CATEGORY: Little Pieces Of Life

Claire

The clock on her phone read 1:43 a.m. Claire lifted her head from her book and glanced towards the window. Outside, everything was perfectly quiet. Most of the lights in the apartment buildings opposite had long since gone out. In her room, however, the small desk lamp was still on, illuminating the underlined pages, her notes, and a half-empty glass of water.

She was reading the same paragraph for the third time. She understood the words and could almost recite them, but whenever she closed the book, she struggled to remember what she had just read. She rubbed her eyes and pulled her notebook closer. She wrote two lines, erased them, and put down her pen. She was exhausted. If she went to bed now, she might manage five hours of sleep, perhaps even less. She had school in the morning and tutoring classes in the afternoon. Another practice exam awaited her on Saturday.

She stood up to stretch her back. Walking over to the mirror, she studied her face. Her hair was tied up carelessly, her eyes tired. She had begun to grow accustomed to this reflection. Over the past few months, she had rarely found time for the things that used to bring her joy. Her friends had stopped inviting her out so often. They knew she would usually say no. Even when she accepted, she constantly checked the time, calculating how much studying she could have done if she had stayed home.

She returned to her desk and picked up her phone. Dozens of messages had arrived in the class group chat. Someone was asking about an exercise, someone else had sent photographs of their notes. One of her classmates wrote that she had finished revising and was getting ready for bed. Claire looked at the books still lying open in front of her. Her stomach tightened. How did everyone else manage to get everything done? Had she organised her studying badly? Was she wasting time without even realising it?

She placed her phone face down on the desk. She didn’t want to read any more messages. At the same time, though, she wanted to know what everyone else was doing, how far they had progressed, whether they were struggling as much as she was. It seemed to her that everyone had found a way to cope with the demands of the year, while she spent each day trying to close a gap that only seemed to grow wider.

On the calendar hanging beside her bookcase, the days remaining until the Panhellenic university entrance examinations were marked in red. Every evening, she crossed one off. At first, this little ritual had excited her. It made her feel that she was getting closer to her goal. Now, whenever she picked up the marker, she felt a flicker of anxiety. The days were running out, but the amount of material she still had to study seemed enormous.

And then there was that thought which had been appearing more and more frequently lately, usually when she was at her most exhausted. What if she had chosen the wrong academic path?

She hadn’t told anyone. The previous year, when everyone had been discussing universities and careers, she had had answers. She had chosen, she had decided, she had explained to her parents what she wanted to study. Now she wasn’t so certain. Some subjects interested her, but others were difficult to imagine being part of her life for years to come. Sometimes she wondered whether the choice had truly been her own, or whether she had been influenced by everything she heard around her about prestigious universities, promising careers, and decisions that had to be made before it was too late.

These thoughts made her feel even worse. It wasn’t enough that she was afraid of failing to get into her chosen university programme. Now she was also afraid that she might succeed, only to discover that it wasn’t what she wanted after all. And yet she didn’t dare openly question her decision. So many months of preparation, so much money spent on tutoring, so many conversations about her future. How could she suddenly announce that she wasn’t sure?

There was a gentle knock at the door.

“Claire, are you still awake?”

It was her mother.

“Yes, Mum. I’ll be finished soon.”

“Sweetheart, it’s almost two. You need to sleep.”

“I know.”

“You can’t keep going like this. You’ll wear yourself out.”

Claire looked at the door without answering. She knew her mother was right. She also knew that the following morning she would wake up with the same anxiety about everything she hadn’t managed to finish.

“Goodnight, Mum,” she finally said.

She heard her mother’s footsteps fading down the hallway. For a moment she remained motionless, staring at the open pages. She wanted to close her books, collapse into bed, and fall asleep without thinking about anything. She wanted to spend an entire day without having to prove that she was trying hard enough. To meet her friends, laugh, and talk about something that had absolutely nothing to do with exams, grades, or university courses.

More than anything, she wanted to know that she would succeed.

But there was no one who could guarantee her that.

She closed the book and switched off the lamp. In the darkness, her thoughts did not stop. The Panhellenic examinations were approaching, and Claire felt that with them came a moment that would determine far more than what she knew. At eighteen, with so much she had yet to discover and so many desires she had not had the chance to explore, she had begun to believe that her entire future would be decided in the space of a few days.

