vegetation seemed to be old, older than the rest of the compound, and thick with ages of unmolested dust that rioted in anger as he wadded his way through the dead leaves and the dry, broken branches searching for the voice. As the bushes grew thicker and almost impossible to penetrate, the young man stumbled upon a figure covered with a filthy white robe shaking in agony with a muffled sob. He drew closer to it, moved by compassion. The ghost-like figure was a man, a very old man, with a face full of wrinkles resembling an old dry log abandoned for the elements to forsake. He had long thin limbs with a stature that seemed to have been shrunk under the weight of time and insurmountable toil.
“Sir, do you need help?” asked the young man.
With effort, the skeletal figure managed to raise his sunken head, gazing with lifeless eyes at the boy penetrating his soul and forcing a trickle of cold sweat down his neck. With that, the sob seemed to have gained energy and evolved from a hoarse moaning into a mumble and finally into an articulate speech.
“I started a war once. I did, yes, I did.” Said the old man with effort. “I did it for love. But I lost, I did, yes, I did. My family shattered and ruined because of me. I dared not see them again. No, I dared not.”
“Let me help you, sir. Come. Here, grab my hand.”
“I have been away for too long, for way too long. I had hoped to see them again. I wandered the land seeking support and retribution. I toiled and endured for ages hoping, no, knowing that I would one day be able to go back home. Oh, I did, I truly did.
“Do you live here, sir?”
“I lived in many places. I saw them get neglected, abandoned, and ruined, but I had never thought that this would happen to my home, for it was different. Yes, it was. It was full of love, warmth, and honied dew and bless. It was a paradise.”
“Sir, why don’t we continue this conversation somewhere else?” asked the young man politely, realising the old man’s delusional state.
“I was banished, shunned, and smitten down like a rabid dog. I was forced to stay here. Yes, I was. But I couldn’t make this place my home, so I tried to break free. I tried to return home, yes, I did, the same way I left it. I blazed my way through the gates with all the might that I had left and all the passion and anger that I brewed and simmered for ages. Oh yes, I did. You should have seen me barging in with fiery wings full of pride and glory like the old days of yore.”
Upon hearing the word fire, the young man tensed up and asked, “the owner told me that today’s fire was man-made. Have you perhaps seen the culprit?”
The mention of the owner seemed to have ignited the last remaining vigour in the old man’s chest. “Man-made? Man-made? How dareth he mistaketh I for him”, said the old man in a rising voice that broke into a series of raspy, strained coughs.
“What happened after you got there?” Asked the man in an attempt to calm the old man down.
“I was born there, and I wanted to go back home at my journey’s end to rest forever surrounded by my family. But when I got there, the colossal guarding gates were wide open, almost collapsing, and were only held together with the overgrown vegetation. And as I ventured deeper, I saw the pristine translucent lakes turned into swamps; the evergreen gardens abandoned and ruined; the sweet flowing rivers stagnant with muck; the statues of gods and angels tumbled and broken; the eternal light dimmed and flickering. I looked around, searching for my brethren, searching for anyone! I even tried calling for the sly cherubs, but my efforts were for nought! The cherubs? Who could have guessed? I was abandoned, and my home, the heavens, was abandoned. Oh, yes, it was.” As he uttered these words, the old man seemed to have parted with the last sparks in his eyes; his voice gave up with a lonely sigh; his body collapsed and crumbled with a creak into a heap of cinders that died out with a hiss and turned into ashes scattering with the morning gust. The young man, stunned at first, looked around bewildered. He noticed the sun rising and spreading its threads throughout the ether, banishing the night stars into oblivion. As he looked around gazing, he saw the celestials wane and disappear, one by one, except for the rebellious Venus, the morning star. It sparked in defiance against the supreme light for one last time before surrendering its pride and succumbing. On his way back, the young man grabbed his notebook, scrabbed all the previous notes and wrote, ‘Our home, the heavens, abandoned!’
The Book Of Life 