Story: The Work

This story was commissioned by Tim. It was written by Michael DiBiasio-Ornelas, via Last Site Press. To order your own Custom Short Story, click here.

__

At night he was tired but in the day during the work it was better.

Still, something nagged.

He loved his family, without question. The work was for them. It was also for him in that it gave him something to do. Somewhere to go. A reason to move. This was good but he felt increasingly certain it was not everything.

He knew enough to know it was not everything. With the work came the check, with the check the money, with the money the rent and groceries and everything else. 

Then...repeat.

He didn’t mind it. But he felt sure by now that it wasn’t everything. 

It wasn’t a matter of small responsibilities or big, of busyness or idleness. The work itself didn’t bother him. He even liked it, and felt it was enough, as far as work went. He just knew that life held a little more.

In the back of his mind, he thought about this, while he worked.

At home, the faces of his children seemed closest to providing the answer to what was missing. They were both the reason he did it and yet not -- he would have done it anyway. To provide for his wife. Himself. Work had never been an issue. It still wasn’t. Would never be. He didn’t need the additional motivation but it was comforting to know that he’d always do it for them. The work made sense, in that way.

Was there a God watching? He thought so. 

Did he feel special enough to receive specific attention from God, a direct answer to his non-unique questions?

Not especially. Neither was this what faith was about, in his opinion. So, he worked. During the work it was better.

One night, he came home exhausted. It had been one of those days. This was fine, but he was glad to be home. Quietly, he went about his evening.

Dinner. Time with the kids.

Shower. A long one.

A drink with his wife, on the deck.

Before dawn he woke. 

It was quiet. In the still, early light, he felt closer to an answer than he had for a very long time. He looked at his wife and saw importance. Carefully, he looked in on his children, and felt the surety of his love for them. Work was still far off, and he would go and it would be good, but this, here now, seemed the answer.

It was like looking at the same painting and seeing what he had always seen — and yet, in the grace of quiet dawn, it was at the same time a very different experience. He was different, in this moment. He felt clear. He was aligned. Purpose and question overlapped into an answer that was wordless but real.

As the morning accelerated, his certainty slipped away. But he remembered it. And he kept this memory with him as he worked. When he got home, tired again, he clung to it.