Pantelis

Pantelis put his key in the lock and entered the house shortly after eight. He left his bag on the chair by the entrance, took off his shoes, and headed towards the kitchen. Maria was sitting at the table, looking at something on her phone. She briefly raised her head.

“You’re home?”

“Yes. The traffic was terrible.”

“I’ve left some food in the oven.”

“All right, thanks.”

Maria returned to her phone, and he opened the fridge to get some water. They weren’t angry with each other. There had been no argument, nor was there anything in particular they were avoiding discussing that evening. It was simply another ordinary return home, one of hundreds before it.

They had been married for nineteen years. They had shared far more than a house. They had grown older together, faced financial difficulties, cared for one another through illness, made plans, fulfilled some, and abandoned others. There were photographs of them from holidays, family celebrations, summers he could still remember with a smile. There had been a time when he couldn’t wait to get home from work and tell her everything that had happened during his day. Now, quite often, he delayed leaving for home just a little longer.

He put his food on a plate and sat opposite her. He asked how her day had been. She told him about a colleague, a bill that needed paying, and a family obligation at the weekend. Pantelis listened, replied when necessary, and asked a few questions. Anyone watching them would have seen nothing unusual. Just two people talking quietly at the end of a tiring day.

And yet he felt a distance between them that he couldn’t remember exactly when it had begun. He couldn’t recall the last time they had sat down and truly talked without some obligation occupying their minds. When had they last laughed wholeheartedly, embraced spontaneously, or decided to do something together simply because they wanted to? It wasn’t that there were no good moments. There were, but they seemed increasingly rare, like brief intervals in a daily routine that repeated itself almost unchanged.

After dinner, Maria went into the living room and turned on the television. He stayed in the kitchen for a while, cleared his plate, and stood by the window. Cars and a few pedestrians passed along the street. From the neighbouring apartment came voices and laughter. He wondered what those people were talking about and why the sound of their happiness filled him with such a strange melancholy.

He couldn’t say that Maria was a bad partner. She was someone he knew deeply, someone he respected and still cared about. Sometimes, when he saw her tired or upset, he felt the same urge to protect her that he had felt years ago. At other times, however, he looked at her and wondered how they had come to live like this. How could two people who once sought each other’s company now spend entire evenings in the same room with almost nothing to say?

He had thought many times about talking to her. About telling her that he wasn’t happy, that something was missing from their relationship, that he felt lonely. But every time, he stopped before he began. What exactly would he say? That the life they had built together was no longer enough for him? That he wanted something different without knowing what that something was? He was afraid she would be hurt, that she would ask what she had done wrong, and that he would be unable to give her a clear answer.

There were evenings when he thought about separation. Not with excitement, nor with anticipation of a new life. It was more a thought that appeared whenever he tried to imagine the next ten or twenty years. He pictured himself returning to the same house, sitting at the same table, exchanging the same words. And then he felt a heaviness in his chest, as though he had already lived all those days that had yet to come.

Guilt overwhelmed him immediately afterwards. How could he even think of leaving a marriage of nineteen years? What would he say to Maria? How would they divide everything they had acquired together? What would happen to their families, their mutual friends, their habits? And what if, after some time, he discovered that he had made a mistake? What if the loneliness he feared within his marriage turned out to be less painful than the loneliness awaiting him outside it?

Sometimes he wondered whether he was being unfair. Other people faced far more serious problems. He had a home, a stable routine, a woman who knew him better than anyone else. There were no insults, affairs, or major conflicts. What more did he want? The very act of asking himself that question made him feel that he ought to be satisfied.

And so, every morning, he got up, prepared for work, and carried on with his life as usual. He met friends, laughed at jokes, discussed current events, and made holiday plans. No one would easily have guessed that beneath the surface there was a restlessness that followed him almost every day. He didn’t always understand it himself. Some days he felt better and thought perhaps he was exaggerating. On others, the smallest incident was enough to bring back that familiar sense of emptiness.

That evening, he went into the living room and sat beside Maria. She was watching a television series. She smiled at him and moved along the sofa to make room. Pantelis smiled back. For a moment, he considered telling her everything that had been troubling him. They could turn off the television and talk, even if the conversation was difficult.

“What’s wrong?” she asked, noticing how distracted he seemed.

He looked at her. It was such a simple question and, at the same time, so difficult to answer.

“Nothing,” he finally said. “I’m just a little tired.”

Maria nodded and turned back towards the television. He leaned back against the sofa and tried to follow the story unfolding on the screen.

