Life Happens
but you must keep pushing on
I remember being young and having aspirations in life, always wanting something bigger and better but those dreams were out of my actual reach. I miss being the young and naive Uptika but now I am old and life has been slowly eating away at my longevity. 70 years ago I would not have imagined myself to be homeless and hungry, living on prayers and the scraps of other people.
All of you pass by me on the street with eyes full of either disgust or pity, that is if I am even worth the time for you to send a glance my way. I haven't had a shower, a nice meal, or a bed to lay on in over a year. I wasn't always homeless. I had a real life, a house, a wife, and a dog, before I lost it all and now I can only call the streets my home.
I am a retired school teacher and my wife was an artist. Life used to be hard, or so I thought before I became homeless. We were living paycheck to paycheck, just like all of you who pass me on the street. Struggling time to time to pay the mortage and have our bellies full, but we still always managed, that was before the fire.
Flames licked away at the walls of my home, smoke-filled all of the rooms, everything turning ash, including my wife, my dog, my whole life, all these years of memories are now just smoke in the wind. Insurance refused to pay out my claims, they decided since I was the only one to escape that it had to have been my plan all along to burn my house down with my wife included. They tried to make me out to be a murderer, they lied to news reporters, ruined my reputation, and their rumors were believable that my pension was put on indefinite holding. Their investigation would take more than a year to even conduct, meaning I am now left with nothing and a bad reputation.
I did not start the fire nor would I have ever. I miss Julie everyday, she was my entire life.
About the Creator
Devin McGurk-Nixon
Navy veteran, wild writing imagination, dog lover, and avid coffee drinker. Enjoy some of the stories that still float around in my head.
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