Decades flew by, each curling and twisting around another. Some snapped off of another year, or obliterated itself.
I could only watch myself, not in my own body.
They screamed and echoed into a void that did not care of their pain.
When I was young my mother used to let me light candles in the house. I had an affinity for putting the lid back of after the flame began to dance. I took a sick pleasure in watching the flame suffocate. It would cling on to life, but I showed no mercy. I waited till the wick was black.
Now, they are the one whose wick is growing dark. I am.
I am the one who suffocates. My lid is closed too tightly, I can not inhale. The carbon flakes off, each crumble a piece of my poor soul.
But, no one was around to watch my wick grow black. For they did not even have the mercy to do that. I would die.
My father once told me, “There will come a day in which the world will feel cold. You will be alone.”
“Your mother nor I will be there.”
I stared blankly at the open space around me, there was no person filling the emptiness.
“You must do one thing for me.”
I squeezed my hand tightly across my stomach.
I held on until the shimmering white light turned to flashes of red and blue.
I held on until I could smell the sterile white ecosystem.
I held on while many of the other inhabitants let go.
I held on while they stood over me, prodding and poking.
I held on when they forced needles into my arms and a tube down my throat.
I held on when I told them I was alone.
I held on when the overseers pondered about the lack of flowers.
And I will hold on until it is my time to let go.
Then it will be time to hold on to you, once more.
