Twisted immortality

XV - Alone again

How was Henry even supposed to fix this? When Songkarn sneaked out of the bed, it took Henry the whole thousand years of experience he had accumulated to stop himself from turning around. Of not grabbing Songkarn's hand to stop him from going. But what could have he said? The situation was impossible. Henry couldn't be selfish enough to ask Songkarn to be with him. Knowing what he does.

All the pain he had caused Sogkarn was totally unnecessary.

"If only I had kept my distance..." Henry sighed and took a sip of coffee. For Henry, It was an awful thing to drink to feel awake. Especially now. "Do I really want to wake up to this empty feeling?" Henry thought. But the thought of the pain he would cause Songkarn if he stayed with him was a hundred times harder. It would be a bit of a paradox. Henry had a thousand years to get used to the curse. To understand what it is and why. What he can and cannot do. But telling this to Songkarn and making him suffer as a normal human surely would and yet being with him only for another year was stupid. The upcoming inevitable end would always loom over their heads. However selfish Henry was, he couldn't do that. It would be the most awful thing he had ever done in his life.

On every other day, Henry would appreciate the beauty of the morning sun. But he couldn't do it today. It's usually a real welcoming feeling to see the sun. There really isn't anything more rewarding than basking in the golden sunrise every morning of every day. It should be a privilege, not something people get used to. Finally, now Anurak can say he is at last able to appreciate every moment of life. Of course, he knew that often enough people don't think what nature offers us as miracles. Well not anymore anyway. People are grown so far from the simple miracles of their world.

In today's world, people think that it's normal to watch crackling fireplace from a tv. To have absolutely no idea how easy it is to appreciate the simple power and rawness of nature. Even inside their own homes, friends and families don't do much together anymore, let alone talk about going out together to enjoy the physis. Nothing could be simpler than giving children smartphones and telling them to get lost. There are more and more people who can't see what is more important in this world.

"Is he okay?" It wasn't necessary to add a name to that thought. That person's face flashes in front of his eyes every time he closed them anyway.

It had felt such a weird day from the start. Like every choice, Henry made seemed wrong or distorted somehow. Like, he was not sure if he really made the right decision. Looking into the reasons and consequences of every choice in the past, he felt a compelling need to go over his more significant journals again. They so often gave him understanding what exactly was going on in his life. Why he reached some of the decisions he did. And how he could get out of these situations he so often made himself trapped in.

He went through the journals after every hundred years or so anyway. It was a habit he got into, more than five centuries ago. He'd read his journals from start to end. Every time when he did that, he found some details that were missing from the entry. Or see old happenings in a different perspective. As long as he did this, he hoped he would not repeat the same mistakes too often and would be able to keep at bay the huge ones. There have been times when he wrote about something that happened recently and discovered new memories repeating old ones.

Henry felt that people are helpless in front of the mistakes they don't learn from. Also, people don't exactly know how to celebrate the bad from which we learn the most. Or that it's important to notice the bad as much as the good, not conceal it. Because that is where you learn most.

When Henry first started designing his house, he already had a dream about a big library. Mainly because he had been in every library that's ever meant something in the last 1000 years of history, he figured that it would be best to design it himself. To design a library that shows exactly how much he loves to read and how much he cares for the books. So, he designed a beautiful library for his home. It had no lighting from outside to not bleach the binding of the books. Two stories-high with glossy mahogany wood and big old-looking dim chandeliers hanging from the ceiling. Few couches in the middle of the room with a coffee table and small lamps beside them. Everything was with really warm lighting.