The Fight (Republished)

Chapter 11: I Confess

As a writer, my imagination tends to guide me a lot. My ideas come naturally and are rarely forced. I get to live in someone else's shoes, see what they see and feel what they feel. Sometimes I have to research how someone might feel by asking sensitive questions, or watching television shows and movies to get an idea of how emotions are portrayed visually to translate them to words.

Fictional writing means that what I create for the reader, isn't true. It could be based on a true story, or fact, but it isn't some life story of a famous celebrity. The story you've been reading thus far about my life, involving my wife, kids and myself, is fiction. Another words, I lied. It wasn't just another creative story to entertain people, it was a release of pain and an escape from the reality that I have to face every morning.

Going right back to the very first chapter would be a good starting point. It's very much non-fiction and based nearly word for word on actual events that occurred in my life. After that though, I began to weave a web of lies to make my horrible story more bearable, more positive - optimistic even. I had lost all hope of things getting better, but I wanted to live a life where I wasn't so full of fear and doubt. Creating that life was the best thing for me. It helped me cope with what had actually happened and allowed me to make an attempt at moving on. Losing your wife is never easy, but losing the mother of your child after one year of giving birth is far worse to recover from.

I told you that I lied and made everything up. Now I guess it's time for me to bring down the veil and reveal all the smoke and mirrors. This story started off in a bad place, but I turned it around because that's what I truly wanted to happen. I was in love with my wife, as well as my son when I first laid eyes on him. The only problem with loving someone, is that your love can't protect them from the inevitable fact that we all die sooner, or later. Just so happens that for my wife, her time came far too soon and I was left in complete disarray, with a newborn son, and no hope. Even now as I write the truth, it's not setting me free. I should feel guilty about lying for this long, but I don't. I wanted you - the reader - to have faith and hold strong through your adversities and similar struggles. The only problem with that though, is that I felt the need to get the truth out; no more sugarcoating from me.

We won't revisit the very beginning, but once I pinpoint the exact moment where I veered from the truth, I'll set us back on track for what actually happened to my wife when our son was born. No more bullshit, no more lies, no more fiction, just what I remember. I'll do my best to recall everything so it is as authentic as possible. I just have to remember that the pain is temporary and it needs to stay in the past. As I write this now, I find my eyes tearing up as I think about telling you the truth. I'll have to relive every moment that I wanted to bury and pretend didn't happen. Don't worry about me though, I'll be fine, and so will my son. We have a lot of great people around to support us as I relapse into the memories that I thought could be buried by writing a story about hope, perseverance and miracles.