Short Stories by Me

The Chinese Jewlery Box

I am the Chinese jewelry box. Not a he, not a she, simply an "it". If I were to describe myself, I would say that I am black with thin drawings of mountains and lakes and rivers, and all my drawers are carpeted with red velvet. My lock is broken and can slide off easily. One of my drawers is missing and when I play music, it's slow and hard to follow.

This is my life story.

Mind you, I had just been imported from a little woodshop in China.

One day, in my little antique shop, I sat on a shelf, watching over the people walking around and looking for the perfect thing. The small store was quiet, and I liked it that way. No one would be loud, rushing around with the exception of the occasional little child that giggled through the store. An old man came down my aisle near the back of the small store, and his eyes fell on me. And then after he gave me a solid look through, he picked me up and we soon left the store.

We traveled a long way until, finally, we reached a small house in a large neighborhood. The man crept quietly into the house and wrapped me in paper. I stayed there, in the dark, for only one day. When morning came, I was lifted up and the paper was peeled back. I stared into the beautiful face of a young woman.

She smiled as her dark eyes glistened, her hair pulled up neatly in a bun. This lady was my first owner. She filled me with beautiful jewels that I admired day and night.

After years of living with them, the house filled with laughing and talking. The woman took me in her hands and brought me to a table with people sitting all around.

They "ooo-ed and ahhh-ed" over me as my owner held me above the table. A child rushed past and bumped into the woman. Surprised, she dropped me and I fell the four inches that it took to get to the table, but it felt like an eternity. I felt my insides jump, literally.

Everyone gasped and examined me for scars. When they tried to play my music, it was slower. A lot slower. The young woman was horrified. One of her most prized possessions was partially broken. Some of the people scolded the child. Eventually, they all left. I gently wept that night, but no one heard it because human ears are too weak for us.

As decades passed, the couple grew old and older, yet I didn't. One day, when both the man and the woman were not young and their hair was pure grey, the old man didn't wake up, and only after a few days, the lady passed as well, so they were soon taken away. A younger woman came to the cottage a week later, looking pained.

She took away my friends, the jewelry, the dresser, the hairbrush, as well as many other things, ignoring their protest.

We were all loaded onto a large van, and closed off from the world. After hours of sitting in the dark, there was light.

Glorious, happy, natural sunlight.

Many men and women took us out and put us in a plain square room. It kind of reminded me of a garage, and it was very stuffed with all of the furniture and little trinkets. I was set far away from any of the bedroom items, therefore I knew none of them. The things that I was next to claimed to be from a bedroom.

"Which one?" I responded.

"The guest bedroom. Where are you from?" they replied.

"The master bedroom, where the old couple used to sleep," I replied proudly.

The furniture didn't believe me so I wasn't friends with them. All the trinkets got annoying fast. I didn't become friends with any of them, either.

We all stayed there for years, and everyone eventually got quiet. Nothing left to say. No more stories to share, and no more memories to make. No more sounds worth making. No more anything. This was it.