Of Life and Loss

Who wins a class struggle in the end?

The walking stick that the man carried was an adornment rather than a utility. It was the tinsel on his darksome tree, an accoutrement and affectation befitting only one of his class; it was his vanity, carried before him like a plow.

"Mr. Boggat," offered a passerby, tipping his hat deferentially. Boggat nodded his head ever so slightly to acknowledge the man, feeling a familiar and slightly troubling pang in his chest. Unless directly addressed, he ignored the street and everyone on it. This befitted his position, which was tantamount only to wealth. He eschewed the grey but festive environment around him, the men and women stringing popcorn round the fir in the town square— everything, even the horses clattering along the cobbles drawing passengers that ignored him just as efficiently.

Entering the dark edifice shingled as Boggat & Co, he left humanity behind him: no great loss. In these silent halls, people were called to roll in stacks of ledgers and records. A shadow of a smile twitched the old man's lips as he turned to left down the corridor to his office. The windows, dirty on the outside with soot, were rimed with ice. The men were on ladders putting the star on the community tree outside, but Boggart was safely insulated from such company and soon seated in his austere wooden chair, rubbing his chest absently.

And that was where he was found the next day. No one had missed him in the evening; no one had marked his absence on the street, or even in the halls of the building with his name on it.

Boggat had died, taking nothing with him, leaving nothing behind, as repudiated by the town and the world as he had repudiated them.

Just another entry in another ledger. No great loss.

NOTES: ▶︎

Word Count: 300
Submitted for "Daily Flash Fiction Challenge" 
Prompt: Use the words star, tinsel, popcorn