Yo there, Wanderers!
Well, I have no excuse for not posting anything last month... And pulling this kind of post, especially when it's a few months old story, is kinda unforgivable as well, so I'll make sure that I made up for that with another Scribble down the line...
If I ever remember, that is.
This story is a short one I wrote seven months ago in Reddit. The original story could be found here, but you could simply read the one posted here.
The Story shall now begin.
"It's killing me that I won't get to hear your laughter anymore."
I can't help but think that doctors are very arrogant people, using overly complicated words to describe a really simple occurrence, as if it would reduce my pain if I don't understand what they're talking about. But it didn't, not a little bit.
I can't even spell the medical name for it, but my condition could be described as "inability to filter out unnecessary information". In other words, I treat all and every information received by my sensory perception as equal, overloading my sensory functions over the time. It was a miracle that I could live this long until my brain gave up processing all those information.
Every surface on the room where I was being held was oddly white, no unequal light reflection, messing with my depth perception. I didn't even know how they illuminate everything so perfectly, that even the door is practically invisible. The doctor said it was necessary to minimize my sensory feedback, I can't even listen to my own heartbeat.
The door opened twice a day, sometimes thrice, with occasional visitors in between. It's usually just the doctor though, slowly letting me develop ability to focus on information I really need to know by manually eliminating everything else. But it was of no use. Slowly, my brain can't keep up with the deluge of information, and starting with my sight, my senses began to fade.
On my first year of hospitalization, everyone in my class came to see me once a week, one by one. By the second year, everyone had been busy with final exam preparation, and so no one save my parents came to see me.
Oh, and a girl. Of course it had to be a girl.
Lina was a sweet girl, if a tad timid, and I don't hate her at all. We talked about a lot of things, casual girls' talk, sometimes we even talked about the lesson's progression. Around the end of August, my sight had given up entirely, and my hearing was a bit compromised, but she never gave up.
I was really frustrated. But each week, she came and talked with me, even when the final exam came and went. She said she wanted to be a doctor, and she even said that was so she could find a cure for me.
But it was too late. By March the next year, my hearing gave up entirely, shutting me down from outside world. Even then, she never gave up. She taught me the Braille alphabet, and even brought me books.
"You know," I said one day, when the hot air of summer had started to replace the warm spring. She instinctively hold my hands. "if there is a single greatest reason I hadn't given up until now, it was because of you." a piece of paper slipped on my hands, embossed with braille alphabet from a Perkins Brailler.
[You made me blush.] I chuckled.
"Listen. I know you don't like me to talk all depressed, but while I still able to talk, I want to get everything out of my chest." another piece of paper slipped on my hand.
[Not that you have much of it. Your chest, that is.]
"How rude." I pouted. "That aside, thanks for being here, Lina. When everyone had moved on, when everyone had forgotten about me. To be honest, I could live without them. I could live like this, blind and deaf, if it's a life I could live with you, then I don't need anything else."
[Me too, I don't need much else if you're here by my side.]
"But you know, I'm afraid that this kind of life wouldn't last long."
[Why would you think like that?]
"My senses are fading, Lina. It is not long until my tactile sense would also give up. Eventually, I would run out of senses to even acknowledge your presence."
[Then I would just try harder.]
"It doesn't work that way. You know, most people would grow crazy if they can't see and can't hear. But I don't care. I'm not afraid. Because you're here."
[And I always will.]
"I know. But I'm dying, Lina, and not only because my illness. Would you like to know why?"
[Please, if it's something I could get rid of.]
"It's because you never really laughed around me. You smiled, of course, and sometimes even chuckled at my lame jokes, but you never laughed, not since I lost my sight. And, and it's killing me, Lina, as my ears gave up, the thought that you never laughed, and never will, not any that I could listen." something soft and moist pressed against my forehead, it took me a few seconds to realize it was her lips.
[I'm sorry, Ana. I never knew.]
"It's fine. I love you, Lina. I really do. And that means I want you to be happy, even when I'm not here anymore."
[I love you too. Please don't say that. We'll be together, for the rest of our life.]
"I wonder. But promise me, that you would give up on me when the time comes."
[But why?]
"Why, indeed. A life with a corpse cannot be a happy one, Lina. When I lost all my senses, I would be a little more than a corpse."
[I don't care] her hands trembled on mine.
"But I do. Please let me at least die knowing you would find someone you could be happy with."
[But you're that person]
"No, I'm not that person, I can't be that person. Please, Lina. Promise me that you would."
[I would rather die with you]
"But you must've known by now that there are things in life you should do even when you rather not to." she did nothing for the next few minutes, other than holding my hands even tighter.
[Fine] she left right after. But she still came the next week, and the weeks after, alone.
Even when I pushed her away, she keeps pulling me back.
Would she find someone, somewhere, who would do the same to her?
The Story shall now end
