AllFreeNovel
Share Us
So, anyway, after a battle against words, I came out as a winner.
Well, almost. I started reading my notebook without feeling the immediate need to hide, throw up, or drive my car into a tree.
Almost, because even to this day, I still have problems with one letter of the alphabet.D. Fun fact: that damn letter has most of the negative words underneath it, and many of them are in red.
Damage.
Decay.
Dirt.
Distress.
Disgust.
Depression.
Disease.
And my most dreaded of all.Deadly.Dead.Death.
I couldn’t really cope with it, no matter how much I tried. It gets stuck every time I say it, pushing against my vocal cords and slashing my voice down. So I made that letterDmy bitch. I wrote each word a thousand times. I wrotedeath, a few thousand.
My wrists screamed, my heart jackhammered in my throat, and I nearly stabbed myself and bled out on the floor.
When Grandpa died five years ago, I didn’t collapse or cry. I just got all my shit together and was there for Dad as he and Susan slashed each other down.
So I was over it, right?
Wrong.
My eyes open as the true reality of death slowly forms in my awareness.
The possibility that my father could die.
As in, my only family member. The only person that kept me together and flipped the world the middle finger while he raised me on his own.
A salty taste explodes in my mouth and I realize it’s because I’m drinking my own tears.
Ever since I desensitized the letterCand its words—cryincluded—I don’t do that anymore. Well, I don’t do it much.
But it’s like these tears have a mind of their own. They’re not due to the word itself. This isn’t my irrational reaction to a random word. This is pulled from a place so deep within me, I have no clue where it’s located.
It doesn’t matter that my neck hurts and my body is all stiff from the uncomfortable position I slept in. All my psyche is able to process is that Dad could be gone.
I’ll be all alone without my father.
The man who painted the world in bright colors and then laid it at my feet.
The man who scowled at the world but only smiled at me.
Now, I won’t have anyone to sing meHappy Birthdayoff tune. No one will hug me goodbye every morning or have dinners with me every night.
There won’t be anyone who’ll slowly open my door late at night to make sure I didn’t fall asleep at my desk again because I got so consumed with whatever project I was working on. No one will bring me my favorite green tea infused with vanilla when I can’t sleep.
He won’t be there to pull me inside when I dance in the rain because I could catch a cold.
He’ll just disappear like he never existed. And unlike when Grandpa died, I don’t think I can survive this.
