Belonging - MWBB

It seems to be becoming a regular weekly to think for me to get placed in the Mid-Week Blues Buster weekly Flash Fiction competition. And with this weeks I was sure that my depressing little story wouldn't make it, but it still managed to get a 2nd place.

The prompt was a song:

  “Home” by Depeche Mode

 

They’d gone, and she sat there alone in the lounge; her lounge, her home, but she couldn’t connect the dots, she couldn’t quite feel the connection.

She absorbed the silence, enjoying the peace. But was it peace? The house was empty, silent, still, as though waiting to be filled. It reflected how she felt.

She had the weekend. They were gone just for the weekend, and she had wanted that. She couldn’t have gone again and pretended to be with them, to be a part of the big yearly gathering. Sitting apart, watching, spectating as they all interacted with each other, but never quite with her. Ten years she had been going, but it was enough. The ice hadn’t thawed; she would never be a part of it, she would always sit on the outside. And however hard it had been to watch her husband and children go without her, the confused look on their little faces as mummy stayed behind, the guilt was quashed by the overwhelming feeling of relief. 

And so here she was home alone. Home. She loved some of the rooms in this house; their smell, their decoration, their furnishings. And it wasn’t just hers, it was theirs; a partnership, something they built together. So why did she feel so disconnected from it? 

She stood up and went upstairs, fussing the two cats on the bed – no home was complete without one. And she asked herself, what was she seeking? What more did she need, to reach that sense of belonging, of satisfaction, of completeness?

She sat on the bed and faced the big window looking out at the sky, watching the clouds go by as she had when she was a small child.

Back then she would escape to the bottom of the garden and get on the swing. Leaning back she would dream of being up there amongst them, imagine their softness, their quiet foggy calm, and imagine being able to drift away with them. But in reality she was trapped here on the ground, in a life of being ignored, being invisible, unless someone needed a hug from her or to shout at her about something. Dragged along to events for moral support or to be shown off, but never to hear her, never to talk to her, or interact with her. She’d never actually been a part of any of it, she was just an extra used to fill a space.

And that had spilled over into her adult life. She went through the motions; doing as was expected or wanted of her, but never quite being there, never fully present, always a step back, watching and waiting to be invited in.

And here she was in her own home, not fully belonging, or feeling present; choosing to withdraw, rather than take part.

She so wanted to change it and break out, but she could only do that in her imagination and in her writings. She sighed getting up and going upstairs to the loft, to her desk under the skylight. The computer was waiting for her. inviting her in to its world of social networks and communities, giving her somewhere to belong and something to be a part of.