He thought that perhaps things would have been different if they had spoken sooner. Perhaps they could still change. He didn’t know whether he wanted to try again or whether he had grown tired of hoping that something would change on its own. He didn’t even know whether Maria felt the same distance between them or whether, for her, their life was exactly as she wanted it to be.

The only thing he knew was that he didn’t want to go on feeling this way.

And yet, the following morning, he would wake up in the same house. They would drink their morning coffee and say goodbye before leaving for work.

Just as they had done every morning for years.

Elpida

The alarm went off at a quarter to seven. Elpida reached towards her bedside table and switched it off without opening her eyes. She lay there for a few minutes, listening to the first sounds from the street. A car starting, a motorcycle passing, someone’s footsteps in the apartment building.

She hadn’t slept well. She had woken twice during the night, once without knowing why and the second time because she remembered an unfinished task at the office. She tried to fall asleep again, but her mind had already begun organising the day ahead.

At seven, she got up. She put the kettle on for coffee, went into the bathroom, and stood in front of the mirror. She was forty-two years old and had been working for a private company for the past fifteen years. She held a stable position, knew the demands of her job well, and was considered dependable by her colleagues. She rarely left anything unfinished, even when it meant staying late at the office.

The strange thing was that she had never truly loved what she did.

At first, she had accepted the position because she needed the money. It was a good opportunity at the time, and she couldn’t afford to turn it down. She remembered telling her friends that she would stay for a while, until she found something better suited to her. Then came the first pay rises, new responsibilities, household expenses. Her job became a stable part of her life, and every thought of change was pushed a little further into the future.

“It’s not the right time,” she would say.

Sometimes because money was tight, sometimes because the economy was uncertain, sometimes because she was so exhausted that she couldn’t face dealing with CVs and interviews. There was always a reason to wait.

And the years went by.

Lately, mornings had become particularly difficult. It wasn’t just tiredness. It was the heaviness she felt the moment she realised she had to get ready for the office. Sometimes, while drinking her coffee, she would look at the clock and wish she could stop time for a little while. That the day wouldn’t begin just yet, that she wouldn’t have to get into the car, face the traffic, the telephone calls, the demands, the meetings that seemed to go on forever.

She arrived at the company already irritated. A remark from her manager, a message demanding an immediate reply, or a delay in some task was enough to ruin her mood. She tried to control herself, but there were moments when she answered sharply and regretted it afterwards. She didn’t like the way she reacted. She used to have more patience. Now she felt as though her nerves were constantly stretched to breaking point.

One afternoon, a colleague asked if she was all right.

“I’m fine,” she replied automatically.

“You seem really stressed lately.”

Elpida smiled awkwardly and changed the subject. She didn’t want to start complaining. After all, what could she say? That she could no longer bear a job she herself continued to choose every morning?

When she returned home, she often had no desire to do anything. She left her bag on the sofa, took off her shoes, and sat for a while without even turning on the television. There were friends she wanted to see, books she had bought and never opened, things she had been thinking of starting. Yet on most days, she felt she had used up all her energy simply getting through her working hours.

And that bothered her more than anything else. She didn’t want her job to occupy such a large part of her life, or to return home carrying so much tension that she couldn’t enjoy the hours she had left. Sometimes she became irritated even with people she loved, over insignificant things. Afterwards, she felt bad and promised herself that the next day she would be calmer. But the next day almost always resembled the one before.

The thought of change had never entirely left her. There were evenings when she opened her computer and searched for other career opportunities. She read about training programmes, people who had changed direction, professions that seemed more interesting to her. She took notes, saved websites, and made rough calculations. At times, she felt an excitement she hadn’t experienced in years.

Then she opened her bank account.

The rent, the bills, the groceries, the obligations that couldn’t wait. Her steady salary was not something she could walk away from without consequences. What if it took months to find another job? What if she had to start again on much less money? What if she discovered that the new profession didn’t suit her either?

She closed her computer and decided to think about it again when circumstances were better.

Except circumstances never seemed quite good enough.

One morning, while driving to the company, she stopped at a traffic light and looked at the people waiting at the bus stop. A woman was holding a small child by the hand. A young man was hurriedly drinking his coffee. A little further away, an elderly man stood outside a closed shop.

Elpida suddenly felt the urge to turn the car around and go somewhere, anywhere else. It didn’t matter where. She simply didn’t want to follow the same route one more time.

