Everywhere at the end of time

Untitled part

"What are your fondest memories?" asked the nurse as she took out a notebook.

Thinking back, I remember the days when I was a boy, playing football with my dad dancing in the sunlight, gliding along with the wind. Hanging out with my best friends and crushing on girls during high school, laughing as we got drunk. Meeting Maria in that old coffee shop, bringing her caramel of all sorts until eventually bringing her a ring. Watching our kids grow up as we soon become grandparents. Oh, the list goes on.

"Do you remember?"

"Pardon, what was the question again?" I instinctively replied, my head a bit foggy.

"Nothing," she smiled before she got up and escorted me to the door.

"Am I ok?"

"Well..." she hesitates.

"No problem, I know I'm fine." I smiled back, trying to ignore the clear hint of sadness and pity in her eyes.

"See ya, dr ... "

"Mary."

"Yea, mary." I waved as I stepped outside into the hallway.

When I Checked the time I realized it was already 4 pm, although I couldn't remember exactly when I arrived I knew that I had a doctor's appointment with a person whose name started with the letter M.

Knocking the door next to me, a man opened the door in confusion.

"Can I help you, sir?"

"I'm here to see a doctor..." I paused trying to remember her name.

"Doctor jerry."

"We don't have a doctor jerry here sir."

"Oh, I must've gotten the wrong building then, sorry." I smiled as he abruptly closed the door.

Walking down the empty hall, I feel my head getting foggier and foggier. Must be a lack of sleep, I thought before stumbling across a poster in the hallway.

"Do you have dementia?" it said in bold as I scratched my head trying to remember the symptoms before shrugging it off as some dumb advertisement. After all, I've been healthy all my life, or so I thought as I focused on remembering the happy memories that made up of my early days.

Images of Maria and our kids laughing soon brushed away the vivid fog and I relaxed myself, immersing into those same old feelings of comfort and warmth before confidently striding towards the elevator at the end of the hallway.

Her sweet smile, the way she would take care of me when I got home from a long day. The happiness on our sons and daughters faces when I bought home that big birthday cake for them. How I remembered it so vividly.

Pressing down the elevator button, I patiently waited before I reached to press the elevator button. Only to find that someone had already pressed it.

"Weird, I thought the building was empty." I pondered before realizing that I didn't recognize where I was.

Confused I press down the elevator button before I realized the elevator door had always been open.

"I don't really have dementia, do I?" I swallowed the thought, mindlessly stepping into the elevator.

"Maria...." I muttered, trying hard to see through the dense fog in my head.

Pressing a button on the elevator, I didn't even realize when it said I was at the parking lot, but why am I at the parking lot? I asked myself as I pressed another button, realizing that someone had already pressed it.

"Why can't I remember?" I asked myself as I realized that the memories in my head had become completely clouded into nothingness. Like if I was unable to remember anything but yet was able to recognize that I could remember. Remember what?

"Who is maria?" I stare at my hands in disbelief as I sat down against the walls.

Thinking back I find myself at a loss for words before I made out a shape of a hand, not any hand but my son's hand.

"My son's hand!" I exclaimed only to realized that I somehow have a son.

Getting up I walk out of the elevator and stare at the doctor's door. Wondering why I am at a Psychiatry centre for dementia before the door opens and a surprised woman stumbles backwards in shock.

"W-who are you and what are you doing this late in the hos-" I space out, trying to remember what she initially said. Leaving her with an empty gaze as I fumbled through my brain.

"Hello?" she waved her hand over my face before I realized the whole thing was just a memory.

Still in the elevator I lay down and close my eyes, hoping to be able to concentrate on remembering the slightest bit about my past, before waking up again inside the elevator.

I find myself lost within a corridor filled with doors, it was strange, however. As the light that had shined into the building before has now completely disappeared. Shrouding the building and hallway in a thick black mist.

Opening the first door, I find someone catching and receiving an object as their loud voices echoed throughout the hall. Strangely I smile, feeling somewhat familiar before the door fades into the surrounding.

Opening the second door, I find a car and some used-up cigarettes, the smell of alcohol suddenly filling the air. I instinctively lift my hands up in the air, before putting them down, confused by my actions as the door too fades away.

Opening the third door, laid some pieces of clothing and a ring.

"A good choice for a bride," I said before the door also faded away.

As I approach the final door, I felt my skin being pinched as everywhere felt soft. The feelings of sadness and confusion leaving my body while I watched the door open. My mind felt numb as I saw a long path, lit up by the darkness around me.

In a state of complete apathy, I ascended up the pathway. Watching the surroundings shift into unrecognizable structures and staring back into the eyes of those that walked past me, not that I recognized any of them. But that I can feel their shapes disappearing into the void along with the structures around me.

With one final step, I too fell and disappeared into the void, the feeling of my body and mind separating as i closed my eyes and faded into a brutal and yet peaceful bliss called nothing.

With the sudden stop of the elevator. I open my eyes, finding myself lying on a hospital bed. Around me surrounded my friends, my children, and also my beautiful wife. Maria.

"D-dad?!"

"Joel...."

"DAD!" he lunges and me and hugs the life out of me before all the familiar faces around me join in.

"You're fine... Dad.. you're fine... you won't leave us anymore...." he cries as I see the relief on their faces light up like the break of dawn after a night of thunder and lightning.

"Maria, can you do me a favour?"

"Anything for you my darling," she sits down beside me.

I reach out my hands and run them through her hair.

"Take care of our grandkids and tell them all about my stories."

"What do you mean, you can tell them you-"

"No."

I lie back comfortably on the soft cotton bed.

"What do you mean no?" Maria laughs, still lost within my benevolent gaze.

"I am gone already, what is left is but the mercy of his boney hands," I mutter before closing my eyes, enjoying the ability to remember one last time before it takes me. An empty bliss beyond this brutal forgotten world.