Timeless Sympathy by Hana Carolina

Our house was what dreams were made of—a hazy vision of lost grandeur, countless rooms, and long corridors leading to an airy parlour. A crumbling gilded ceiling glittered in the light seeping through tall windows. A polished table with a deep, glassy sheen, where I sat my laptop, stood on the elegant curve of Queen Anne’s legs. Georgian bookcases were crowded with dusty oil lamps, their glass chimneys catching the cold, sterile shine of fairy LED lights. A heavy marble fireplace, its mantle cluttered with birthday cards, roared into the night.

Guests arrived and left unannounced—friends, friends of friends, close and distant family, remembered and forgotten acquaintances, and sometimes, rarely, those unfamiliar to all—from shadowy figures in powdery wigs dressed in silver-threaded doublets, to lonely, ragged strangers wrapped in shapeless rugs, dry lips stretched in toothless smiles—ever present yet vacant, as natural and unquestionable as the ivy climbing our garden walls.

Uneasy after a horrid day at work—as determined to relax as if resting was another task I had to finish before being allowed to go home—I found myself pacing amongst the labyrinthine corridors, old floorboards creaking under my feet as the sun faded behind the float glass. Once the darkened parlour emerged from behind a wooden door, I paused at the threshold, startled by a woman sitting there—motionless, shoulders hunched, legs folded under the chair by the fireplace, a petite figure drowning in heavy, black silk dress, the fabric pooling around her.

She welcomed me with a tight smile, and didn’t protest as I sank into the sofa opposite her, sharing the silence with me as the mantle clock ticked by, the steady crackling of the fire calming us both. Once the conversation began, I discovered how easy it was to speak to her. She absorbed the words with interest and patience, a nod by gentle nod.

It started with a slight trickle of bitterness, then worries poured out of me. “I might never have children,” I said. “I’ve been chasing something—trying so bloody hard—and what have I achieved?” The whole path, decisions upon decisions, imagined ambitions and wants, all culminating in me being relegated to a soulless office, lost in a rhythm of meaningless projects, the hateful pay-off to a decade of education and effort, every choice a miscalculation in hindsight, time slipping, possibilities shrinking year by year.

She kept nodding through it, until I ran out of words.

At last, she spoke, her voice a distant echo. “I lost both my sons in the Prussian War.” She hugged herself, fingers curling into the black folds of her dress, pressing against the curve of a bump. She cradled it and her hands stilled as if she realised she was holding onto something already beyond reach.

The obvious came as a shock—we didn’t come from the same time. My ears burned with embarrassment at the insurmountable void between us, as if it was my fault.

“I’m sorry,” I said, sounding hoarse, apologising not so much for the deaths, but my inability to grasp her experience. For how small and petty my world seemed next to hers.

Only her sorrow was vivid and contagious, seeping into my heart—thick, clinging—something unsettling about the smoothness of her face, so much younger than mine.

The silver cross at her throat caught the firelight—a quick, cold flash against her skin. She clutched it, as if to remind me why she didn’t feel compelled to complain, and pulled on the chain without realising, eyes clouded with memories she wasn’t willing to share.

Resignation lurked underneath the bravery she needed to cope with tragedies beyond her control, the pull of history—relentless and unfeeling—carrying her forth as she gave into her fate with humility, as washed-out as the battlefield fog her children sank into.

“I’m so sorry,” I said, forcing warmth into my voice, hearing it ring false. Trying too hard, as if it was possible to match my tone of voice to the extent of her loss, to compensate for the inadequacy of the words with my choice of timbre.

But it was there, behind the glassy emptiness of her eyes, the sadness I recognised and knew—easy, graspable, bridging our differences and the decades stretching between us, the slight twitch of her lips at the helplessness of feelings taking over.

I stood and reached out, offering to comfort her, and when she lifted herself up to meet me, the bump loomed underneath the folds, and her dark hair cascaded over her shoulders in neat waves. She turned away from the fire and the light played on the gash on the side of her head—a bullet wound framed by black, crusted blood.

My chest grew tight, and eyes watered at the full sight of her, at the way she rubbed her hands together in nervous embarrassment—ashamed of the wound, as she blamed herself.

I embraced her, the swell of her stomach pressing cold and solid between us. For a heartbeat, she was still—then she clung to me, tighter than I could have expected. Her grip tightened—unyielding, crushing. I gasped, tried to pull back, but her arms locked like iron bands.

I pushed harder, panic flaring, her strength growing as mine waned.

As my consciousness faded behind the veil of green and yellow stars, it hit me, for the first time, the thought: what a stupid idea it was, to hug a strange, dead woman in my living room. To think that it could help.

Hana Carolina

Image: a cloud of grey and white smoke on a black background from pixabay.com