Fiction: And There Are Many Rooms

Two cousins lived beside each other, each in their own home. They had been inseparable friends, more brother and sister than cousins, from childhood (and, said those who knew them, perhaps from before even then). One of them, the woman, had, since a young age, been continually renovating the house in which she lived, expanding and demolishing, constructing and deconstructing, and for what purpose her friend never knew (nor was ever told, despite frequent queries). The other, a young man, was oft bewildered by this behavior, being quite content with the little cottage of his forefathers.


Time passed. Words were had in anger between them, and worse as well. The man moved off, and it must be admitted (for he would not have it any other way) that a bigger share of the fault for their falling-out was his. For a long time he did not forgive himself for this.

Time passed. The penitent man returned, and asked his friend for forgiveness. His friend denied him, and then said: "For how can I forgive he that did me no wrong? For what wrong have you done me, though you have some resemblance to a man I once knew? You are not, I say, the man that left this place in anger years ago."

The man could not believe his ears, and begged for an explanation. He was that man; he knew it, and he knew that she knew it. In answer the friend simply gave a tour of the house to him, and in the course of it discussed every nook and cranny therein, every nail and every subtle working of the wood, and every ornamentation.

At last his friend ended it and asked "Is this the same house in which this body of mine was born, and in which two youths played in the spring of life?"

The man admitted that it could not be, for not a single part of that first house remained in this one. There had been a state of transition, but that old cottage had now been replaced in whole by a mansion.

"Even so," replied his smiling friend, "so too is that silly man that left so long ago now replaced by a better man, whose friend I hope that I can be. The cat that jumps is not the cat that lands. Come, then, there is a place prepared for you in this mansion, for it is and always had been built for you, in preparation for the day of your return."

And, though this phrase may seem trite and overused, they truly did live happily ever after.

And thus it is.

Follow-up: What will your mansion look like?