Moss

The old wall sodden with moss. That funny smell. The wall, crumbling under its own weight. Wondered what kept it together for all these years. Why would it stand through this relentless, all drenching rain. And those large deep brown bricks, don't see them around anymore. Inside the house was even more depressing. The old tiled roof- i could actually see the chinks in the tiles, and patterns of moss underneath them. Yes, this roof leaked. I felt like i was in the last century. And how could i forget that old black and white television. The kind with the shutter in front you could pull and close. But that wasn't what i set out to tell you, no.. Describing that house was the last thing on my mind. But the feeling of the place had seemed to have seeped into my skin, almost like that constant moisture you could feel inside the plaster, and the sand which seemed to be like an invisible grit carpet under your feet.
What did interest me was that old clock on the wall. Not a grandfathers clock, but those nondescript kind with a pendulum inside the glass case. Chimed at the half hours and the hours. Sounding out the time to an empty house. Empty. That's the feeling you got when you went inside it. You could feel the hollowness in your own existence. Like that God damn moisture I kept feeling under my skin. God, it was as if the place was inside my veins. The house was far from empty ,it was full as it could be, with rotting furniture and random items strewn about the house which time had failed to rot like the rest of the unidentifiable things stuck to the walls or floor. Like the entire place had been soaked in a giant layer of spit, and everything had congealed into a uniform mass.
And that dampness.
I draw a deep breath as I feel the oxygen in my bloodstream run shallow. Its more like short gasps being all i can afford. I look across the dimly lit rooms. The humidity was so thick, you could feel the air making its way into your lungs like a liquid. A broken window pane looked out into an overgrown backyard. There was the crumbling remnants of a well there , and its paved surroundings. Moss there too. Even the old pulley with the frayed rope was there. Thick undergrowth. You could lose your soul in that vegetation. I push open the window. A shard of glass falls to the cement. It shatters the silence. I look at the millipedes crawling there get smashed by the glass. One of them curls itself up making it look like a wound up spring. The damp earth near pavement, with nothing but saplings pushing their way out, trying to crumble the cement as they continue their pitiful existence. I get the feeling someone is with me in this room. How many lives and deaths did this old hovel see. And how many different feelings did it harbour. My great grandfather whispering sweet nothings to my great grandmother. My uncle and aunt as teenagers courting by the door. My pitiful existence in solitude by the window. The cloudy sky offered no sighs of blue, just the dull white light that preserved this place a few centuries behind the world. An old clothes line sagged between two sticks. A dull red rag was tied to one of them.

The nurse walked into the dimly lit hospital room. She took the warm towel off the patients head and wiped it dry. She turned on the lights and went to check on the other patients. The bedside table had a bunch of faded flowers on them. They would never be seen anyway, by the patient. They would be taken away and replaced by fresh ones the next month. And the next one. Till he would die someday.

The sun finally managed to cut through the clouds and started drying the place up. That feeling of warm moisture under my skin stared departing.

Tomorrow I think I'll go to the beach and bring back some old memories. I wish I could imagine people there as well. I feel so lonely sometimes.