For My Sins

This journey seems too short for story telling and then its too long, for the events run in my mind from the beginning till now as swiftly as a blink of an eye and I don’t want to spend the remainder of time in silence.

I made sure when I started off that I would think the happy moments of the story- not the grief, the pain nor the climaxes. I would reminiscence the parts where the flower had pretty petals and a sweet fragrance. The thorns I decided, I would ignore and also the wind around, that blew away the petals one by one leaving the flower withered and dead- no, this last time, I will end smiling.

I was scared, no denying the fact. My heart thumped frantically inside and I thought of bolted doors and of me, a prisoner inside, beating my hands against them, crying out for someone to open them, to release me from the suffocating darkness, a way out- a way to end.

Beads of sweat appeared on my forehead and were blown away instantly by the rushing air. The coolness was calming and I remembered this from life, I had liked it then too.

I had also liked my life, enjoyed my influence over others. I had considered myself a savior then, pretended like I was the keeper of keys that led to peace- numbness I now call it. I would rent out those small packets when beseeched by anyone needy and feel proud when they snorted their way into oblivion.

It was like people turning up the volume to a rock band, trying to drown the voices in their heads. It worked for a while, until you grew accustomed to the sound and reality screamed in your faces once again.

I was the musician orchestrating the Song of Unfeeling and those people, my devoted listeners, hooked to the music by the force of their own bodies rebelling against them, craving for what only I could give them. That was my power, one that had made me the helpless being that I was today.

I closed my eyes trying to think of a happy dream to keep me smiling as I had promised my self I would, but all that I could remember were nightmares. Nightmares from the time she came to me, asking for help and I made her a part of the cult of the doomed and the damned. I dreamt and I feared, feared because it was my fault. I wanted that dream to end but it had become a part of me like scars from an accident. This was my scar from a dream.

Dreams, spiritually, people think always hold some messages. Maybe it’s an outlet for our subconscious to speak, tell us things that manage to elude our roused minds.

Most times when I wake up, I hardly remember what I dream about and others It’s a prayer of gratitude that starts my day, for I’m thankful that what I saw was just a dream.

I dreamt of regret once and also of comeuppance, of the grief proceeded by mistakes and of the insane desire to go back in time and stop my hands from getting burnt in the fire of wrong.

I cried then, and felt the desperation. I felt the walls closing in on me, throttling me and I groped in the darkness for a light of miracle, but there was none.

I wept on my mother’s bosom, trying to confess to my mistakes, speaking of the betrayal of trust, of the demise of all the good that I had in me.

I wasn’t able to tell her what really went by, and only managed to scream in ragged breaths,

“It’s bad…it’s bad…”

I saw all of this with my eyes closed and then for the first time I wished to never open them again.

My eyes were still closed- I was too much of a child to face life head on. A dour silence or an angry growl, I was the infant that cried when it was hungry and cried when it was in pain. I screamed when I was hungry and screamed some more when I was in pain.

I was past the part where I would end my story with the contentment of life, because truth be told, I was never content with anything, which of course was my own doing.

A friend of mine once wrote in an essay in grade school, that happiness wasn’t short lived; it’s not as commonplace as a good joke, a goofy face or a fall down on a banana peel. It was elation, it was satisfaction, it was feeling light, for abstract as happiness is described to be as, it does weigh on our hearts, physically.

He was trying to describe contentment I think, I’m not sure because this was a feeling, I had never experienced.

I found oblivion blissful because it was like being stuck in nowhere, in a limbo, in space, where eternity stretched till as far as eyes could take us and all this eternity held nothing. I found this a better world and so I started living here.

I helped others inhabit this place too, feeling pleased of saving them from jostled lives on this planet, until she died.

When she died I imagined her to be an angel, a pretty one, floating on soft clouds in light gowns and halos. She would fit right there, but where will I fit…

I doubted if angels had tattoos, and that too of profanities?

I wouldn’t fit in the white peace and so I must head to the fiery pit, yes this is my niche, in this world and would be in the next.

The journey was coming to a close and I wanted to end the trip with a message, with farewells with a note of reminder, but I couldn’t. Instead I saw three pictures running in my head like a ridiculous, haunting dream. I saw her, merry and contended, then I saw her wasted, slumped, staring into nothingness and then I saw her dead with no one crying for her.

My punishment was well served, I didn’t save lives, I stole them and it was time that I stole mine.

There was no air blowing now, the nature had stopped to witness the end of the callous creation, and was giving its destruction the cold respected berth that would set an example to all the creatures that breathed.

Nature wasn’t cruel, it was majestic and gracious. I can say that for if I had been a spectator of the triumph of the right, I would have jeered and celebrated. The thunder would have lashed the clouds mercilessly and water would have poured heavily to purify the land of my impure being.

The silence gave me hope that maybe forgiveness was attainable, that maybe she would smile again and that maybe the lives I had touched and burnt would be whole and healthy again.

Relief washed over me and I smiled again, just slightly for the very next moment, I felt a blow on my scull, an iron fist, under which I crumpled like a glass vase broken to uncountable pieces, I fell to the ground and felt tremors emanate marking the end of my journey. I lost all feeling and lost all thoughts. A thin ray of light pierced the darkness and I sensed the shadows of many surrounding me. Chaos reigned; I registered, amid which I heard the winces of the pitiful and the retching of the disgusted.

The light then dimmed and was engulfed by darkness again and I braced myself, this time, for repayment.