The choices are what define us

His soul burned as he took the keys, a trembling hand attempted to open the doors of a place he once called home. He was wrapped in worm clothes and guilt spilled all over him. Still tasting the finest scotch the town could offer in his mouth, his drunk mind had once again wished he hadn’t drank that night. When he opened his eyes to see the rotten wooden doors, he knew that regrets don’t come as he thought. He tasted their bitterness, caught red handed by himself in the middle of his recollection. “Not now…” was all he thought of it.

He hadn’t been here in years. But tonight it was different, he had lost his last and only true regret. The rusty key that he kept around his neck had finally been used, almost breaking in the lock. His hand shortly glided on the wood before reaching for the space behind it as it pushed the doors away. The place was now a ruined memory, held in pieces only in his mind. He stopped at the dusty bed of his childhood, his sacred sanctuary he never wanted to leave, and then the images merged together, forming new ones as he dreamt that night.

     

A crate in front of him stood

It wasn’t touched for long

But he thought that he could

 

And so the life had given to him, a lemon. Why? Only because he dared to take it.

 

He reached for the lemon inside the crate, looking at it with hunger in his eyes. Was it his to take? Should he do it? He asked himself for just a brief moment before deciding to hold it in his hand. It was warm and shined yellow as hard as it ever could.

It is perfect, he thought. Considering it a sin to take it. Behind him, he heard footsteps. A crowd with peaceful expressions on their faces had stared at what he had in his hand. He knew they wanted it, as much as he did, and yet they weren’t going to fight for it. Instead they made a path for him to pass between them.

Not trusting that they wouldn’t collapse around him once he got between them, he stood there looking at all of them individually. What were then peaceful faces with seconds they turned angrier, and the path was narrowing down. He ran desperately between the crowds which turned towards him as he passed.

He passed all of them with a heavy heart. He felt like a criminal, and the jury was behind him. At the end he found the empty streets, only a small girl, a beggar. He stopped, as if he froze on the spot. She wore ripped clothes covered in dirt with hands in front of her, pressed against one another, asking for the man’s possession. He took pity on the child, gave her the lemon and kept running from the crowd behind them. But now, they swallowed the girl, and he could see her no longer