The Good Life

Gregory needed light. He couldn't see much of anything. His hands fumbled in the dark across knives, grenades, and mouse traps. Finally, they felt the familiar touch of a matchbox. He picked it up. Not a single match resided inside. He kept feeling around until he found another matchbox. Still no matches. This happened to poor Gregory again and again. It happened 19 straight times. Only when he grabbed the twentieth matchbox did he find a match.

He wondered why his parents had 19 empty matchboxes, but just put it out of his mind. When the realization that he needed a candle hit him, his heart sank. But then a lemon-scented candle dropped from nowhere and whacked him on the head in much the same way that a rock would if it had been thrown at his head for no reason.

But that didn't matter too much. Because as soon as he lit the candle, he had the bright light he had been craving.

Gregory walked into his kitchen. In the light of the abnormally bright candle, he saw something strange. A Turkish Vegetable-Eating Horse was looking through his mail. He let him finish. The horse whinnied while perusing a letter from New York. Then he walked out of Greg's house casually.

He picked up the letter and after brushing a horse hair off of the envelope, began to read. He read about familiar violins, long days in June, and memories of bitterly cold winters. Then he got to the last sentence. It didn't follow the previous train of thought. In fact, it seemed to belong to its own letter. It said, "Gone." That was it. Just "Gone."

The oddness of that word did not have time to properly sink in to poor Gregory's head. A thief named Tom made sure of that. It was a blow to the head that made him forget the past 13ish months. He spent many years trying to remember it. Yet he never could. Just one moment remained burned into memory despite the amnesia. That memory cannot be described. Not because it is indescribable, but because it is known by every single human being who ever drew breath.

And that is the end of my story.