III. Bohemian Rhapsody

     Twenty five years was a long time to spend in a box. Over a half of his life was locked away in that small cement box. A locked iron door served as the only unforgiving adornment. It was mere punishment at first, to him, but then the stunning loneliness became less and less tolerable as the time crawled by. The cell seemed to shrink every so often, the space becoming tighter and tighter until it seemed there was barely room to breathe. His prison cell was slowly, unstoppably becoming his coffin. As the walls closed in, he began to pound, pound, pound on the door, screaming for someone, for anyone. His life flashed before him – his average childhood, rough adolescence, marrying his college sweetheart, putting a gun to a man's head and pulling the trigger until it clicked empty. And then his life ended and hell began. He scratched furiously at the walls, searching for a flaw or a crack or a single mote of dust captured by oh-so-glorious sunlight. But there was nothing. He was going to die and rot away in a box. Life had just begun, and then he'd gone and thrown it all away. He could still hear his mother crying when he called her for the last time. He tried to tell her that it would be alright, that in the grand scheme it didn't really matter… but she knew better. She knew. He relaxed and closed his eyes as his cell shrunk further. A soft laugh escaped his lips, growing quickly into a gut-splitting cacophony of pure, mindless joy.