May 7th 20.. – Saturday – 03:23
Dear diary,
Last night we lost a comrade. But I can assure you that one mouse dies here, one thousand mice resurrect with the spirit of our deceased friend. We must keep our solidarity and get ready for fierce fights. I saw him struggling in the mouse trap; half of his body was squeezed by the thin metal stick, he was weak with his inner organs came out off his skin. Can you imagine how it feels looking at your dying friends’ eyes and not being able to do anything to save him? It was like a horror movie that had a never-ending murder scene and you forgot that you are watching a movie. I watched my friend dying and the people around were making jokes, laughing, discussing world politics. You idiots don’t deserve to talk any politics because politics exist to make life easier, to make life more peaceful for everyone. Here a life is getting tortured and you think you are smart to talk politics. If I was big enough I would make a human trap, catch the humans who try to catch us and take the revenge for all my ancestors who lost their lives in mouse traps. They don’t only kill us for fun, they also like torturing us, entertain themselves with the blood spilling from the small bodies of my friends and celebrating their hunts as if it is for survival. I cannot believe how disgusting human beings can be sometimes!!!
Not only disgusting, they are also ignorant species. They don’t remember that we were the first residents of this room. We escape from the Great Genocide in the garden at the time of the construction and made this place our home. My grand grandfather used to tell terrible stories about how the houses of his grand grand grand father were destroyed by the heartless construction machines and how they were poisoned to death. Majority of my ancestors living in the garden lost their lives. Some lucky ones managed to enter the building 1 and made themselves a simple living out of the leftovers people leave on their tables or in the rubbish bin. However, the ground floor was easily flooded and rats were galore.
Dear diary, I am writing here so history must know: Rats are our biggest enemies. They exalt power while we mice respect strength. They occupy our lands, steal our food and force us to move far from the major food supplies. And yet, they still attack on us, steal our stock and leave us with nothing to feed our young ones. For rats, we are slaves and we have to work for them so that they will have a comfortable life. Exploiting our labour and enslaving our souls what they enjoy doing the most. Rats think that it is impossible to enjoy both equity and efficiency in a society. Therefore, some must suffer for the efficiency and of course because they are bigger and stronger; all sacrifices are made by the little mice. So we had to escape to far places, to the smallest holes to grow bigger. The only place to move is the upstairs of the buildings where we can easily squeeze into small pipes and make ourselves tiny but comfortable homes. Whenever we have enough power –both physical and spiritual- we will hit back and establish a system in which every soul will live freely, without the fear of being perished by some powerful forces.
My grandfather came to this room before none of the current human residents were here. He kept saying that offices where we should be living due to its relative low population density and the never-ending food supply. There will always be someone bringing food –biscuits, cakes, pies, pieces of sushi, pizza, raisin bread… - and there will always be some leftovers. So we can live on these leftovers. As long as they don’t see us, there is no problem. This is why we do not walk around in the day time and take action only in the evening, after the lights are off. With this mutual respect to our cohabitants, we can survive long years and pursue a happy, prosperous life.
But dear diary, the first person enters the office at 7 am in the morning and sometimes the last person leaves about 10 pm. This means 15 hours of hiding! So we have to wait 15 hours for freely walking on the tables, looking for the food in the bin and making sure that our young ones will be sustained with sufficient amount of daily food. Do you know how hard it is to hush kids with no food in hands and asking them to stop crying? You don’t… You are not a father! I am a father, dear diary and I am a responsible one. My kids’ mother left the room 1.6.07 after hearing too-good-to-be-true news from the first floor where they keep the big garbage bins. I told her that the rats will make our lives miserable, will constantly threaten us. She did not listen to me and went. But I did not go. I did not want my children grow in such an unhealthy, hostile environment. She did not come back since then so you can call me a single father! Maybe she found a new ratfriend and now happily living with him. I heard rats like small mice as wives. How disgrace! How awful! Being a slave in the hands of rats for a comfortable life! No, dear diary! I am a mouse of honour! A good mouse with a few words but a lot of action!
I could not wait this evening for the lights to go off and went out the electric cable line to look for something to bring my three babies. In these days, some teachers stay late either for killing time not to go home or for studying to some exams. In both ways, I pity them. I never felt that way. I always loved my home and always wanted to get back home after “food gathering” excursions. But people are strange! They work long years to set up a family and then once they complete everything, they try all the tricks to stay away from that home. What a sham! What a waste! Anyway, the room was quiet, unusually quiet. Light was on but it seemed to me someone left it on temporarily. Maybe the last person left for a toilet break. I was sure someone would be coming back so I needed to be quick.
