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Short Story Winner: Home

Posted by archifCLICarchive from National - Published on 09/08/2010 at 09:00
0 comments » - Tagged as Creative Writing

  • Fireplace Cat

**This story was the winner of theSprout Short Story Competition!**


Bitter winter wind whipped at her long wild hair, her face burning with the bite of lashing rain as she clambered into the waiting car. Clouds loomed bleakly over the sleepy village like a grey army, waiting to cover unsuspecting houses in its gloomy blanket. It was just another November day, cold and unwelcoming as the car started off through its thick fog.

She let out a Monday Morning sigh. The rain reflected the dreary sense of impending boredom that overcame her as she thought of the day ahead.

Grace had never felt like she truly belonged. It had always felt as though there was something more out there, something missing, something better. Life had so many questions left unanswered, yet most people seemed to care more about the colour of their shoes than the meaning of everything; the answers to the big questions. She wasn’t comfortable with religion; the rules, the formality, the unquestionable faith people had in its scriptures. Yet there had to be more. There had to be a reason for existence.

“You watch the football last night then?” Tom joked. It seemed sometimes that for him football really was the reason. There was no way Grace would ever waste time watching people run around kicking a ball and getting paid millions for it, yet, most of the time at least, their friendship was a perfect match.

“What do you think?” she smiled. The car’s brakes squealed as they turned the corner to find a tractor bumbling at a snail’s pace along the meandering country lane. Damn it, Grace thought as they slowed to a measly twenty five miles an hour. Late again. 

The wind howled in miserable agreement.

--------------------------

“Miss Harling, I assume.” said a wizened old man, looking up at her over a tiny pair of wonky spectacles as she rushed in, stumbling over an apology. “Please take a seat. My name is Professor Aldrick and I will be your substitute teacher today.”

She reached her desk, her pencils rattling noisily in their battered tin as she got them out of her bag. It was then that she realised, strangely, that hers was the only noise taking place in a normally zoo-like class. Everybody sat, transfixed by this small, feeble man as if he was about to utter life’s most precious secrets. 

“Very well,” the Professor boomed. “We shall begin.”

The proceeding lesson, however, disappointed Grace immensely. The Professor looked like a man with a wealth of wisdom settled somewhere under his nest of wiry grey hair, yet he droned on about quadratic formulas until the class’ eyes were drooping heavily. 

Grace was a bright girl; eager to learn and quick to question. Yet she struggled to see the relevance of fractions and equations in everyday life. And that was what she wanted to learn about. Life.

As the clock ticked to ten past two, Grace sat willing the day to end. All the years she had spent in school already, all the knowledge that had come and gone; all had been for the exams, for letters on a piece of paper. It all seemed like such a waste when she had such a thirst for knowledge and yet had none that interested her. 

The bell rang with a deafening scream, chairs suddenly screeching as the class rushed to escape. Professor Aldrick beckoned her towards his desk with a long, leathery finger. 

“Miss Harling,” he said hoarsely. “Tell me something. Do you enjoy quadratic formulas?”

Great, she thought. He noticed I wasn’t paying attention.

“I’m sorry Professor... I was paying attention, it’s just...”

“No no, you misunderstand me. Do you enjoy them. Paying attention to something, or someone, is very different to enjoying them.”

“Honestly?” The old man nodded his head, his steely blue eyes fixed on hers, judging her expression as she replied. “I don’t enjoy them, no. I don’t mean to be rude, but none of it really interests me, I mean, really interests me. I just don’t see what, I don’t know... Quadratic formulas, or whatever... Have to do with real life. I just don’t see how it’s going to be useful in the grand scheme of things.” The Professor let a smile slip across his face briefly, as though this was both the answer he expected and wanted.

“Come along to this address on Thursday night,” he implored, handing her a slip of paper. 

“Come, Miss Harling, if you want to learn. Learn about life.” 

--------------------------

Thursday’s night was dark and cold, the street lights glancing dimly upon shadowy shops and huddled houses. Grace’s curiosity had carried her to the stern oak door that stood in front of her. She shivered in the bitter chill, hesitating upon a knock.

The door creaked open to reveal Professor Aldrick standing with a peculiar, complicated looking sort of object emitting plumes of brightly coloured smoke, which formed a luminous trail behind him. 

“Come in, come in,” he beckoned, directing her towards a warm living room where a group of people sat huddled around a blazing fire, deep in discussion.

“The human brain,” the Professor began. “The most complex organ in the body. And without a doubt the most fascinating. Did you know that an average human only uses 10% of their brain at any given time?” He paused as Grace shook her head, a bemused yet fascinated expression painted across her face.

“The people you see here,” he said, waving a flippant hand at the collection of people settled in various battered looking armchairs. “Are what we would describe as above average. In fact, most of them are functioning at around 67%. And at a guess, I would say that you are what we would describe as above average also. It is people like you that you see here, people who questioned, people who wanted to learn about life, not just muddle along through it like the rest of the world.” 

Grace could have sworn the cat that had previously sat basking in the glow of the fire had mysteriously turned into the butterfly that was now fluttering about around her head. It felt like she was in a bizarre sort of dream, a hazy alternate universe.

The Professor continued his hoarse mutterings as the evening faded into gloomy black and the stars began to twinkle on their ebony bed. His words were like diamonds, each one precious and gleaming as they settled in Grace’s mind. 

--------------------------

The following weeks brought more and more such sapience. Every Tuesday and Thursday night, Grace marched to and from the Professor’s home, each time her mind buzzing with new knowledge. The wealth of wisdom she had predicted the Professor would wield was certainly apparent and impressive, but something troubled her each time she returned home. 

The group that seemed to permanently reside beside the Professor’s fire were in constant fierce discussion over some scientific problem or another, yet they never showed a spark of emotion, any indication of feeling at all. The Professor’s brief smile as she talked of her dissatisfaction with her education was the one and only expression other than concentration she had witnessed since the beginning of her classes in his small, cosy home. 

“Professor,” Grace interrupted one evening. He was explaining the deterioration of a baby’s intelligence as people refused to use any sensible or indeed understandable language when communicating with them, but looked up expectantly at her. 

“Do you have any children?”

The professor paused.

“No, no I don’t. No time for those sorts of things. My life is taken up with looking for people like yourself to join our group, and with my inventions. You don’t think I could have developed the equipment to enable our survival on Venus whilst changing nappies, do you?! Besides, human emotion it’s all very pointless really. All just chemical reactions in the brain you see. Knowledge is much more valuable.”

“Pointless?” she repeated. 

“Shall we continue?” he proceeded. “The infant years”

Grace looked around her. Tom’s face flashed before her eyes. His soft smile, the sparkle of his eyes as he joked about football or showed off his novelty socks. Is the pursuit of knowledge, she wondered, necessarily the pursuit of happiness? 

Just as she had once learnt that wealth did not equal happiness, this new lesson began to form in her mind. Was this another of the answers that she had originally been searching for?

--------------------------

Grace’s mother was busy cooking supper when she returned home, the rich smells tantalising her taste buds as she entered the alluring kitchen.

“Grace,” she said with a warm smile. “Just in time.”

She would not return to visit the Professor again. His world was light-years away from hers, his heart had no home in the real world. Grace, finally, had realised that there would always be things left to learn, left to discover. No-one, not even the Professor, knew the true answers. 

Life was a guessing-game with hazy rules. But the important things, the things that truly mattered, were right there on her doorstep. Her home was in the smile of a friend, in the lovingly ladled stew her mother knew she adored. She finally felt she belonged. 

IMAGE: las - initially

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