Tag Archives: Short Story

Little Girl

By Matti Linke

“old iron gate” by Core­Force is licensed under CC BY 2.0

The day start­ed with a cold waft from a freez­ing night in the mid­dle of March, as the warm light from the slow­ly ris­ing sun filled the old but well-kept house of Mr. Par­nell with bright­ness. It crawled from the kitchen sink over every cup­board to the emp­ty wood­en din­ing table and the flow­ered arm­chair in the lounge, paved its way to the frayed car­pet in the small hall­way and revealed the out­lines of the main door, an incon­spic­u­ous iron gate, cov­ered with branch­es and tendrils.

Although the house includ­ed a few more rooms, you could nev­er see through the heavy drapes behind the win­dows, falling grave­ly from the cur­tain rods. Nei­ther Mr. Par­nell nor his lit­tle girl ever used the rooms, which were filled with antique fur­ni­ture, old paint­ings, sculp­tures, and var­i­ous col­lec­tables. Every lit­tle piece had its prop­er place, well ordered but in their sheer mul­ti­tude sim­ply unfath­omable. The nar­row base­ment, which was most­ly used as a stor­age room for gro­ceries, had anoth­er tiny win­dow, but it was noth­ing more than a vent and way too small to let any light in or out.

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