Gregory woke up as a chair. Not a metaphorical chair. A literal, four-legged, wooden chair. He tried to scream, but chairs don’t have mouths. His wife, Margaret, walked in, saw the chair where Gregory should be, and sat down to read a book. He wanted to tell her, but he was a chair. Days passed. Margaret started dating a new man named Carl. Gregory hated Carl. Carl spilled coffee on him. Carl called him “a sturdy old thing.”
One night, Margaret whispered to Carl, “I miss Gregory.”
Carl shrugged, “He was kind of stiff.”
Gregory seethed. Weeks later, Margaret moved out. The house echoed with silence. Gregory thought he would rot there.
Then, the new family moved in. The little girl sat on him and whispered her secrets. She imagined him a wise old storyteller who kept monsters away. Gregory couldn’t speak, but if he could, he would have said:
“Thank you.”
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