The Old Blog in the Desert

Ken sat at his computer, hacking away at another meaningless article. He should’ve been out in the yard, cutting away the dead hosta, trimming the brittle stalks before frost came and finished them off.

But then it had always been like this.

He ignored everything but the writing. His wife, his children, his hygiene, their home, even the dog, each had learned to orbit Ken’s obsession at a safe distance, like planets around a dying star.

The glow of the screen painted his face a sickly white. The cursor blinked like a pulse, mocking him.

Ken typed a sentence, deleted it, typed another. The article was supposed to be about local real estate trends or the resurgence of vinyl records.

He wasn’t sure anymore. The words bled together in his head.

It didn’t matter what the topic was. None of it mattered.

He sipped cold coffee that had gone bitter hours ago. The mug left a brown ring on the desk.

The smell in the room was a mixture of dust, old paper, and something metallic, blood, maybe. Ken noticed a small cut on a finger where the edge of a file folder had caught it earlier. He sucked at it and kept typing.

Down the hall, his wife moved about quietly. She had learned not to interrupt him.

The last time she had, Ken barked something cruel and hollow. The words came out like shrapnel.

He couldn’t remember what he’d said, only how her face looked afterward: stunned, not angry. Ken meant to apologize, but he never did.

The article grew by inches, reluctant and dull. Ken’s fingers moved out of habit now, the way an old drunk might reach for another bottle without thinking.

He had once loved the writing, no, not loved it, needed it. It had been the one clean thing he could hold in a life otherwise stained by failure and small betrayals. But that was decades ago, when editors still called, when his name meant something.

The checks were no more, and the only calls that came were robocalls about warranties and elections. Ken was a ghost paid by rejection slips.

Ken paused, staring at the keyboard. There was a dark smear between the letters, coffee or blood. He rubbed at it with his thumb, but it wouldn’t come off.

It had sunk in.

Outside, the wind knocked a loose shutter against the house. The sound was rhythmic, almost like the ticking of a clock.

He thought about going out there, fixing it, maybe even cutting the hosta like he was supposed to. But the idea of moving felt absurd.

Besides, Ken was still working.

The dog padded into the room, a shaggy thing with cloudy eyes, and sat by his feet. It sighed heavily, a sound too human.

Ken glanced down and muttered, “Not now.” The dog stayed anyway.

When he finally finished the piece, it was well past midnight. He read it over once.

It was nothing, thin and predictable, work a machine could do better. But Ken attached it to an email, sent it off, and leaned back.

The silence in the room pressed in. Ken could hear his own heartbeat.

For a moment, he thought about shutting off the computer and walking outside, maybe breathing the cold air, feeling something real. But instead, he opened a new document.

The blank page blinked, patient, endless.

He began typing again, words spilling out with the mechanical persistence of someone too far gone to stop. Somewhere behind him, the dog got up and left.

In the morning, when his wife came in, the computer was off, and the room was just as Ken had left it on the day that he had died.