The Old Man’s Very Old House

By Philip Millheisler

The House, which frightened any child who crossed paths with it; was very lonely. The House was created by somebody, but it didn’t know who. And sometimes it wished that person would return and help him. It hoped that person would repaint its chipped bark. It hoped that person would fix the broken windows. It hopes, really does wish, that it could be fixed. Because then it wouldn’t frighten the children.

But those thoughts would only emerge when The House sat alone in silence. When The Old Man wasn’t around to bother him. Oh yes; that Old Man. His green rotting gums; which use all of their strength just to hold in a few teeth. His one, huge, angry eye; which resided just to the left of his messed up right eye. The eye which had a patch on. Oh yes. Oh yes, indeed… That Old Man. His fat belly, filled to the brim with beer and milk. His tight jeans. His long beard. He was an amalgamation of failure molded into one human being.

        The House was very excited when The Old Man did come about. It was the first time somebody wasn’t disgusted by it's state of being. However, over the years, it has come to dislike this particular visitor. Every night; The Old Man would come over with a six pack of beer, get drunk, scream and pout, shatter glass, and then leave. The House didn’t hate him, but it hated all of the mess that he created. So, during the moments when the Old Man was throwing a drunken fit, The House would try to get some rest.

        Now- a few months back, The House discovered something. There was one particular item which rested inside of him that The Old Man respected. It was a painting. It was a painting of a beautiful woman. The House used to think that because the girl was beatiful, the drunk man refused to attack it. The House first noticed this when The Old Man raised his empty beer glass to throw it, but quickly re-adjusted his angle after noticing the painting in front of him.

        There were many more instances of this before The House decided to experiment. During one of The Old Man’s chaos tornadoes, The House moved the painting right in the path of a flying beer bottle. And when it shattered across the face of the smiling woman, The Old Man stopped. He stopped screaming, he stopped pouting, and he sure as hell stopped throwing. Instead he fell to his knees and started to cry. It was obvious the lady on the painting was somebody special to The Old Man. It wasn't her beauty, it was her.

        After this, The House felt very guilty. It felt bad for The Old Man. This was until The Old Man did something very wrong. Something that would shift The House’s perception of who The Old Man was.

This night in particular, instead of arriving drunk and angry, The Old Man arrived very happy. The House thought that The Old Man had caught a huge turkey for him to feast on tonight; but that was not the case at all. The man dragged a huge, long bag onto a table, and cut it open.

        Once The Old Man started laughing, The House became very confused. Why would he be laughing at a dead body? It was a corpse, what was so funny about that-? Oh wait. Oh yes. Oh; The Old Man. Oh yes indeed… that Old Man. That body was somebody he hurt. It wasn’t The House that was being hurt this time, unfortunately. The House was forgiving, and could take a beating from an angry eighty year old. The young boy lying before him could not.

        The dislike that The House had begun to feel for The Old Man did not grow into anything more, except now The House did feel a strange obligation to punish. And The Old Man would in fact be punished.

        After The Old Man went to sleep, The House took action. It woke up the body. It tapped the body on the shoulder, and the body woke up. Then the body stumbled through the halls of the house before reaching The Old Man. And then the body would tap on The Old Man’s Shoulder. The body ran away, and The Old Man woke up in confused shock. The only thing he could hear were the dampened sounds of feet skiddering away. So, assuming there was an intruder playing tricks on him, he wielded a pistol. When the Old Man reached the table, he noticed the missing body almost as quickly as he noticed the body standing at the other side of the room.

        The House was so amused by The Old Man’s screaming and jumping, the whole building began to shake a little. The shaking did end though. It ended as soon as The Old Man fired his gun directly at the corpse puppet. But The House did one extra thing before the bullet hit him. Do you know what that was? He put the corpse's face on the painting, and the woman’s face on the corpse.

        This time, instead of feeling remorse for its actions; The House felt a rush of glee as the Old Man cried of fear and terror, holding the woman from the painting in his arms. The House laughed as the man held the love of his life in his arms.