The lock had no key. Not one that could be found anywhere in the house.
He knelt in front of the chest and tapped the lock with his finger, watching it swing back and forth. Taunting him.
He would have broken the chest open if it wasn’t built so sturdily. But it was solid metal with an enclosed hinge he couldn’t get at. There was no way to get it open without the key, not with the tools he had access to.
The letter that had accompanied the chest had said his heart’s desire was inside. Everything he wanted and needed was inside that chest. His life would be made complete and whole if he opened the chest.
The possibilities of what could be inside the chest taunted him. He had been living a fairly contented life until the chest had appeared, and after that he was tormented by his wonderings about what was inside.
Gold? Jewels? Straps of hundred dollar bills? The mystery was killing him.
The arrival of the chest had destroyed his contentment with his own life. He’d gone from waking up with a sense of enthusiasm for the day to come to a feeling of desperation as he remembered the chest and what might or might not be inside.
Ever since the chest had arrived two weeks before, he hadn’t had a complete night’s sleep. He would wake up and look at the chest, his mind unable to let it go. Wanting to know what was inside more than he wanted whatever was inside. The wondering was what tormented him.
What was his heart’s desire? He didn’t know. But somehow it was inside that chest. Waiting for him to open the chest and claim it as his own.
But there was no key, and even if he had the key, it would be of no use. The hole of the lock had been filled with a clear glue, something he had discovered when he had tried to pick the lock.
He hated whoever had sent him the chest. This mystery he could not solve because he lacked the necessary tools and didn’t trust to take it to anyone else that might decide to claim the contents for their own.
Before the chest arrived, he was happy.
He thought he had been happy.
But now he didn’t even know what happiness was. All he knew was that he wanted.
=END=
~Harper Kingsley
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I love this!