Not So Far Beyond
So Long
Everyone dies.
It's a fact, something you can't argue or change, but that doesn't mean it can't suck. For me, death was painless and sudden, so sudden I hardly remember why or how I'd died.
But here I am; existing in my old apartment, watching my makeup brushes collect dust, my favorite boots go unworn, and one side of the bed slowly loose my familiar outline. The cream color walls reflected the late afternoon sunlight so beautifully, making the air radiate with warmth.
I may be dead but I can still feel things, like happiness, sadness, and confusion; however, it all began with pain, an ache to be more precise: an ache for the soft touch of my robe or a sip of coffee, hell I'd even take shutting my finger in a car door. You don't realize how much you've taken for granted until it's all sitting in front of you one day, just beyond reach.
It wasn't long after my death that things began to move quickly around me. Most of what I saw was my family crying, flowers aging, wilting, and dying, and boxes. So many boxes, scattered in all different shapes and sized throughout my apartment. Most of them were labeled, or already taped shut by the time things began to slow down again.
It had been months. The calendar in the kitchen was gone, but leaves had begun to fall outside my apartment window, which was now coated with a thin layer of dust particles. Time didn't flow at normal speed for me, it skipped the meaningless, momentary lapses and skipped to what I needed to see. My bedroom door opened, and there he was: tall, dark, and scary was holding a box and wearing the expression he saved for only two things: disappointing movies and bad dreams. It fit the moment.
His movement, while it may have been choppy and unclear initially from my perspective, felt like home. His suddenly loose fitting jeans sagged around his hips, and the neckline of his old t-shirt was stretched and worn from years of sliding it over his auburn hair topped head. The image of him that I had saved for myself may as well have been a completely different person from the one packing up my things that day. With each item, he hesitated to add it to all the box of belongings he would never look at again.
Then I felt it, I felt him. A violent throb in my chest that blurred the vision even more. I lost grip of the connection and everything became fuzzy. The ache diminished as the connection weakened, and when everything came back into focus, it all became clear. Amongst the various items he'd been wavering to take from my desk, he'd stumbled upon my journal. Within its pages were years of adventures, memories, and photos we had taken together. His motions began to quicken as he wiped his eyes and dropped the small, gray notebook on top of every other piece of me.
It's a fact, something you can't argue or change, but that doesn't mean it can't suck. For me, death was painless and sudden, so sudden I hardly remember why or how I'd died.
But here I am; existing in my old apartment, watching my makeup brushes collect dust, my favorite boots go unworn, and one side of the bed slowly loose my familiar outline. The cream color walls reflected the late afternoon sunlight so beautifully, making the air radiate with warmth.
I may be dead but I can still feel things, like happiness, sadness, and confusion; however, it all began with pain, an ache to be more precise: an ache for the soft touch of my robe or a sip of coffee, hell I'd even take shutting my finger in a car door. You don't realize how much you've taken for granted until it's all sitting in front of you one day, just beyond reach.
It wasn't long after my death that things began to move quickly around me. Most of what I saw was my family crying, flowers aging, wilting, and dying, and boxes. So many boxes, scattered in all different shapes and sized throughout my apartment. Most of them were labeled, or already taped shut by the time things began to slow down again.
It had been months. The calendar in the kitchen was gone, but leaves had begun to fall outside my apartment window, which was now coated with a thin layer of dust particles. Time didn't flow at normal speed for me, it skipped the meaningless, momentary lapses and skipped to what I needed to see. My bedroom door opened, and there he was: tall, dark, and scary was holding a box and wearing the expression he saved for only two things: disappointing movies and bad dreams. It fit the moment.
His movement, while it may have been choppy and unclear initially from my perspective, felt like home. His suddenly loose fitting jeans sagged around his hips, and the neckline of his old t-shirt was stretched and worn from years of sliding it over his auburn hair topped head. The image of him that I had saved for myself may as well have been a completely different person from the one packing up my things that day. With each item, he hesitated to add it to all the box of belongings he would never look at again.
Then I felt it, I felt him. A violent throb in my chest that blurred the vision even more. I lost grip of the connection and everything became fuzzy. The ache diminished as the connection weakened, and when everything came back into focus, it all became clear. Amongst the various items he'd been wavering to take from my desk, he'd stumbled upon my journal. Within its pages were years of adventures, memories, and photos we had taken together. His motions began to quicken as he wiped his eyes and dropped the small, gray notebook on top of every other piece of me.