CLASSIC MAN

When the Clocks Strike One

An Orwellian society

Photo by Nikita Khavkin on Unsplash

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It was a bright cold day in April, and the clocks were striking thirteen.

The silence of the crowd made the atmosphere too strange to even whisper. People were rushing here and there, but no one was moving forward, towards the tall black metal gate, behind which lay a mystery.

I dared to stop, and looked at the gate, as if it called my name.

But the rushing crowd drifted me away.

I walked with the push and pull from other people, but my mind was still hanging at the metal gate.

What was behind it?

I wondered. And only wondered. I didn’t have the courage to turn around and seek the answer myself.

But the ringing in my ear didn’t stop, it was calling my name, in daylight, at midnight.

It was a bright cold night in April, and the clocks were striking one.

I found myself again at the foot of that tall black metal gate and I found the courage to move forward this time.

I pushed it gently, and it flung open, as if there was a force behind me, with me, that wanted answers as much as I did.

I walked inside, into a place that can only be described as strange; it had a weird smell, it had a weird noise, it had a weird taste. The wind there was much colder, colder than I’d ever felt, but it had warmth in it.

Warmth!

In April?

I was sure, there was some new machine made for the lucky few; the ones with privileges, the ones with luxuries, the ones with life.

And I knew, I wasn’t one of them.

And I knew, if one of them saw me there, they would kill me.

But I dared not to step outside that warmth which I felt after years of cold.

I stayed, like a rebel.

I stayed, like a coward, who wanted to hide from the coldness of the world.

I stayed, like a human, who wanted warmth.

And I found myself again.

In the world of Big Brother, there is no warmth in the air, just a small abandoned park hiding behind a tall black metal gate.

This story is inspired by George Orwell’s dystopian novel, 1984.

Thanks Stephen Dalton for this amazing prompt: Clock.

When the world we live in is deprived of warmth, then what’s the point?

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