Time flow

The old man sat in a chair on the porch and gazed at the river. His eyes were set deep, as if flooded by the tide. He wore a straw hat on his head and a faded, gray coat draped over his shoulders. A cigarette glowed between his weathered fingers, wisps of smoke curling around him.

Pale sunlight filtered through the porch windows, bathing the bare trees around him in a dim glow. The occasional sounds of passing cars drifted to his ears, yet he remained motionless, rooted in place.

A series of hazy recollections and musings drifted through his mind, appearing only as blurred shadows, elusive and distant. He tried to summon memories of his wife, gone long ago, but in the mirror of his mind she remained only a ghostly figure, her features no longer clear to him. His thoughts also circled around his three children, though their names and whereabouts seemed to escape his grasp.

Frustration tangled his thoughts, and the wrinkles on his face, resembling a riverbed, deepened into creases of confusion.

He lifted his gaze from the river, and the creases between his brows deepened as he sighed. He looked down at his trembling hands and realized the cigarette had burned out. With a resigned gesture, he placed it in an ashtray filled with cigarette butts.

He rose from his chair, the porch floorboards trembling under his unsteady steps. He walked down a narrow hallway into the living room. The walls were adorned with faded photographs, each offering a glimpse into a past life. For a moment, he gazed at the photos with curiosity and confusion, trying to recall the faces that now seemed so distant. He reached out with his dry, trembling fingers and touched some of the frames, then wiped them on his trousers, leaving dust marks. A large tear formed in the corner of his eye, and as it rolled down his weathered cheek, he murmured, "Who are these people?" He turned and walked back outside, settling into the same chair. He closed his eyes and felt vague memories swirling in his head again, like tangled dreams, slipping away with each attempt to catch them.

He couldn't tell how much time had passed as he sat there lost in his own thoughts. When he finally opened his eyes, he saw that the sun had vanished behind the horizon, leaving only a faint red glow in the sky. He rubbed his eyes wearily with the back of his hand and turned his gaze back to the river, which now appeared as a dried-up bed of memories. The world before him seemed strange - full of shadows and blurred images.

This was the only reality he knew. He felt like a sailor without a compass, adrift in a foggy sea, unable to find his way. His sense of disorientation intensified, and he struggled to make sense of the vague memories and fragmentary thoughts that danced in his head like elusive ghosts taunting him from the fog of his fading remembrances.

Like the river before him, his memory was dry and empty, with a fate that mirrored its own. The river, once teeming with water and fish, now barren and desolate, save for a few yellowing plants clinging to its edges. The man reached into his pocket and pulled out a cigarette. He lit it, the embers casting a faint glow in the gathering dusk. He whispered in a trembling voice, "What am I doing here?" Before he could take another drag, his gaze returned to the same spot on the river.

It seemed to burn with longing for rain, mirroring the yearning he felt within himself. However, he couldn't quite grasp what he wanted.

#Firdavs_Azam
#Short_story
#Tajikistan, 2023