The Thinking Chair

It stood right there in the corner of her room, each morning since she had ever known; it was always there, unwavering, faithful. It was her grandfather’s chair and she remembered climbing onto his lap watching him as he rolled his pipe and settled down to begin a story. The magical quality of the stories was enhanced by their unfolding within those layers of hazy smoke that came from his pipe.
That was a long time ago and since he had passed away the chair was seen as redundant and discarded into her room which was also a makeshift storeroom. She recollected not minding it because it reminded her of him, his tobacco scented breath and the sweet-smell of his beard forever etched in her memory.
Those were some of the best childhood memories she had, the time she spent with him always passed by in a haze and she could keep listening to him for hours. He had the most peculiar way of telling stories, his stories never seemed to have an appropriate beginning or end, they was like one big story of which the smaller stories were instances. She would keep asking him if the story was over and he’d always say, “It’s up to you little one, the story is only finished when you want to hear no more of it.” She remembered thinking about how the story would never end and become like one of the Arabian nights tales because as far as she was concerned, getting tired of any story for her was like getting tired of splashing in monsoon puddles in the heart of Central Street and she surely wasn’t getting tired of that anytime soon.
It made her sigh, childhood fantasies. He called it his thinking chair, he said the chair gave him the inspiration to weave the web of stories and that he wouldn’t have been able to recite a simple tale if he wasn’t sitting on his thinking chair. She had almost believed him and had fervently prayed for its safe return when one of its arm-rests needed repairing and had been sent to the carpenter.
Story-telling had always fascinated her. Conceptualizing another character’s scheme of thoughts had always excited her. After his death, she had tried to gather the courage to give it a try, but being too scared of the outcome, of the very thought that the chair wouldn’t respond to her and refuse to flood her imagination.
It always felt good, thinking of the past, her most intimate joys and insecurities made her feel as good as sipping hot coffee and snuggling into her rug while it rained outside, comforting, that was the word.
She had managed to become a writer, though not a very famous one but she enjoyed her work and that was the only thing that mattered. This visit to her old house to clear out her room because it was being sold, re-introduced her to a world that had been her own, not a very long time ago. This time she decided to give it a try, there was no childish fear anymore, only the inkling of curiosity made her want to give it a shot.
She settled down on the chair and closed her eyes, all she saw was his sparkling face and flashes from the multitude of stories he had told her. At that moment she knew. Under his protective shell of self-sufficiency lay the desire to have a safety net. It had always been her, all his inspiration to narrate stories had been her, her enthusiastic face always ready to get blown away by his tales, and she knew he could have never disappointed her. She was his thinking chair.







This is something i wrote ages ago, figured i must have all that I've written in one place, forgive the violation of space-time.