Not many people know how cynical people get when they’re stuck looking at the world through a window and nothing else. Imagine being forced to live in your room your entire life, not being able to do a thing, or else you die of some medical misfortune. These bubble boys and girls can be some of the most depressed people in the world.
But imagine if you were in a similar situation, but there wasn’t something medically wrong. What if you were being held against your will, not allowed to go into the world you can see through your bedroom window. That was the life for Michael Gibbons.
Michael’s father was a twice divorced museum owner. He adopted his son before proposing to his first wife, in an attempt to convince her that he wanted to settle down. As it appeared, it did not work. He knew that he couldn’t be cruel to the point of bringing a newly adopted child right back to the orphanage, even if the child was only two years old.
What made Michael wanted by the father was something a little different; although he owned many a museum around the US, he always wanted his own name on a painting. Unfortunately, he had some incredibly brittle bones, an unfortunate medical deformity that made it very difficult for him to paint, write, sculpt, or any other type of art. The only way to get his name on art would be if his son did.
That’s all Michael was raised to do. He was given some books, a tutor once in a while, but all he could do was basic reading and writing. He never learned academics; he was given paint and canvases, and he was told to paint. So, that’s what he tried to do.
But despite his encouragement and peace, it wasn’t something he wanted to do. People always want what they cannot have. Many student artists will wish that they could completely ignore school and just live alone with their creativity. And for Michael, it was the opposite. He hated art to death. And his father made art into a prison.
Michael wasn’t ever let outside. He was given anything he asked no matter the cost, be it a meal, a book, or even just a nickel. The word given is the main word in that sentence. To ensure that he could do nothing but focus on his art, his father kept him in his house. He had no friends, no social life, never went further than his back yard.
What makes it all the worst for Michael is that this thought comes to him every hour and every day, when he looks outside his window and at the little suburban homes that are a distance away from the little mansion he lives in, he sheds a quiet tear to himself for the life he wants to live. He continuously contemplated suicide, but he had his own little fear of death. No relatives, just an adopted father and a few friends of his dad. He never met anybody who died before, and was too afraid to end his own.
So, on his eighteenth birthday, Michael knew that he could legally free himself. He’d aged, he’d done a small portion of decent art, and he felt he earned freedom. His father was busy, but every birthday was the only sure, certain time that his father would have a day off at home.
Michael was a nervous speaker, so he hand wrote a message.
"As much as I thank you for all that you have given me, and for being a kind and caring father, I have very little care for the art world that you hold to me so dear. If it would be alright for you, I would like to leave and go on my own life adventure. I don’t know exactly what I want to do with my life yet, but for now, I want to travel. Maybe I’d go to a university or a college and get a degree in something I find interesting. The point is, I think I’ve reached an age where I think I should have my own freedom in life, and would like to leave. Thank you again, for everything, and I’m sorry that I don’t believe in the passion you’ve wanted me to have."
Michael was satisfied with his letter, and looked at the clock. It was ten in the morning, just about time for breakfast. He walked downstairs and could smell his father making pancakes. Michael planned to give him the note, and be done with it all early.
“Morning, Dad”, greeted Michael.
“Happy eighteenth, buddy boy”, said his father, laughing while he spoke. “Feel any different?”
“A little”, he replied. Michael sat down at the kitchen table, and put the letter down on his father’s plate. His father went over to the table with a large plateful of pancakes, and he put it down between them. He smiled and took suspicious notice of the letter, folded on his plate. They were both quiet as he read it.
Michael’s father grew a straighter face as he read each word. Michael grew worried, and got even more so when he put the letter down.
“Why?” asked his father, “Why would you want to leave this?”
“It’s what I want”, Michael said. It was all he could say.
“I would’ve loved to have what I give you. No school, all art, no work, everything you want, and you want to throw this paradise away?”
“I don’t want to throw it away…I want to leave it”
“Well, you aren’t going to”
“What?” Michael asked, shocked.
“You’re a good artist, and you should stay where you’re best at”
“But what if there’s something else I’m good at?”
“You haven’t done anything else that you can be good at”
“I want to see if there’s something else I like”
“Stay in the familiar, Michael boy. You’re much safer there. Alright?”
Michael was pretty much in an instant snap of speechlessness. He couldn’t believe this. He was so certain that it would go perfectly. He was in a place between depression and slight insanity. The birthday breakfast was incredibly silent, and afterwards, he went right back to his room, only to lie in his bed and think to himself.
How could he?, Michael wondered, why would he?
It played in his head for hours. As those two questions rolled in his mind, he went through a few different emotions; he started with depression, which turned to envy of the kids he saw through the window, which went to a short bitterness, which went to an unstoppable anger, which brought him into silence. No emotion whatsoever, just silence. He emptied his mind of any and all thoughts.
But with no emotion, he couldn’t stand in the way of himself. He wanted to go, so he tried to. He got up, and walked straight towards the front door. As he passed the living room, he saw his father in the kitchen slurping on a bowl of soup. As he passed the door, his father approached him. He wanted to know what was going on.
“Michael, where’re you going?”
“Out”
Michael’s father was surprised. He thought he’d won the battle already, and wanted to stay on top. He walked up behind Michael and grabbed his shoulder and tried to hold him in place, to try and talk to him. Without emotion, without care, without remembering that this man was his father, Michael jabbed his elbow into his father’s stomach, bringing his father to his knees.
Michael just walked onward. He didn’t even look back. His father put one hand over his stomach, where he was in considerable pain, but still walked onwards, trying to get Michael’s attention. He pulled enough speed out of himself to make it to the door as Michael opened it. Michael was just outside the door when his father reached for his shoulder again.
Michael made an angry panic. He didn’t want to be touched, he just wanted to leave. In his irritance, he turned around and shook his father’s hand off his shoulder, and then slammed the door on his father as hard as he could. Once wasn’t enough though. Again and again, Michael slammed the door with his father being crushed between the door and the frame. His body began bleeding, bones were broken, and after almost thirty seconds of door slamming, Michael’s father was bloody and dead on the ground in the doorframe, in the middle of the door frame.
Michael left the door open, and didn’t look back. He began walking away from the house, with no direction. He just wanted to see the world that he’d been trapped looking enviously at for sixteen years. He never thought about his murder again in his life. He just forgot about his father, and walked. But as drastic as the reaction was, you can’t deny that if you were in Michael’s position, you probably wouldn’t do anything different. If you love something, set it free. If you don’t, then be ready for one hectic pet.
