Thing

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There was a house.

It had long since been abandoned, the windows boarded up and the rooms dark and dusty. Only a few things were left in this house, after the family that once lived there was forced out of it. A stray chair upstairs, knocked over, once accompanied a desk. An odd stand in the front hall, one that used to hold miscellaneous knick-knacks. Other pieces of furniture scattered throughout the rooms, ranging from an armchair with fabric torn up and dirty from rodents and stray cats that wandered in occasionally, to a mahogany table, with wood that once shone glossy and new, now covered in scuffs and scratches, a thick layer of dust coating it.

But there was one thing, sat on the floor of the living room, laying on its side. It was once a stuffed animal of some sort, but it is now too old and worn to be able to decipher what kind of animal it once portrayed. It had one ear attached to the left side of its head, but it was only a small, somewhat triangular piece of fabric that was ripped at the top. It's head was shaped an odd, oval shape, with two small beady eyes and a small brown nose that was wearing off. The mouth was now were to be seen, and the Thing did not have any arms either.

Any traces of fur left over on the Thing was matted down and dirty, as if it had been handled and hugged and washed so often before. And this Thing was so used to being brought along to trips to a playground and held tightly during the night and loved, that when the Thing was left behind, it was sad. It felt betrayed. Why had the Thing been left behind, when it thought it was loved so dearly?

The Thing thought that if it waited here, that someone would come back for it, and they would tell the Thing that they missed it and loved it and would never let it go. So the Thing waited. It waited for so long, that it began wearing away, becoming older and dirtier with each day it waited. But the Thing kept waiting for anybody to come and help it. But nobody came for the Thing, and it began to lose hope. It lost hope until it didn't believe that anyone would come find it, and it stayed in the same spot for days, months, years maybe, not knowing what to do. The Thing began to think that it was unloved, unwanted, and forgotten.

What the Thing didn't know was that it was loved, no matter how worn out and sad and different it had become. The Thing had spent so long believing that nobody was going to find it, or love it, or understand it, that it forgot that someone else was out there, someone who was also feeling alone and forgotten. This someone was still looking for someone just like the Thing, someone who was lonely and scared and imperfect. But the Thing just had to keep waiting, because one day, whether that day be tomorrow or next week or next year, the Thing will find someone. They will find the Thing, and they will look past the fact that the Thing doesn't have arms, or a mouth, and has big, ripped feet, and beady eyes, and is missing an ear. They will find the Thing and they won't see the flaws. Instead they will see how much strength the Thing has, how they have suffered for so long, and they will take the Thing and show them newer, brighter places, and they will care for the Thing, more than anyone ever could.

The Thing just has to keep waiting. And even though the Thing might lose hope, it will never give up, because the Thing knows that it should never give up waiting.

And so the Thing kept on waiting.

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