The Dying Embers

Each of us is born with a box of matches inside us but we can't strike them all by ourselves.

Urging to finish off watching reign I barely felt time passing off. By the time my phone ringed it was 1207 14th of April, a day I imagined the worst of all days, my birthday... It was her, an idiot ruining the perfect scene of Mary, the Queen of Scots, but all the same an idiot wishing me a happy birthday reminding me that I was not alone. Then my brother bashed in, my mother with a card comprised of creatures I love, owls and pretences of annoyance and once again a happy birthday ( a phrase which brings a hell lot of uncomfort to me). I switched my pc off, didn't bother to look at the stars, and dumped myself into the bed. But I did my duties of the night; I reverently rubbed my fingers along the silken mattress. I pressed my cheek to the pillows, switched on the fan to the speed of three(believe me, these days are incredibly hot. The comforter was thick and irresistibly soft, like a billowing cloud. I toppled into it, relieved to rest my weary feet. Warmth and darkness enveloped me. I love to sleep and I soon succumbed to the call of sleep. Sleep?? No, my thoughts drive me make the most of time and I hate it, yet as usual thoughts swirl until my brain drags me to sleep. Every year on my birthday I felt like I died a little more. It was reminder of myself and all my regrets yet also a nagger of urging me be stronger, more responsible and serious.

Fifteen, I can barely imagine myself in that age. It was only month ago a tree occupied me climbing it. Birthdays loom over you on the horizon like a personal tsunami. I felt like being 15 would drag me bodily up the beach and throw me in the raging water like a rag doll; leaving only the body of a decrepit old creature behind. Too old to climb trees? No. Too old to play? No. Too old to waste your time thinking? No. Yet others expect you to be different and do I give heeding to them? No. Deep down I know I'm still the defiant, stubborn girl and developed into more obstinacy by the turning of age.

I was having a nice dream, a real nice dream and she spoilt it, my friend, my ally, at 8 00 in the morning. Bah, I never get up at 0800, at least an hour later maybe. (I cannot deny but I need a lot of sleep...) Yet drowsily, dreamily I picked and again the monotonous happy birthday and you have to put that one tone that's never yours and say thank you. But it's nice to think that people at least remember you. I walk out of the door, wash my face and well, I drop dead on the bed again until my brother comes roaring with his plane and screams in my ear. Honestly, no one understands how much it drives me up the wall. I go out and the sunlight swallows me whole.

It's my birthday I realize, more like one year down, ____years to go, and surprisingly reminds me of my philosophical mentor(Philosophy of Buddhism) and him telling us about death. Day goes on, and it's just a reminder that I'm not even going to spend my birthday evening at home, but at my cousin's. Wretched day or so I think. But then I think "positive, positive, positive nor negatives." I get calls all along and then a text of someone notioning me 'Potato' which brought a smile upon me to which I usually go mad. Putting everything aside, I sit to watch my favouite show, REIGN and I cry as Francis dies. Believe it or not, I actually broke my heart and couldn't pick myself for hours and showed much reluctancy when my cousin came and squeezed me to death wishing me happy birthday.

Then came evening and I dressed myself into my favorite blue dress, and well, endured two hours of drive to cousin's place staring at the passing towns ,trees yet unaware of my own heart beating or the rise and fall of my chest, I drifted into semi-consciousness.

An evening of glamour, I was there alright yet my mind drifted along with the blowing wind. My grandmas cat occupied my interest for a while and then she averted her interest upon some else's foot. I felt drifted indeed. The cat I guess didn't love me, she just liked me, It is then I realize, "I'm not a nice person but I am kind." My cousins greeted me as if I was their queen and that was nice yet the whole mood was spoilt by my uncle who looks exactly like Sid in the Ice Age, by his morbid irony and sarcasm but trust me, it was worth laughing for. Cake was entirely out of the question, I'll only imagine myself ashamed. It was nice to have all the relations gathered together and all the cousins at my feet and after a feast of lovely things, I just sat down unable to move, for I ate more than usual and it is after I realize that I shouldn't have eaten that much. My cousin sister, one of the younger dragged me into this game of catch and play whiles two of the other cousins (my favorites disappeared into darkness). It was a custom of families during the new year to light crackers and fire sparks, while the rest of them enjoyed doing that, I sat in my elder uncle's room engaged in a book of Sherlock Holmes. The candle light seemed to dim, my focus drew thin away from the book into the flame of the candle. I couldn't focus for much longer as my sister dragged me outside.

Outside. It takes a second or two for the new information to sink it, even though it is right before my eyes, larger than life. Then I feel my lips stretch wider into gaping grin and my eyebrows arch for the sky. Amazement doesn't quite cover it. I feel like someone just took my spark of wonder and poured on kerosine. The smile I show on the outside can't adequately reflect what I feel inside; it's like every neurone of my brain is trying to fire in both directions at once - the best kind of paralysis. A fire—a camp fire and they made me sit and kindled to its warmth. The outside environment was hot but the fire never made aware of that fact, it made me warm. The rest of the people around it just chattered, my mind was far from them, somewhere far far way. The glowing embers leaped and twirled in a fiery dance, twinkling like stars in the hot swirling air before cascading to earth like gleeful fire fiends. Watching the ashes drifting to the sky they were like sparks that urged you to touch the fire. The heat from the campfire seemed to be sucked into the frigid air before ever reaching their frozen hands. They added more wood and poked it with long sticks. It seemed to die a little as if unsure of itself, unready to devour the new offerings. It licked at the new logs like a nervous kitten and sent feeble sparks to die in the air. But after a time it found it's confidence and grew until the heat warmed them, orange flames celebrated with their wild flickering dance. It would have to last through the night.

Burning inferno outside and inside me. The fire reflected me and it urged a thought to be a stronger person. The sight was eerily beautiful in the predawn light. . . The flames leaped and danced as they consumed, radiantly beautiful in their destruction. Fresh embers jumped and spread ever higher until the entire structure was engulfed in a blazing, explosive inferno. Then I watched as, piece by piece, it crumbled to the ground. The fire left only ashes in its wake, grey and empty, to be blown away on the wind. Then they left and I stayed behind, looking above, I couldn't believe it, best night ever filled with stars unimaginable. It was difficult to look up but that didn't matter, it was a heavenly sight. The wind was chill, and the stars burned with the brilliant sapphire pallor of electric light. They illuminated the darkness and my fears crumbled to dust beneath my feet. The words, the lies, the hatred, the failures--they now lingered at a distance. A white crescent shaped scar flickered on my wrist. I was reminded that wounds would eventually heal into scars, some of the permanent, some of them not. No longer did I stand in the shadow of the past. Instead, I marched forward in hope of reaching the stars one day.

On the way back home, I stared at the fields of paddy, and above them the darkness. How I loved it, the dark, the coldness, the wind. I believe it was one of the best days ever, a day I didn't expect to be an optimist. But I was. Eventually drowning with the darkness, I fell asleep.

In the end rereading what I have written, I expect it to be a dream, the day did have ups and downs, but who would expect it to end in such a way? I was drunk in the moment. I was in the moment, it was a glimpse of reality in dreams....Hope smiles from the threshold of the year to come, whispering 'it will be happier...'Not always, but maybe. In the end, hope is a powerful thing after all.