The Hoarder
Jessie Anderson
They call me a hoarder. I’m not a hoarder. A collector. That’s what I am. Televisions, lamps, electric fans, anything from the year 1992. The year she left me. That little production code, that number stamped on the bottom of your house hold items, you would look at it and not think twice, but these days that’s all I can think about.
I wake up on another bleak Tuesday and look to my clock. My seven clocks. My seven alarm clocks, all manufactured in 1992. It’s 8:01. I have nothing to do, nowhere to go, as per usual. Some old routine of getting up just to go back to bed.
I stare at the cream pressed tin ceiling, flecks of paint hanging, only just defying gravity. The leaking roof causing rust to accommodate the gaps between each panel of geometric patterned sheet of metal.
“I should really get that roof fixed,” I think to myself, as I do most mornings. I know I won’t.
Drips of water splash loudly into the almost full bucket, protecting my floor from the worst of the dilapidated roof’s generous stream of rain water.
“I should get up and empty that,” I think to myself. I won’t. Not until the bucket begind to overflow.
I drift back into a light, unsatisfying sleep, waking to the sound of cardboard boxed slumping and collapsing in on themselves. Their bottoms are soaked. I jolt up before any further damage and scoop the contents into my arms and throw it to my bed. Books upon books upon books. 1992 was a good year for Penguin, I suppose.
I grab the buckets, water sloshing all down my front. Freezing, it makes me shiver.
They call me a hoarder. I’m not a hoarder. A collector. That’s what I am. Televisions, lamps, electric fans, anything from the year 1992. The year she left me. That little production code, that number stamped on the bottom of your house hold items, you would look at it and not think twice, but these days that’s all I can think about.
I wake up on another bleak Tuesday and look to my clock. My seven clocks. My seven alarm clocks, all manufactured in 1992. It’s 8:01. I have nothing to do, nowhere to go, as per usual. Some old routine of getting up just to go back to bed.
I stare at the cream pressed tin ceiling, flecks of paint hanging, only just defying gravity. The leaking roof causing rust to accommodate the gaps between each panel of geometric patterned sheet of metal.
“I should really get that roof fixed,” I think to myself, as I do most mornings. I know I won’t.
Drips of water splash loudly into the almost full bucket, protecting my floor from the worst of the dilapidated roof’s generous stream of rain water.
“I should get up and empty that,” I think to myself. I won’t. Not until the bucket begind to overflow.
I drift back into a light, unsatisfying sleep, waking to the sound of cardboard boxed slumping and collapsing in on themselves. Their bottoms are soaked. I jolt up before any further damage and scoop the contents into my arms and throw it to my bed. Books upon books upon books. 1992 was a good year for Penguin, I suppose.
I grab the buckets, water sloshing all down my front. Freezing, it makes me shiver.
