Memento Mori

"What do you want?"

Silence.

She doesn't answer my question. Instead she points her finger at me, no, at something behind me. I turn around and is met by the emptiness that surrounds us. How did I get here? I turn back to the mirror only to find a door. Why did she leave me?

Thump, Thump, Thump.

I can hear my heartbeat on the other side. I close my eyes. I shut them tight and try to find my heart.

Thump, Thump, Thump.

It's her heart.

All I have to do is breath.

Breath.

I can't seem to catch my breath. Where did it go?

Thump, thump, thump, thump.

It's beating faster now.

A cry. A cry and a push. I can't believe I pushed myself over the edge.The air is cutting through my skin as I fall.

And fall.

And fall.

And-

The roof breaks as I crash through it. I can see a man on a fishing boat looking as I fall into a river of memories. There's a young girl waiting for me underneath the surface. Her face is broken, her dreams leaking into the water and disappearing before her eyes. I think I know her.

"Did it hurt when you fell from hell?" she asks.

"No"

"Does it hurt when you die?" she asks.

Yes.

"Maybe"

"Breathe" she says.

And I breathe.

But I can't breathe. I never should have trusted myself. The water is flooding my lungs, filling up all space inside until I become one with it.

I'm not drowning.

I see myself walk away and there it is again. The heartbeat. But it doesn't sound like a heart, it sounds like an alarm. Is it warning me?

Thump, thump, thump

I try to swim away from it but I'm stuck, stuck in time. Stuck trying to escape the inescapable. There's nowhere to hide. I look up at the ceiling. There's a black hole where I fell. Did I fall? Did I fall or did I let go? I can't seem to remember...

I close my eyes and let myself sink deeper and deeper into the icy cold water. As I sink I can see the little girl growing up, growing up to become a nobody. How pathetic I am. Why is it that only the good people go to heaven? Why is it that only the bad people go to hell? Who are you to decide what is good and evil? Who are you?

I open my eyes as my body hits the bottom of the river. It's not the end, it's another door. I open the door and is met by air. Air that's forcing its way into my lungs, squeezing the water out, making it easier for me to breathe. I think I'm drowning.

Thump, thump, thump.

She's here. But where am I?

As I walk through the door the beat grows louder. Is it warning me from her? I thought I was her?

There are no walls, no floor, no nothing. Nothing but me. Me and him. He's in the far corner of the nothingness. Barely visible, barely there. The fisherman? I can't hear my own steps as I walk towards him. Do I know him?

"No you don't" he answers.

I look up at him, how did he get so close? Why can't I see him?

"Are you going to save me?"

He moves his hands towards me. Please let him hug me. Let him say that everything is going to be alright. That she's still here, that I'm still alive.

I'm breathing.

His grip around my neck tightens as I try to escape. There is no escape. The more I try the smaller the room becomes. Maybe I should just give up...

No.

I try to push him away but he only grows larger and stronger. Nothing I do is going to save her. Nothing she does is going to save me. This was all just me trying to be the hero in a story where I'm doomed to be the villain. Doomed to fail.

There is no beat, only an endless tune with no beginning nor end. It's deafening.

And then I see her. She's lying on the far edge of the nothingness, no, in a room. A room full of machines trying to keep her alive. Trying to keep her from losing her breath, unaware that she lost it a long time ago.

I close my eyes as my arms grow tired of fighting, tired of trying.

What's the point? Why do I want to breathe so badly? I don't deserve a second chance when it's my fault. I killed her. I killed her and I...

I pushed myself over the edge, no, I jumped.

I let go. I let go and I fell. It's not the fall that kills you. And then I remember.

Remember death.