Krabbe Cakes

Chapter 4

What is the void?

       Is it white? Is it black?

       I have so many questions and everyone I could ask them to is dead – for obvious reasons. The living don't know it. Can't know it.

       Will I even be able to see it?

       Life among the dead will be awfully dismal if I can't even see it. A blanket of eternal darkness. If I can see, will I even want to? What if the devil is one horrid looking man... or woman?

       What does the afterlife smell like?

       Acrid I imagine. Like the smell of burning rubber. Or maybe flowers? Does it even smell?

        Is it lonely? Does it hurt to die?

       There's just so many burning questions bubbling up in the back of my throat that I want to ask you. Questions that I cannot ask, not without dying first and then I would never have to ask them. It's still surreal even after so many years of trying to wrap my head around it.

       People, like you, that die in car accidents die fast. Quick. Easy. Not painless and it would be harsh for me to say easy. Scratch that. I think it's harder to sit here and wait. A watched pot never boils, until it does and you've spent all that time staring – not preparing yourself to add the pasta. Not ready.

       And that's what I am. I'm not ready to jump into that void.

~~~

       Over the course of the next few days, the pins and needles in my hand had spread a bit and as usual my mother was adamant to drag me across town to the hospital, where she worked. As any good mother would do.

       It would seem cliché to state that I hated hospitals, but I really did dislike them. Scent is the sense most closely linked to memory and I could certainly attest to that. It was the soft smell of aging hospital food, cheap detergent and baby powder all blended together.

       "It smells fine," Mom said within seconds of entering the building. "I don't even know what you're saying."

       "I didn't even say anything yet," I replied, but already she was letting out a quick breath.

       "I already called Dr. Bertrand. He's expecting you around 9 so just wait around in the pediatric ward, hug a kid or something." I could feel Mom's feet itching to get to her patients but she refused to let me wander the hospital alone. "Okay, here we are, do you remember Bruno? He's back in here again."

       "He is?" It had been such a long time since I had been one of the kids lying in the bed but you never forget college roommates, let alone hospital ones.

       "Yup, Stacey was telling me about him," Mom answered. "I really have to go but he's in the second last room on the left."

       Feeling no urge to respond, I set off for Bruno's room. I knew this wing of the hospital fairly well. Having spent at least a year's worth of time there it was to be expected.

       When I entered the room, there wasn't a sound to be heard. It felt wrong to make my presence known when Bruno might've been sleeping.

      I approached where the hospital bed should've been and reached down to touch the blankets. The bed was empty and the sheets cold.

       About to leave, I was startled by a rattling sound behind me and a soft feminine voice, "Excuse me, who are you and why are you in my brother's room?"