Writing Prompt: The Old Dusty Book

@SoulfullyAButterfly

The old, dusty book sat untouched on the shelf for decades until one day..."

The young boy who lived in that centuries old house, with creepers hanging from the every corners of the house and broken walls, came back from Blukin after having heard about his mother's health degrading. When he came to the house, his mother, in her 90s was lying in the bed, gasping for breath. The nurses were running from the front and back of the corridor bringing out bowls of cold water and clean towels. One nurse was wiping her forehead while she was burning from fever and coughing continually. The doctor was called, he had said that there is no hope for her. The best she can live is up-to a day or two. And that's exactly what happened, after two days of non stop coughing and even vomiting blood sometimes, his mother breathed her last.

The boy was heart broken, he wept holding his dead mother's cold hands, he remembered how she had loved him dearly and always took care of them. His father was in the army, served in the war against another countries. He was given a gold medal for outstanding service, but unfortunately that was the only thing from his father's remains that came which came back home, or so he was told. His father died fighting against another country. His mother had always taken care of his grandma and him from where he can remember.

After the funeral was over, he came back home. It was raining heavily, thundering outside. He went in a room, which was locked for years, he wasn't allowed to go there. He was told that there was nothing there except for old rags and books. He entered the room, in hopes of finding any of his mother's old belongings as he knew the house would have to be sold, he would be returning tomorrow to Blukin.

It was thundering and raining heavily. It was dark outside and inside. It was pitch black. The pattering sound of the heavy rain and the sound of thunder was causing ringing in his ears.

He lighted a candle, the light scattered and brightend the whole room. As if the long lasting gloom from the room had vanished from the room with the darkness. He saw a old table, with a paper on it and a pen kept beside. The room was covered full of dust from all this years and many torn clothes and rags. He spotted a shoe, a little torn and destroyed and covered in dust, lying amidst the the rags and newspapers. The color had faded mostly, but he realized that it was pink someday. The shoe, actually heels, not too long , were of a woman. He couldn't find the other pair near. There was also a book shelf in the room, made of wood. Most of the wood was eaten by the termites. He was surprised that there were no rats in that room. He suddenly spotted an old dusty book, lying alone in the darkness of the shelf. It was covered in a red cloth.

He took it out of the shelf, removed the dust and the red cloth. The book was actually an old diary. He opened the diary, it said 1908 - 1917. He opened the first page, it was written by his dad. He had seen his name on the cover. He had written about many things, from being selected in the army to having parties with his friends and fighting a gruesome war against their enemies. He noticed some pages were torn from the ending of the writing. He couldn't understand what happened that he tore the pages. He put the down the book on the self and went near the table. There was a paper on it ( as told previously) and a pen. It was a torn paper, a bit crinkly and yellowish covered with tones of dust. The pen was a fountain pen, a very old one. He took the paper, something was written on it in his dad's handwriting . He hold it in front of the candle. It was written,

" Please run away from there, you won't be able to reach me, I am very far away from where I was suppose to. It is an emergency, please take Tom and leave the country. Don't worry about me, I will see you all soon. Take care of yourselves and him."

Tom, the name of the young boy, was surprised to see that paper with his name written on it. He didn't understand why was the the note was lying there, and to whom did his father wrote it to. He put it down and decided to make a visit to the basement of the house, just to check if there was something there too.

The basement, was full of dust and dirt. It seemed like it wasn't opened for ages. It was more dirty than the old room in which he found that diary. The basement didn't had any windows, it was getting hard to breathe. The rain was falling even more harder, with thunders in between time to time. He saw, in that dim light of the candle, there was lying a suitcase, brown and with black stripes, ages old. It was looking grey due to the dust covering it. He thought that it did be good to open and see what was in it so he got the suitcase out of the basement..

After bringing it outside the basement, he felt like something stood there when he was trying to carry the suitcase upstairs, just at the corner of the room. Tom brushed off the feeling, thinking probably it was a mouse. Tom noticed that the suitcase didn't had any lock, he didn't understand why. Why would someone even throw a suitcase in the basment without a lock? He thought that there might not be anything much important, so maybe that's why.

He opened it, to his surprise, there lie a pink shoe, just like the other one in the room, a heels, not too long. But it was clean as it was kept in the suitcase. Beside that, there was an envelope. He opened it, there were many pictures. Some were of his dad and his friends and one woman. He saw his dad drinking and having picnic with his friends in some pictures. And a woman beside his dad ,holding hands together. He couldn't recognize the woman, it wasn't his mother. Who is she?

There were some letters too, from a person named Emily to his father. He opened one letter, it was dated 11 March 1913. The letter read,

" Dear John, I can't wait to see you again. It has been very lonely here without you. The war is getting more intense, I hope you are all okay. I have some big news to share , we will soon be welcoming a new member, maybe a junior me or you. Please come back soon,

Your beloved,

Emily "

Tom was very puzzled, his mother's name was not Emily, nor any other person he might know. Who is this lady? He checked the address, but couldn't read it. It was faded and the only thing he could read was, Hilstom.

Hilstom? Isn't that place in Jarenfit? He is sure he doesn't have anyone that lives in Jarenfit. It was their enemy country, why would he have anyone there? He opened another letter, it was from the same address. It read,

" John, I am in hiding just as you said, but it's really getting difficult to continue to stay here anymore. They are after us, I don't know what will happen to me and Tom, I don't even know if I can ever write you back after this letter, Please I just have one last request, please, if something ever happens to me, please keep my child safe, please don't let anything ever happen to him. I am thinking to leave him at one of my friends house, you know who I am talking about. I will be going somewhere else to hide. They will try their best to reach you, please save him. This is my last request from you.

Emily. "

Tom stood there silently, he was shocked and didn't knew what he just read.

Everything suddenly made sense to him, everything that has all this time had hit him, at this moment, he realized what happened. He understood that his mom, who he thought was, wasn't really. They weren't able to reach dad, were they? He knew from the note lying on the table that some people weren't able to reach his father's place with Tom. This only means one thing, they escaped from Jarenfit with him, after getting another letter from dad saying that they should escape. This all must have been kept from him so he doesn't know the truth. They wanted to keep Tom safe, so they raised him as their own after getting news of father's death. This means that the woman, Emily, is his real mother! But was she from the enemy country? What happened to her?

Maybe she also died, maybe she was caught. But he still can't understand one thing, who left that note on that table, shouldn't it be inside this suitcase too just like the other letters?And was that shoe also of his real mother, who also may have not made it? How did they came back here?...

He was lost in all of this thoughts, when suddenly he felt a sudden shiver, passing through his body, bringing a sense of unknown relief to him.

-By Taru

I know this story is really long and cringe and I had to end it this way with so many things questioned. My charge was dying lol, it took me two hours to write this. You can interpret the ending however you want, with coming up with your own answers. Please forgive me for any grammatical errors or something which didn't make sense ( English isn't my first language and this is the first thing I ever wrote).

Thank you for reading this story 💙

@SoulfullyAButterfly

The old, dusty book sat untouched on the shelf for decades until one day...the book got tired and singed: "I have this thing where I get older, but just never wiser