Long Street's Orange Window

The night closed the bright orange window which had been passed by the cycle boy every single day since June, way back in '84. The window had been a loyal admirer of the umpteen tunes that the boy whistled to. He was a merry boy, and the window- a merry aged, unaltered element of the street. A landmark. A bellwether of its own kind, as the paints of yellow peeled open the red bricks, bit by bit, day by day, year by year.

Not a soul peeked from inside you know, yet it was the most lively detail in the whole of good ole Long Street, they said. Romeos would park their bikes next to it, and wait for them pretty pretty girls swinging their way in long evening dresses and high buns. Peddlers would string on their ukuleles and sing to Gene Autry and wink at the kind pedestals with pennies. Police men would eventually shoo them off and patrol around lazily, or join them and hum along when drunk.

The humor was in the gospel according to the neighbors around, that more the wall peeled, more the cracks peered, and more the pipes rusted...a strange sense of comfort manifested in the daily participants of Long Street. That old orange guy was a perpetual furniture on the abandoned wall that was a favorite, to all of them. It reassured them, it made aging easier, it calmed them, it was a part of their Christmas, Fête des lumières, Easter, and Hanukkah. It was a part of their wails when all the kitchens in the street would hear the fat maiden cry at her misfortune or yell at her goat who was bulled by her cat, again.


Either way, against all odds, the orange window was family to their secrets and hopes, to marital alliances or broken homes.. 
Either way, against all odds, the orange window would be there, tomorrow, the day after, and the day after that. 

- Nil. :)