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I've never given much thought about how I would die. But dying in a place of someone I love seems like a good way to go.
To stay is always harder. They fall asleep peacefully, resting on a soft earthen bed, while you remain, knowing that each passing day pulls you further away from them until they become so distant that you can barely recall their faces.
Memory is a strange thing: strange and unfair. I want to remember, yet I don’t want to at the same time. But in the end, nothing remains except to remember. Nothing is left: no notes, no strands of hair inside a locket, no scent on old belongings, no photographs on the shelf — as if you never existed.
You are like chrysanthemums — that’s the only thing I will always know for sure.
We simply knew each other too little for anything to remain, except for the echo of warmth left after your hand touched mine. Your fingers tightly held my palm in an attempt to keep me close for a little longer. I don’t want to let go; I want to be near you, but you are the first to let go. You push me away: go. Go, or it’s all in vain.
Nothing remains but the weightless warmth lingering on my skin from the last touch in your life. Soon, I will forget this feeling — I will forget against my own will. I am bound hand and foot, and I can do nothing about it.
I turn around one last time. I know it will hurt — unbearably so. But I must. I must remember your face, remember your smile, and those black, sparkling eyes. The plea in your tearful gaze: don’t go, don’t go, don’t go. Everything within me screams to stay, but I must turn away and move on, locking you away behind seven locks within my heart.
Time is a strange substance. We are bound by it, thinking we see the truth, yet the truth for us lies beyond. We exist simultaneously everywhere, in a thousand variations of events. The second hand relentlessly moves forward. Right now, you exist. In a second, you will not. A second, a minute, an hour. You drift further and further away, but I will forever remain in that moment where you are still with me. You love movies, and perhaps this is like a fantastic film.
In our lives, happiness is real fantasy, isn’t it?
I cannot accept it, so I cling to any opportunity to keep you here a little longer — to stay in that moment when you are near me.
You will haunt my dreams for a long time. It’s a pity I won’t feel your warmth in my sleep, but I am glad for even that: the blurred image of you, born from my subconscious. Here, you will always be alive. You will smile and sip Maldives just as you dreamed. Your bare feet will sink into the blue sands, and the waves will carry away your sorrows with a taste of lime. Everything is so turquoise, so sparkling and sweet. You run along the water’s edge, inevitably losing the race against the wind. I, too, lose, trying to reach you. You are close — within arm's reach, but so far away, and yet I laugh with you in unison.
Because I love you.
You fall asleep. And soon, I will fall asleep too.
And then we will finally be together.