Remembrance

1 [unedited]

"I'm never gonna know you now, but I'm gonna love you anyhow"

- Elliott Smith, Waltz #2 (XO)

~~

For my grandfather, who isn't dead but isn't quite alive either.

~~

An old man is dying.

He's over 80 and he knows that there is no going back now. No calling doctors at the last minute to save his life for the umpteenth time in this last week of June.

He is lying on his bed. This is going to be his death bed.

The time is coming near, he can feel it. And so can everybody else in this room.

Everybody's here. His various children, grandchildren. Half of the others he does not even recognize but maybe he has forgotten. Just like the several other things that he has in his old age.

They're all looking down at him expectantly. Waiting. Waiting for him to say something. Anything.

But he doesn't open his mouth.

He remembers something. Someone.

And this feeling of remembering after so much time is overwhelming.

He feels disappointment. And guilt.

Because this someone is not here.

He remembers, he has given up much of his life looking for this person. He has moved cities, countries, continents. This someone is important.

But that's all he remembers.

No name, no face.

The old man's wife enters the room and makes her way towards the front of the group of people standing around the old man's bed. She smiles sadly at him. He looks at her. Over 75 years of her life has weathered her beautiful features away. But he still loves her. Because of her eyes, a twinkling bright blue. They've been the same since he saw her for the first time around 50 years ago.

Suddenly he remembers another pair of eyes. They're flashing green and he knows that they belong to the person that he suddenly remembered on his death bed on his last day in this world.

He frowns as the past clangs with the present, he still looks at his wife.

He shuts his eyes as he is yet again overwhelmed by his remembrance.

He remembers laughter; resonating with pure joy. Soft blonde hair that he is suddenly filled with a longing to touch.

There is a headache.

There has always been one. But this one is a lot more severe. 

His eyes fly open.

His wife is still there, holding his hand and so are the others. Patiently waiting for that moment. When through the passage of death, the old man would cross this realm into the next.

His wife is crying. She's not sobbing; she's smiling at him. She's smiling at him as slightly salty tears roll down her cheeks quietly.The old man wants to wipe her tears away for and tell her that everything will be alright. That he will be alright.