The Cabin

A, Cold, Dead, Uncaring Night

I woke up on a winter morning in the same position that I had woken up from a thousand nights and days, next to a cardboard box.
The box was the only thing that had always stayed by my side throughout all those years of wandering around from place to place, surviving, having to figure out how I was gonna get my next meal, every night and day.
After getting up and stretching, I put my cardboard box away and started walking around.

Eventually, I found a local dollar store near me, I set up camp and started begging for money. Every day I had done this, maybe in one of these people, there was a kind soul that would spare me even a dollar.
Most people looked at me with disgust, as if they were looking at an animal, one drenched in sewer water. I used to be able to look at their faces. It hurt, and I didn't wanna keep looking at their dead expressions, so I learned to just look down, as if I were some puppy that didn't know its place. Hours passed, and I still had an empty cup, but in time, someone finally stood in front of me.

I thought to myself that maybe someone had finally arrived, someone that was gonna save my day, an angel on Earth, but the person was neither angel nor from a heavenly place.
He had a nice suit, a well-kept mustache, some pair of pants I couldn't even tell what kind they were, and a pair of leather shoes.

For minutes on end, he just stood there with a sinister smile on him, as if I was entertainment for him, such as seeing a lion jump through rings of fire. Then finally he crouched down and said,

"Money is what you want, right?"
I responded with
"Yes...please spare some money for me."

He then sat beside me and pulled a cigar out of his pocket and lit it up, took a big puff and blew it on my face, he took it out of his mouth and said
"Well if you want money why can't you get a job"
I say
"No one wants a stinky middle aged man to work for em"
he took another puff off his cigar and blew it on my face for the second time

"You know I despise people like you, begging here in front of a dollar store, don't you think that the people that come here are also struggling."

But no, you don't think about that. You think only of yourself. You and your selfishness" I looked down to my feet, feeling ashamed of myself, building up the courage to respond with "Sir...I never said you had to give me money, but I would most certainly appreciate it, if it is in your heart" this time his face turned from a smug face to a pissed off one, he took two puffs and instead of blowing it on my face he blew in front of him. As if saying I wasn't worthy of being blown on. He laid, still finishing his cigar up until it reached his fingers.

In the absence of speech, I too laid there with him, wrapping my head around how I got to this point. It was only a few years ago when I was in this man's shoes. It was 2008, and I was but a humble CEO of a decently large company. I had all that money could buy, luxurious cars with leather seats, a nice big mansion, and most importantly, I had the most beautiful wife and kids. This wouldn't last long, as I had, at the time, invested into real estate, and that year was when the 2008 financial crisis happened. Everything turned downwards for me. I let the hundreds of voices around me tell me that nothing could go wrong, I didn't need to worry about a thing, yet there I was, with nothing but a lemon in my hands. Hundreds of dollars were gone overnight, washed away. My wife no longer had any use of me, and she divorced me and took the little I had, making me use the remaining funds on that divorce. By the end of it, I didn't even have the lemon. Left wandering the streets, the only thing that she gave me was the cardboard box that I was sleeping on. She told me that from then on, all I could and was gonna do was beg, no longer human in her eyes.

In her eyes, I was nothing but a tree with money leaves. And just like when people want to do something else with the land of a tree, I was cut down. It was 2015, and years had passed since I saw her and the kids. And even with all that, I still hoped for a day when I returned to that place, that heavenly throne of mine. That's why I sit here next to this rotten man. It's like looking into a mirror. I too had played with the souls of the less fortunate back then, maybe this was God punishing me for not appreciating what I had, so blinded by greed I didn't realize what was in front of me. The man stood up and put out his cigar with his shoe declaring to me "It's decided, I shall give you a job, a job worthy of such a smelly animal" I too stood up and asked him "What kind of job?" He responded with,"You will find out once you're there, now come with me. " he started walking away from me, and I hurried and picked my things up, especially my cardboard box.