All I want

Alone without you by my side

                           19 of April, 2061

Dawn has arrived in a sleepy town of Istanbul, waking some residents while other were still far away in sweet dreams. But for one, lonely man, dawn hasn’t arrived in his life a long time. Every since that day. His walking stick helped him with his steps while he walked the only path he walked in his last forty years. He was getting old. Hi is walking slower day by day, his breathing is getting shorter, and his memories are messing with him more and more. And not just any memories. God, no. Just memories of her. Their short love. Their family they never succeeded in having it. After a while, he finally arrived at his destination. The guard greeted him with a not, shaking his head a little. He started working there about twenty years ago, and the old man never missed a day to visit his love. Before meeting the man, he always doubted that true love is real. But after seeing Serkan Bolat visiting his love, Eda Yildiz for every day in last thirty years in the graveyard, he knew that it was real. True love is real, and Serkan and Eda had the realest od of them all.
Serkan sat with difficulty at the end of her grave and looked at her tombstone.

                                            Eda Yildiz-Bolat
                            8 of May 1997 -  19 of April 2021

                                        May you touch
                                    Dragonflies and stars
                                      Dance with fairies
                                   And talk to the moon

Seventy-years old Serkan looked at it for a long time. They didn’t have a chance to get married, but Ayfer and Melo insisted to add his surname on her grave. Her grave… God only knew how much he missed her. Her smile, her laugh, her dimples. Her everything. He laughed bitterly, as he imagined what would happen to them if on that day, her heart didn’t stop beating. Maybe they would be an old married couple. Always bickering about something, but still being crazy about each other. He imagined what would they look like. Two girls and two boys. Maybe even more. Serkan put his hand in his jacket and pulled a small piece of clothing. He remembered how much happy and sad he was that day. Happy because it was for his son, and sad because he didn’t know if he will get to see it on him. And he was right all along. He didn’t get to see it.
Because on this day, 19 of April, forty years ago, the love of his love died, together with their baby.
He looked at the left side of the tombstone and his eyes were full of tears.

                                            Alp Yildiz Bolat
                                         2021 – 2021
                                   Tonight I’ll fall asleep
                                    With you in my heart

Serkan didn’t really know how did he survived all these years. The only reason he was sure of, is because Eda and Alp appeared in his dream every single night.
He didn’t know if those dreams were sweet dreams or more likely, beautiful nightmare. Beautiful because he saw them every single day, and nightmare because he couldn’t join them.
“Good morning, my little family” he acknowledged them for the first time that morning.
“How are you?” he asked, even though he knew he would never hear the answer.
“I am good” he continued. “As good as any lonely, bitter seventy years old man, with no family and no friends.
“Today is the anniversary, you know. I lost both of you on this day forty years ago. On that day hell began for me.”
“But you know” he said after a while, “I guess I deserved this. After all I put you through, I deserved this punishment. Every day I miss you more and more, and every day the pain is bigger and bigger. I didn’t know how much one man can endure, but here I am” he said bitterly.
“I often thought about killing myself. Because seeing you in my dreams wasn’t enough. I wanted to touch you, to hug you, to kiss you. But I never did it. Because I deserved to suffer. And, Eda, God only knew how much I suffered all these years.”
“The first few years after you died, I was in a shock. I didn’t actually believe that you were gone. I hoped every day that you will somehow show up, come to the Art life, smile that smile at me while I ran to your arms. I would say how much I missed you, how much I loved you, and that I would never leave you again and you would tell me that you loved me back, and that you will never leave me again. And in that moment, I would wake up. I would look at your side of bed, that was empty, it was always empty, and then I would cry all over. After that, I would go to our closet, took one of your shirts and smell it. Your smell still lingered it, only because I bought your perfume and put in on it. So, after these few years, I locked myself in the office. Project after project, I worked 24/7. Rarely leaving it. Basically, I lived there. Did you know Sirius died soon after you two did? He sensed that you were gone and, in few days, he got a heart attack and he died. I didn’t have anybody else after that. Ayfer and Melo soon left to Mardin, and they often called me, but I never answered. Ceren and Ferit left to London, we have now an office there. Engin and Piril tried to help me, but I was gone. There was no help for me, Eda. They continued to work there, and I saw how their family grew year by year. They now have three kids, everything I wanted, they had. I watched day by day their happiness, and I was so jealous, Eda. You wouldn’t approve that, but I couldn’t help myself. They had everything I wanted, but couldn’t have. We grew apart of course. I told them, before you died, that if anything happened to you, I would never forgive them. And I didn’t. They were still my partners, but that was it.”

Serkan sighed loudly after pausing his monologue. Every day he said the same thing. Because he didn’t know what else to talk about. He didn’t have anything else to talk.

He retired ten years ago, but he didn’t have anybody else to enjoy his retirement.
His mother, Aydan, died twenty years ago, peacefully in her sleep, never reconciling with her only son. He attended her funeral, feeling just a little bit guilty, but he didn’t care that much. Serkan Bolat died when his love and their baby died. Since then, he was nothing
He was no longer somebodies’ fiancé, somebodies’ friend, somebodies’ son. He was just an architect. He built buildings, hotels, ecological projects, modern projects, houses and other. But he never cared about it at all. Once he finished with one project, soon he started with another one. And that was his life since she died.
He had nobody to talk to. He had nobody. He only talked with Eda and their baby, and he only had them. Even dead, they were his life.
Life went on, but Serkan never did. His hair slowly turned grey; his face was full of wrinkles.
You know how people had those smiling wrinkles, who were a proof of life filled with happiness. Serkan never had those. Because, after Eda died, he never smiled or laughed again. His eyes were empty, sad, full of longing for his family he would never have.
Forty years went, and Serkan never smiled again.
During these lonely years, his only hobby was collecting Little Prince books
In this moment, he was probably the biggest collector of that book in the whole world.
He founded an Eda Yildiz charity for all orphaned children in Turkey.
He founded an Alp Yildiz Bolat charity for all parents who lost their children.
He founded a Sirius charity, giving money to the shelters in need, hoping another Sirius would get a happy ending.
He remembered his loved ones in the only way he could.
And know, finally, after all these years, he was ready. Ready to leave this world and join his loved ones.

“Aşkim, I am ready” he said as he laid down on their grave.
“Finally, I am going home. I am going home to you” he whispered sadly
“You don’t know how much I missed you. All these years, I lived through my dreams and our old photographs. I lived through your yellow dress, your gift on my birthday, through your gift on New Year. I lived through our old phone conversations and messages. Did you know I actually bought vouchers for your phone, so I can call you and hear your voice once more. I lived while holding this tiny onesie, as I do know, the only proof that our son ever lived. I lived Eda, but it was not much of a life. I counted day by day, second by second, so I could finally join you two.”
He put a hand on their tombstone and fondled it gently with tears in his eyes, looking at her picture on it.
“I love you, my peri kizi.”
“I love you, my baby boy, my son.”
“I can’t wait to meet you two again” he said as he closed his eyes.
He thought that after he die, he would join her
He thought that after he die, he would join Eda and Alp in the Doctors house. That was his vision of heaven.
But maybe it wasn’t his time to go, because maybe this wasn’t real at all
Serkan opened his eyes again.
He woke up.

Author's note:

Vay be, your comments on the last chapter were something.👀👀👀
Anyways, there is a part two of this final chapter, maybe even an epilogue,so this is not the last of it.
Thank you for all kind comments and votes, I couldn't do this without you!
See you soon!

xoxox