I first went to the table of this fat lady who always brings delicious cakes to the office and always leaves some on her table in a plastic pack, wrapped in newspaper. But tonight there was nothing on the table except for a few pieces of crumbs. Damn it! She ate it all! Then I went to the next table where I saw a nice pack of biscuits. I did not know whose table was this as there was no name and I never had food from this table before but it did not matter. I jumped over the biscuits and started gnawing the package. While I was busy dreaming that this would be enough for my kids for tonight, the idea of “someone would be coming soon” slipped away from my mind. I totally forgot that the light was on and a human being might cause a big harm to my life.
Then dear diary, something happened. Something which never happened to any mouse in the whole history of mouse beings occurred in front of my eyes. I did not hear any sound till I lifted my head a bit to have a better bite on the pack. However, at the moment I took my new position I saw her. She was looking at me from a distance of less than a meter. But this is nothing. What would you expect from a mouse to do when he encounters a human face? Run away, right? But I didn’t, dear diary! I couldn’t. She was the most beautiful girl I have ever seen in my whole life. In that millisecond, my heart fell for her, surrendered all the weapons I had and filled with desire to be loved by her. I wish I was Balzac or Tolstoy so I could describe her beauty in words but you know dear diary, there is always distance between the language and reality. We try to minimize this distance with the help of metaphors and surreal symbolisms but I am only a mouse. All I read is the books left on these desks in the night and let it be our secret but most of the books in this office are kitch novels, some post-modern clichés and a few superfluous chick literature. Actually I feel ashamed to see academics read these books and still call themselves academics... Anyway, let’s not get away from the story. I saw her and stunned by her infinite elegance, her incredible charm, her almost invincible attraction...
You believe me, right? She was beautiful. Her face reminded me the pictures of goddesses in Roman mythology, Venus from Botticelli’s painting came to my mind first. Her nose looked very French but somehow I knew she was not French. Her eyes, ahhh her eyes, like a pair of diamonds looking over me to destroy me with her stare. I was the abyss, the secret of her life and she was afraid to fall in, holding the office partition to keep her balance. Her eyes made me frozen, dear diary. I was literally frozen, nailed to the desk, could not move a centimetre but still sniffing her perfume coming towards me together with the growing wave of fear. She smelled like the air after the rain, like the life just saved from an imminent death… Her eyebrows were like the crescent in a cloudless night, her hair was as smooth as the surface of a lake in summer that you would believe a little cockroach could lean forward and drink water...
However, I was not sure if she felt the same way. It seemed she was frozen too. She looked at me with the eyes resembling the windows of an abandoned house! Then her eyes got bigger, her face turned to red, her hands got tense. I sensed some trembling in her body as the desk she was holding started shaking. She left her arm and slapped the book that she was carrying on me with a ferocious force. I barely escaped the hit and run down quickly, passed between her legs –hearing her screams- and disappeared in the pile of used papers. Even after I entered to the electric cable line, I heard her cries, saying things like “dirty, filthy, disgusting…Ohh my God, ohh my God… what should I do now?” I felt broken-hearted but still deep inside I was in love with her. After a while, I calmed down and tried to think more rationally. Yes, I am a mouse and she is a human. But can’t we love each other? I realized that nothing is wrong in our love as long as we have time to solve the problems of cross-species conflicts. At the end, I like cheese, bread, pages of old books and biscuits. She might like red wine, burger king, pizza and Turkish kebab… Apparently she likes biscuits too. So we can learn from each other. The more I think the more I understood her reaction. She did the right thing so I will not judge her for this first incident. I forgave her! I will try hard to make her fall in love with me. I will show her –and the entire world- that we mice are not dirty, filthy, disgusting animals. At least not dirtier, filthier and more disgusting than human beings…
In the night, when I was sure that there was no one in the office, I went to her desk again, stayed there for a while, looked over her books and ate the corners of some pages which she probably touched with her delicate fingers. I also found an Amazon Kindle on her desk and inside there was a good selection of books. If she leaves this kindle on her desk every night, I can even download some books on history of mice and revolutions, read all night.
After filling my stomach and reading 50+ pages from “Of Mice and Men” –What a nice book on friendship between humans and mice. I love Steinbeck!-, I looked out the window, watched motorbikes passing by and dreamed about our good days in the future. It did not fit to my imagination very well but still ok, her beauty and my smart brain could be a perfect match for the future of our world. I dreamed, dreamed and dreamed…
After staying on her desk for about an hour, I took the biscuit pack –and my dreams- and got back my home. On the way I thought again and again, “We will meet again, my love, my precious one, my sweeter-than-honey, my kindle!!!”
May 8th 20.. – Sunday – 23:45
2nd day is here: http://rizaarican.
Dear Ali,
YanıtlaSilThe mouse(not rat) is very cute and this story is interesting. It is attractive enough. I really enjoyed reading and look forward to seeing next story soon!