The light turned green. The car behind her sounded its horn, and she pulled away abruptly. A few minutes later, she parked outside the company, but didn’t immediately unfasten her seat belt. She remained seated with her hands on the steering wheel. Her heart was beating rapidly, and there was a lump in her throat. She didn’t know whether she wanted to cry, scream, or simply stay there in the car without having to speak to anyone.

She thought about being forty-two. If she stayed in the same job, she would spend a large part of the next twenty years of her life there.

Twenty years.

She tried to picture herself at fifty, fifty-five, sixty. Waking with the same sense of dread, waiting for Friday from the moment Monday began, counting the days until her next holiday. And then she realised how accustomed she had become to waiting. Waiting for the working day to end, for the weekend to arrive, for a difficult period to pass, for circumstances to change.

She couldn’t remember when she had begun living this way.

She lowered her head and took a deep breath. For the first time, she didn’t try to convince herself that she was simply tired or going through a difficult week. It wasn’t a week. It was years.

“I can’t go on like this,” she whispered.

The thought frightened her. She had no definite plan, nor enough savings to allow her to remain unemployed for any length of time. She didn’t know whether she had the qualifications she would need to start something different. And above all, she was afraid that at forty-two, it was already too late for such a major change.

She remained in the car a little longer. Then she looked towards the entrance of the company, the same entrance she had walked through every morning for fifteen years.

“It’s never too late,” she said quietly to herself.

She wasn’t sure she believed it. She wanted to believe it, but the words alone weren’t enough to make her fears disappear. She was still thinking about her salary, her responsibilities, the possibility of failure. Part of her wanted to finally make that great change. Another part was begging her not to risk everything she had managed to secure.

She looked at the time. She was already late.

She picked up her bag, got out of the car, and walked towards the entrance.

For the first time, however, she wasn’t only wondering how she would get through another day.

She was wondering how many more days she wanted to live this way.

Claire, Pantelis, and Elpida are at different stages of their lives. They have different responsibilities, desires, and fears. And yet something connects them. All three feel that their lives have become confined to a reality from which they struggle to see a way out.

When anxiety becomes part of our everyday lives, the way we perceive things often begins to change. Difficulties seem greater, our possibilities smaller, and the future full of threats. The mind tries to predict what might go wrong, searching for a certainty it cannot obtain. And the more we try to control what we do not know, the more exhausted we become.

Claire fears that failing her examinations will determine her future. Pantelis thinks about the years he has devoted to his marriage and struggles to imagine his life being different. Elpida wonders whether, at forty-two, she still has the possibility of following another career path. None of them knows what will happen if things change. And that uncertainty alone is enough to keep them from moving forward.

Not all situations, however, are the same. Claire’s examination period has a definite duration, however endless it may seem to her today. For Pantelis and Elpida, by contrast, time alone offers no guarantee that anything will change. Years may pass while they wait for the right moment, greater certainty, or an answer that will free them from fear.

Often, it is not only external circumstances that limit us, but also what we have learned to believe about ourselves and life. That we must succeed on our first attempt. That we are obliged to remain faithful to a decision simply because we once made it. That after a certain age, new beginnings are no longer allowed. That change means failure, or that we will disappoint people we love.

And of course, there are real limitations. Financial needs, family responsibilities, and the relationships we have built do not disappear simply because we decide we want something different. Change may require time, preparation, difficult conversations, and losses. It may not even be possible in the way or at the moment we would wish.

There is, however, a difference between recognising the difficulties of a situation and believing that there is absolutely no possibility for it to change. When we are exhausted or afraid, that distinction becomes difficult to see. Today expands in our minds until it occupies the whole of tomorrow.

Perhaps that is why, when we are going through a difficult period, it can be so hard to remember how many things have already changed in our lives. Situations we once considered impossible to overcome, decisions we were afraid to make, feelings we believed would never fade. Some passed with time. Others changed because we did something, however small. And some left their mark without remaining exactly as they once were.

We do not know what Claire, Pantelis, and Elpida will decide. Nor do we need to. Their stories continue beyond the pages of this article, just as life continues for every person who feels trapped today.

The future does not promise that everything will unfold as we wish. It offers no guarantees, nor does it protect us from difficulties. But neither is it simply a repetition of the present.

Sometimes, looking back, we discover that what once seemed endless has become just one part of our story.

Nothing lasts forever.