Blog 18: Betrayal

This was how it treated him? After all of the time and effort he’d poured into it this was his reward.
In peace children bury their parents but in war parents bury their children. He was at war now and his child was sure to die. He had devoted himself to it. He had focused all his attention on it’s appearance and maintaining its health. Now it repaid his efforts with nothing but weak effort ill befitting his sacrifices.
He turned the key again. The engine spluttered as the stalled car tried in vain to obey its infuriated master. Nothing. He got out, slamming the door and kicked it. He screamed at the injustice of his predicament. This was his baby, bought with hard earned savings. He had nurtured the vehicle lovingly for years. It consumed only the most trustworthy fuel and was polished not with rags but the softest torn furnishings. He had sweated over the engine for countless hours before wiping away the sweat lest its salt rust his beloved.
He had poured more life into that car than he had left now. It’s failure appalled him as he wondered why he had worshipped so long at the temple. His offerings of polish, fuel and parts were for nothing as he stared it broken.
He might have asked where his life had gone but he knew that every second was etched into the components of the engine or there in the custom paintwork of the modified bodywork. His trophy wife shrivelled before him as he stared in horror at the years wasted to maintain the monster. He couldn’t even claim to have given up on his addiction. It was his drug that had decided he wasn’t worth its time.
In a final farewell he set fire to it, still in his driveway. I burnt quickly, the flames tearing away layers of his obsession. He watched the heat melt the plastic that held together the broken glass and moved back to avoid the blast as the petrol tank exploded.
Neighbours would say he was mad but he knew inside that spitting on the grave of his creation was the most constructive investment he’d put towards it.