The man lived alone in a house at the end of the street. Nobody knows why he no longer left his residence after one summer day—nobody except for him perhaps. He seemed to be like everyone else, going to work in the morning and returning home by the late afternoon. Years ago, he had a flower garden along the stone walkway leading from the side yard to his front door. Now it’s an embankment of dirt and weeds. On occasion one might have seen him fetching the paper in the front yard or loading up his car in the driveway, but he would never fail to water his petunias and marigolds. In more recent times the man appeared to barricade himself inside his house. That’s how it seemed to outside observers at least. Really, he was slowly suffocating himself, though he didn’t intend his actions to lead to his demise. First, he simply closed his doors and windows and never opened them again. After weeks of looking out his windows, staring into nothingness, he closed the curtains and dropped the blinds. He used sealant to block out the world beyond his porch. The mail stacked up, his oatmeal ran out, the air became stale, the sun no longer broke through, and one day he died.
