Houses with Lights

Dominique shuffled down 4th street. Or up 4th street, or across 4th street. He hadn't been in the city for over a week yet and figured that was good enough reason not to know what direction he was currently walking. He just knew it was towards home. A house that would have lights on over the stoop and a lock that his key slid nicely into. He'd stopped making his foster parents uncomfortable by calling it a house rather than a home, and seeing the color drain out of their faces as their eyes dropped to the floor. They really were caring people, and who had that other kind of home anyway? It was just a thing some kids came up with because it made them sound rebellious and the girls who still regularly attended class were into that. The ones that put out anyway (followed by howling laughter from the rest of the boys, like jackals around the corner). Dominique went through that phase, and felt he'd come out pretty intact. He scaled the five wet red brick steps of the stoop in two bounds, fished the key out of his sweatshirt pocket and unlocked the door. While the lights outside were on, the rest of the house slept quietly on, welcoming and empty at the same time. He quietly maneuvered through the creaky floorboards as quietly as he could until he reached the plain white door leading to his room. He collapsed on the twin bed and tried not to think. He tried to first block out the past day, then the past week, then the whole past month. He pictured a miniature Dominique going through endless file cabinets in his brain, carefully examining each folder before tossing it onto the floor. Pretty soon he was dreaming, and it was no longer a miniature Dominique tossing out the files, but his hands and eyes thumbing through the tabs and looking at the labels. He found the file detailing his birth, and how the absence of a father was distinctly noted in thick red pen. He saw a note at the bottom of the file, referencing another file in another cabinet. Eventually he found the cabinet and file, and flipped through everything about his father he'd wanted to know, and one by one his fears came true. 

He was never wanted.

His father didn't even know he existed, didn't even remember his mother's name.

He was just there, product of biology and nature and cold scientific fact.

The ink began to run off the pages of the file, which seemed to grow thicker with every page he threw out. It ran up his forearms and under his shirt sleeves, tattooing him with the knowledge. He began to scream as the rest of the drawers began to slide free one by one, the files opening like hungry mouths...

Dominique woke up in a film of sweat. For a moment he hated his father, hated everything about him, but recognized that hot, dark feeling in his heart and quickly subdued it, falling back onto his bed. There wasn't a point. It didn't matter. He thought of Queen, and how nothing really mattered.

--

Jordan caught herself staring out the window above the kitchen sink at the sunset just about to really take on it's last gleam. She shook her head and finished with the dishes, then made some instant lemonade and went back out onto the whitewashed porch. 

The Lakeside Retirement Home was one of the better in Maine, one of the few that no one mistook for a modified detention center, and Jordan actually enjoyed her job. Most of the patients were nice enough, there were always the bitter ones but she figured she saw less here than Sheila did working night shifts at Denny's. It also gave her ample time and stimulus to think about the big things. She could almost here the existentialist conversations buzzing around in everyone's individual mind in the common room, and seemed to breathe it in until it buzzed inside her too.

As she carried the tray outside she caught sight of Mr. Avery and sighed. There were also tedious parts of the job that never really stopped being tedious. His sunglasses (the black plastic bigger-than-aviator kind they got shipped in bulk) had fallen off again and were resting on his lap. Resting defiantly, Jordan mused (after all, she was going to school to be an english major, it was only right to put a little flavor on her thoughts). Mr. Avery was more or less catatonic, less because all the doctors said it was by choice. He could very well respond if he wanted to, they said. Since coming to work at Lakeside Jordan felt the sorriest for Mr. Avery. He had no background other than what she could draw from his features. She guessed he had had some troubles as a young man, and made some choices that didn't mesh with the modern world and her unforgiving methodology. Sometimes she occupied herself coming up with pasts for Mr. Avery, though she never told him what they were. 

She gave the lemonade to the rest of the men and women sitting outside, and with two glasses left proceeded towards Mr. Avery at the end of the porch. She sat the tray on the banister, and reached down to grab the sunglasses. Jordan absentmindedly put the glasses back on Mr. Avery's eyes, already being drawn in again by the particularly magnificent sunset. What did finally bring her back was when Mr. Avery slapped the glasses off his face, sending them clattering across the porch and off the side of the house.

Tears poured down the edges of Mr. Avery's fully dilated eyes. His lips trembled and his hands shook against the arms of the rocking chair. Jordan quickly looked down the line of empty chairs and past the front door, but only fellow retirees moved passively back and forth. She felt the call for help rising in her throat when she realized his eyes were focused on her, his lips still trembling.

"Are you God?" he whispered.

In her head she told him to calm down. In her head she knew exactly what medicine to administer and what therapy to consider post-event. Her lips remained closed. Mr. Avery continued:

"I...had a son" he said passively, no longer looking more through her than at her now. "Maybe...He was beautiful. Was my son beautiful?"

"Yes." Jordan answered, having no idea who Mr. Avery's son was, and wondering if she should start taking medication. Still she felt something like that buzz in the commons room, some irresistible force coming from Mr. Avery and whatever he was seeing. 

"Are you God?"

His hand reached out (shaking, no tremoring) and grasped her smooth wrist. Jordan reached behind her with her free hand, and taking a glass of lemonade brought it around and offered it to Mr. Avery. He relaxed a bit, his other hand holding the glass without spilling a drop. He brought the purple bendy straw to his lips, and his hand slid from around her wrist. Jordan let out a sigh, grabbed the other glass and collapsed in the chair next to his. 

"I would've named him Stephen. I was scared," he said, tears still flowing.

Ignoring all the texts she had ever read, Jordan asked, "Is this the end, Mr. Avery?" He turned to her, a faint smile tracing his tired face.

"May just be, gotta ride it out though. So much."

"What do you feel?"

"It's leaving my legs, my hands now," he looked down. His hands lay motionless against the wood.

Jordan sipped at her lemonade and watched the sunset.

Eventually Mr. Avery looked out and asked, "Are you God?"

It was an easy burial. There was no family to notify.

A.N.- This is a really shortened, rough version of something I've had in my head for a bit but I think it goes into something much longer and bigger, particularly the last scene. Hope this version's acceptable too though, because I have no idea when the other one will come around.