Red Faced Jack (freewrite)

The man draws the faces in his book, a big, red piece of chalk in his hand. He looks up and takes in the balding man in front of him, the lines of his face, the life marked but not lived. Still, he does not judge, he does not care. It is not his job to care, his only job is to draw the faces in his big book.
The man finishes his portrait and his subject moves on, into the real world, out of sight and out of mind, the only remembrance of him, the only evidence he was here written in the big book.
And still, it's enough to doom him, because his face in red can never he erased and it shall haunt him for the rest of his life.
You should not have come here, he thinks, as he wakes and it sounds almost like someone else's voice. Maybe the man who was drawing in the big book said it. But no, he didn't even open his mouth. It is not his job to speak, it is his job to draw the faces.

The balding man with the life unlived wakes in his small apartment, cramped from all the stuff he can't quite bring himself to throw out, some were his mothers, some he swore he would throw out long ago. He used to go into his old mother's house, when he was younger (for the man had never been young per se) and marvel at all the things, and clutter, all the meaningless trifles that seemed to somehow lend the old woman some semblance of meaning. And he'd swear he'd throw them out, as soon as the old woman was gone, but then she was and he couldn't quite bring himself to do it. He trembled outside the homeless shelter many times, with a big cardboard box in his hands, yet never went in.
So the stuff has moved in permanently, but he doesn't mind. It's not so bad, nobody else was living there anyway. Nobody but him. And even a small apartment can get to be too much when you're all alone.
He's come to love the stuff. He doesn't speak to it, if only in his mind, but never out loud, because he's not quite so pathetic. He walks through the house, being careful not to walk anything to the floor and he gets ready to go out into the world and he looks in the mirror, in the bathroom in his house and sees a face painted in blood.
Only it's not blood, it's red chalk, smudged all over. And no matter how hard he tries, the man with no life doesn't manage to get it off.
This is most embarrassing. What will the people in his office say? But the people in his office say nothing, they stare through his red-painted face and they do not even blink. They've grown quite accustomed to Jack not quite being there, not that they cared much when he was. They see the man with the red face, but then the man disappears and there is no more Jack, there is just the rest of their world, of their life.
And Jack sits in a corner, head bent down low, over his microwave lasagna, so carefully wrapped in tin foil. He eats with a proper fork. One of the crappy ones he bought at the store, not one of the rusted silver ones his mother left him. He wouldn't want it to get stolen. But this is still a proper metal fork, because Jack knows never to eat with plastic cutlery.
Plastic is dangerous to the human body, Jack knows, and he likes to be a healthy little man. He wouldn't want to die prematurely, because he wants to enjoy every moment of his life, isn't that right, Mother?
And the old woman now long dead, herself rusting away under quite a lot of rubble, nods her head of thick gray hear in approval. Her son has grown up to be a wonderful little boy.
They probably noticed the red chalk, Jack thinks, as he chews, they probably just don't want to embarrass me. His colleagues have always been very attentive not to embarrass poor old Jack, so they've left him pretty much to himself for the last twenty years.
And red faced Jack walks home and is surprised once again at the goodness in people, because on his way home, not one stops to stare at his big red face. It's almost as if he wasn't there.

And that night, Jack wakes in his dream once more, only to face the man with the big book and the red piece of chalk, staring down at him.
I had the weirdest dream, Jack says, with a smile, I dreamt I was painted red and nobody saw me.
It was not a dream, Jack Anderson, the man with the book says, peering at him. It looks as though the man is frowning, but he is not. The man with the book remains expressionless, always.
Oh, Jack pauses to think, then is this the dream?
No, Jack, the man shakes his head, this is not the dream either. You do not dream and the truth is, you never have. This is a sort of reality you know wander and that – that is also a reality you sometimes wander.
So it was never real, as it were? All the times my friends didn't see me, that was because I wasn't really there wasn't it? I was like a ghost or something.
A soft trickle of hope begins to make its way through Jack's thoughts and it hurts and it tears because he doesn't often allow himself to think this way, so close to the surface.
No, Jack, it was, for a long time, that was your only reality. They did not see you even when you weren't a ghost. And they were certainly not your friends.
And cold realization dawns over Jack like a fire, like the embodiment of destruction.
This is Hell, isn't it?
Of sorts, yes, this is your punishment, Jack Anderson.
Why? I didn't do anything wrong or bad, I never hurt anyone.
This can't be, what would Mother say?
And the man peers down with what can only be imagined to be sadness and a tad of disappointment.
No, but you didn't do anything extraordinary, Jack, so you deserve your punishment.
But why? Jack whines.
I told you why – because for a long time, that was your reality.

Today's prompt was 'chalk'. Check out @mariannewest to join our freewriting community! There's a new prompt out every day!

Thank you for reading,