Just a very short story by DF
Posted: 2005-09-18 09:26am
Author's Note: Please don't read too much into this, it's just writing that's all. Literary critiques welcome. (Update: Several errors corrected) ~DF
It happens to everyone, whether or like it or not you have to die. I've never been afraid of my own death, not that I welcomed the end of my life, but I figure that when the time comes there is nothing I can do about it. In the meantime I could try and put it off for as long as I could. However, the concept that people I love and care about has always terrified me to no end. I have always had a hard time dealing with loss, especially when that loss was untimely or unexpected. My experience with death is and always has been sorely limited. There have been many nights where I went sleepless at the thought of what I would do if certain people close to me would die, my parents, my siblings, my girlfriend who was the love of my life, these were things I felt I could not live without.
That time never came, because as fate would have it, my time came first.
It was late, and I was tired, all I wanted to do was get in the car and get home. As tired as I was I knew it wouldn't take me long to get home and then I could pass out on my bed. I wasn't paying attention as I crossed the street, and neither was the driver of the truck that never slowed down through the nearby intersection as it plowed through me. I flew up into the air and landed on my back, hitting the ground incredibly hard.
She came running out of her house from the window where she had been atching me as I went to where I had parked across the street, the driver of the car had stopped, took one look at me, and then sped off. She raced to my side in the middle of the road and tossed her own phone aside after dialing 911. I coughed once and despite the great pain I could feel the blood trickling out of the corner of my mouth. She knelt beside me and clutched at my hand, her face swollen with tears. It was in that moment we both knew.
"Don't worry." I was surprised I could still talk. "It doesn't hurt, you don't have to cry." I didn't want her to cry, I never wanted my last memories of her to be so tearful and full of pain. "Everything's going to be fine."
"Shut up." She said. "Don't try to talk. The ambulance will be here soon."
"It's not going to come in time, let me just have one happy moment before I go." I tightened my hand around hers, savoring her feel.
"Don't talk!" She reiterated. "I'm not giving up on you!" She wiped the blood from my mouth with the corner of her shirt and leaned into me slightly, still clutching my hand and telling me to relax and to keep my eyes open.
"It's better this way," I tried to tell her. Couldn't she realize how lucky I was never to have lost anyone? I had nothing left to accomplish in my life, I was going to die a very fulfilled person who did the best he could.
She gritted her teeth and her lip quivered. "But I don't want to live without you."
For a second there, as my life gradually flashed before my eyes, I wondered. Was there something I wasn't getting? Then the answer hit me even harder than the car did. She was just as scared as I had always been. Scared of losing me, scared of waking up the next day without the people she cared about. I had been arrogant and selfish, thinking that I was the only person who couldn't handle losing anyone. Everyone else around me seemed to handle the situation better than I did, but I took their ability to deal with death for granted. As the revelation stung me I began to cry also. Because the person I loved more than anyone in the entire world was hurting in the way I had always feared myself. I couldn't think of anything to say, I couldn't think of any words to set anything right. So I just said the first thing on my mind.
"I'm sorry."
She laughed slightly through the tears, it had been a running theme in our relationship to apologize to each other in advance for things we hadn't even done wrong. Now of all times seemed like the least appropriate place to tease her, she held me in her arms, I could hear the wailing of sirens in the distance. They were fast, but the numbness in my legs was spreading up to the rest of my body, and it seemed to get colder with each passing second. I opened my eyes as wide as I could to look at her one last time. I would always remember that face. Every contour, and every color, every sparkle in her eye. As sad as I was all I could do was smile and she just smiled right back at me. Her smile was so beautiful, her smile had always been there for me, her smile could outshine even my darkest days.
The sirens had stopped and were replaced by the sound of a heavy vehicle braking and coming to a sudden halt. Before the medics came and took me from her arms I had to tell her, I had to tell her one last time.
"I love you."
And that was when I fell asleep.
It happens to everyone, whether or like it or not you have to die. I've never been afraid of my own death, not that I welcomed the end of my life, but I figure that when the time comes there is nothing I can do about it. In the meantime I could try and put it off for as long as I could. However, the concept that people I love and care about has always terrified me to no end. I have always had a hard time dealing with loss, especially when that loss was untimely or unexpected. My experience with death is and always has been sorely limited. There have been many nights where I went sleepless at the thought of what I would do if certain people close to me would die, my parents, my siblings, my girlfriend who was the love of my life, these were things I felt I could not live without.
That time never came, because as fate would have it, my time came first.
It was late, and I was tired, all I wanted to do was get in the car and get home. As tired as I was I knew it wouldn't take me long to get home and then I could pass out on my bed. I wasn't paying attention as I crossed the street, and neither was the driver of the truck that never slowed down through the nearby intersection as it plowed through me. I flew up into the air and landed on my back, hitting the ground incredibly hard.
She came running out of her house from the window where she had been atching me as I went to where I had parked across the street, the driver of the car had stopped, took one look at me, and then sped off. She raced to my side in the middle of the road and tossed her own phone aside after dialing 911. I coughed once and despite the great pain I could feel the blood trickling out of the corner of my mouth. She knelt beside me and clutched at my hand, her face swollen with tears. It was in that moment we both knew.
"Don't worry." I was surprised I could still talk. "It doesn't hurt, you don't have to cry." I didn't want her to cry, I never wanted my last memories of her to be so tearful and full of pain. "Everything's going to be fine."
"Shut up." She said. "Don't try to talk. The ambulance will be here soon."
"It's not going to come in time, let me just have one happy moment before I go." I tightened my hand around hers, savoring her feel.
"Don't talk!" She reiterated. "I'm not giving up on you!" She wiped the blood from my mouth with the corner of her shirt and leaned into me slightly, still clutching my hand and telling me to relax and to keep my eyes open.
"It's better this way," I tried to tell her. Couldn't she realize how lucky I was never to have lost anyone? I had nothing left to accomplish in my life, I was going to die a very fulfilled person who did the best he could.
She gritted her teeth and her lip quivered. "But I don't want to live without you."
For a second there, as my life gradually flashed before my eyes, I wondered. Was there something I wasn't getting? Then the answer hit me even harder than the car did. She was just as scared as I had always been. Scared of losing me, scared of waking up the next day without the people she cared about. I had been arrogant and selfish, thinking that I was the only person who couldn't handle losing anyone. Everyone else around me seemed to handle the situation better than I did, but I took their ability to deal with death for granted. As the revelation stung me I began to cry also. Because the person I loved more than anyone in the entire world was hurting in the way I had always feared myself. I couldn't think of anything to say, I couldn't think of any words to set anything right. So I just said the first thing on my mind.
"I'm sorry."
She laughed slightly through the tears, it had been a running theme in our relationship to apologize to each other in advance for things we hadn't even done wrong. Now of all times seemed like the least appropriate place to tease her, she held me in her arms, I could hear the wailing of sirens in the distance. They were fast, but the numbness in my legs was spreading up to the rest of my body, and it seemed to get colder with each passing second. I opened my eyes as wide as I could to look at her one last time. I would always remember that face. Every contour, and every color, every sparkle in her eye. As sad as I was all I could do was smile and she just smiled right back at me. Her smile was so beautiful, her smile had always been there for me, her smile could outshine even my darkest days.
The sirens had stopped and were replaced by the sound of a heavy vehicle braking and coming to a sudden halt. Before the medics came and took me from her arms I had to tell her, I had to tell her one last time.
"I love you."
And that was when I fell asleep.
