Life of a Gas Heater
(Short Story)
The cold drifts through the door. Silent and invisible, it runs a chill through those around me and they would say 'someone stood on my grave' before standing up and reaching towards me with a shudder.
I am their vessel companion. A click of a button and I rise from my slumber, hot and awake. A gas is ignited and I begin my shift as those around me return to their seats and continue their conversations. I am the provider of their lifes warmth yet none of them include me in their social acts.
I am merely a tool, a possession, an object. Both necessary and wanted yet disregarded and forgotten. It is not I who chose my life. It is not I who chose my fate, but it is I who must endure it.
The night continues and the cold outside my reach becomes colder still but I continue to hold it back for those that have forgotten me for it is my place.
Those around me become tired and decide to end their night with a kiss and still I am forgotten until the very end when my own life source is closed and I lose my strength. Then they leave to the warmth of their beds as I remain.
Throughout the evening I hold back the cold but now at night it regains it's control and I succumb to its whime. The provider of warmth now cold to the touch in the long lonely hours until I am needed once more.
For that brief second I will be loved and required, then I will be forgotten once more.
Thus is the life of a gas heater.
