The Unhappy Voyeur

THE UNHAPPY VOYEUR

As dusk gleams it’s golden elegance across the offices, flats and towers that highlight the metropolitan skyline of downtown New York, the unhappy voyeur sits by the now buttery-gold waters of the Hudson River perpendicular to a children’s park. Although his body faces the mighty Hudson, his eyes tilts towards the slides and swings that rise from the ground to create this fantasy of a playground. This is how he spends his daily evenings, sitting in a desolate bench overlooking the bitter-cold New York skyline.

He would usually hear a plethora of sweet sounds ranging from the saccharine commands, candied yelling and honeyed cries of innocent young children. Their sweet mellow tone would reverberate through his dying veins and stimulate the very few sugar molecules that were struggling to swim in his bloodstream which was no as cold and frigid as the frozen Hudson. Sometimes he would share the euphoria of these sounds by dazzling into a state of imagined youth feeling the pleasure of each child as he climbs onto the slide and slays down and repeats about a hundred times until his mental and physical muscles are sored and ached. However, such euphoric reciprocations were as uncommon as a warm winter’s day, for he would usually feel a wave of emptiness burgeoning upon his mind and soul. Against the gleeful and jubilant sound waves that circulate his physical space, the unhappy voyeur would question himself regarding the youth he has now lost and attempt to propose methods to recapture that youth before time ticks goodbye. Sometimes his emptiness would be so overwhelming that he would contemplate his unorthodox desire all in the spirit of recapturing is youth, though this grotesquely dire desire would soon propel him back to the moral rigidity of reality.

So, the unhappy voyeur would repress it; he would repress it so deeply until tears were now cascading down his wrinkled cheeks like waterfalls during a monsoon. The unhappy voyeur would leave the park and head to the eery dungeon he called Home which was isolated from downtown New York, much like from his youth.

As he journeyed through his mundane life, the unhappy voyeur would spend time observing the activities of the city youth through a discrete yet evident lens. For instance, one dawn he was walking out of his dingy little flat as he saw a young boy playing with a Red Balloon by a side walk whilst his mother babbled her tales with the nearby neighbours. The Young Boy’s eyes were glistering with purity as a joyous smile highlighted is visage. He looked up at the balloon and ran like a squirrel around the streets, all whist engaging in a deep conversation with the Red Balloon. He would sometimes inquire the balloon with bogus little questions or at other times instruct the balloon with silly little commands with his minute finger pointing up to the balloon’s little neck. He would then run around the street, again like a squirrel, just before his mother realised the scene behind her and dragged the little boy and his balloon home, out of the sight of the unhappy voyeur.

Another day as he walked into his flat after a meaningless day at work, his inquisitive instincts tilted his eyes towards the sight of a half open door of another flat through which sounds of intense pleasure were pulsating with his steps as he inched close to the door. Beyond the door was a sight that filled many cabinets of his mind though was yet and would never be realised.

On a comfortable bed, laid two frivolous teenagers, their faces reverberating with mixed expressions of pleasure, pain and passion. With an ephemeral ecstasy they topped each other as their playful howls intensified and traversed down the hallways of the empty apartment hurling life to all its objects and life, all except the unhappy voyeur who stood befuddled by the sight ahead of him as he closed the door and silently left with whisps of tears stopping right at the edge of his eyes.

 In the heart of New York City, where the streets buzzed with the relentless rhythm of modern life, there existed a man known only to himself as the Unhappy Voyeur. His childhood had been a cruel twist of fate, deprived of the warmth of a mother’s embrace and the camaraderie of friends. Separated from his parents at a tender age, he was left to grow up under the watchful eye of a landlady during a time when New York grappled with the highs and lows of economic uncertainty.

The Unhappy Voyeur had never known the simple joys of childhood—no playdates, no laughter-filled afternoons. His existence was a solitary one, confined to the monotony of home tutoring from a disinterested accomplice of his landlady. As other children reveled in the sweetness of youthful adventures, he remained an observer, an outsider to the vibrant tapestry of life unfolding around him.

Time marched on, and he emerged into adulthood, not through the rites of infatuation or the glow of first love, but through the mundane routine of securing a job as an office clerk in a high-end New York firm. His salary, though sufficient to meet his material needs, failed to fill the void within him. He found himself ensnared in a limbo between the allure of the high life and the familiarity of his own unremarkable existence.

His solace came not from participation but from observation. From the sterile confines of his office, he watched the city’s youth, vibrant and free, embracing the very experiences he had been denied. The streets, parks, and cafes of New York became his stage, where he silently witnessed the laughter and love he had never known. His eyes followed their every move, capturing moments of joy and spontaneity that he could only dream of.

The Unhappy Voyeur’s life was a solitary vigil, his only company the distant hum of a city that seemed to mock him with its vibrancy. His days were filled with unspoken longings and suppressed regrets, his loneliness deepening with each passing moment. He could sense that the walls of his own life were closing in, suffocating him with their weight.

As the seasons changed, so did his despair, becoming a gnawing, relentless force within him. His yearning for a life he could never have grew stronger, like a tide that swells and crashes upon the shore. The gap between his existence and the world he observed became an ever-widening chasm.

One evening, as the sun dipped below the skyline, casting long shadows over the city, the Unhappy Voyeur made a fateful decision. Overwhelmed by the weight of his unfulfilled desires and the crushing burden of his isolation, he chose to end his vigil. He walked to the edge of the city, where the neon lights and the bustling crowd seemed like distant dreams.

In the final moments of his life, he took one last look at the world he had longed for, the world of youth and joy, of laughter and love. With a heavy heart, he let go of his repressed sorrow, the loneliness that had haunted him now released into the night. As the lights of New York sparkled below, he finally found peace, but it was a peace born of a tragic and irreversible farewell to the life he had always observed but never lived.