Greece, but lacked the gentle grace, the power it held while holding a higher respect. The furnace was just a hungry, hot, angry heat that consumed his youth. He was haunted by the Bear. It wasn’t just a toy; it was the last witness to his fathers face and the wealth of chocolate and nuts from the shop in England. The Bear had been there on the boat when the world was still a perfectly designed puzzle. Every time Baron closed his eyes, he saw the Bear falling; a tiny shape disappearing into the murky cold wake of the ship. He realised that when he dropped the bear, he had dropped his ability to hope. He had spent years since trying to catch things—his mother’s health, a steady paycheck—but everything slipped through his fingers like the water underneath the boat on that eventful day. He remembered the feel of the bear’s fur, which had once been pristine and soft, a stark contrast to the rough burlap sacks and cold iron he handled daily. He lived in a room that smelled of oregano and soap, a desperate attempt to mimic his mother’s scent, but the smell only served to remind him of the certain uncertainty of his future. The degree his mother had begged for felt like a cruel joke when he couldn’t even afford a blanket to cover himself at night. Instead, he spent his evenings walking the desolate streets where the wild grass grew through the cracked concrete. He watched the other men at the factory, men who had surrendered to the charcoal grey sky decades ago and he felt the cold terror that he was becoming one of them. Their faces were etched with the same subdued lines of fatigue that he saw in his own reflection when he went to wash his face in water. He became obsessed with the idea of return. Not to Greece, but to the person he was before the boat. On his days off, he would trek miles into the rural outskirts, guided by a ghost memory of the woods where he had buried his mother. He felt that if he could find a single piece of his past that hadn’t been destroyed by the bleak sky, he might survive. He walked with a never-ending optimism that was at odds with his tired eyes, searching the ditches and the overgrowth for a sign. He began to look for things that are intimate in a world where things felt lost or entirely discarded. He would find a lost button or a rusted key and wonder if it belonged to someone who was as lost as he was. The seasons blended together in a haze of gray. The winter was a murky cold that seeped into his bones, making the factory floor feel like the deck of a frozen ship. He would stand by the vats of of molten steel, letting the rays of sun from the high, dirty windows hit his face for a fleeing second, imagining they were the kaleidoscopic lights of that English toy shop He remembered how the sun had moved slowly up the shelving back then, revealing a world of possibilities. Now, the sun only revealed the dust mites dancing in a dying room. He felt a deep aching desire to be loved again, not as a provider or laborer, but as the boy who once held a bear and felt the world as magical. As he walked the cracked asphalt road toward the rural edge of the county, the charcoal sky finally began to break, letting in a few sharp rays of gold. He passed a fire hydrant, nearly hidden by the overgrown plants and the years of neglect. He didn’t see anything yet, only feeling a peace before a large storm. The world seemed to hold its breath, Every step he took away from the factory and the apartment felt like a layer of grease was being washed from his skin. He
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