We arrived at the doctor’s home an hour after the incident, at a very unfortunate time. The doctor, a man named Theodore Snape, lived in the wealthiest district of our town, in a home that rested on the edge of a great mountain. It was called The WatchTower, for it contained a long spire that allowed the owner to see far into the distance.
His home was made in a modern design, with many windows of various sizes and shapes. The door was a grand entrance. It was red with a shiny brass knob and a crystal window that allowed only the vaguest ideas to be conveyed through to the other side. The house itself was made of marble and had statues decorating its perimeter. There were also well groomed gardens about the property with rich soil and lovely rose bushes.
Along the path up to Dr.Snape’s home were little bushes of flowers and water features with young children playing and splashing and squirting water from their mouths. They looked like fairies. They wore crowns of twisted dandelions and had pointy noses and ears. I thought of when I was a child, playing with my brothers in my parents backyard, and all of a sudden, the night’s cloudless escape into the heavens weighed heavier than before.
As we passed the statues of the young children, I noticed too that they each had a patinated plate with a name on it. They called me. I was forced to stare as my donkey slowly stepped up the stone path. Once free of their call, I looked back to see Samuel. He was smiling, enjoying the scenery just like me.
“Nature is truly beautiful,” he said, noticing my glance in his direction.
I agreed.
“You know,” he continued, “if it were not for the trees and the breeze and the shaking of leaves, I would not be here. I would have tossed my cup to the sidewalk, just as fate had me do today, by accident.”
“They mean that much to you?” I asked, parking my ass near the doctor’s door. For a flash, I saw into his glamorous home through a side window. On the wall hung photos of the doctor and his family. There were group pictures and photos of them all individually. They seemed happy. But then my attention was stolen back to Samuel, who, trying to communicate his whimsy of life, began to cough heavily.
He regained himself, laying still, wrapped tightly with the shirts of those who loved him. “If I…” he said weakly, but still with a smile, “If I had not learned to love the life around me, I would have never learned to love my own, to love your life, to love all of life. For just as you will say that you and I are different from trees, I will say we are the same… we are nothing more than borrowed energy-- you and me-- and soon I will be a tree, at least in some way, once I die.”
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and then Add to home screen.