Dying is the Easiest Part

Chapter 18

Chapter 18

Never Did

It's the same bottle of pills that I used to end my life. It's in my hands. I'm holding it. The same bottle of pills that I swallowed to end it all.

I lick to wet my dry lips.

What if I do it all over again? Will it bring me back? Or will I disappear for good?

I have no idea. I don't even know what am to do.

And as I keep on staring at the bottle of pills, suddenly, everything that has happened to me. Every single bad thing that drove me to end all the pain start coming back all at once.

Everything.

My parent's broken marriage.

My broken dreams.

The words that I wrote with my heart, my soul, and my flesh and how they have been robbed from me.

They say God is justice but where was He when my works were robbed from me? They say God will fight for you but where was He when I was defenseless?

Where was He when the one who robbed my works were getting all the benefits from the words that I built deep within me? Words that I bled with my own blood. My sweat. My heart. My soul. My passion. My energy.

I put my faith in Him.

I trusted Him.

But how come He let all this happen to me?

Amidst all my questions, amidst all the pain the came back all at once I saw darkness began crippling over the whole place. It started from my windows, eating up the light that's coming from the moonlight.

It crawled and crawled to the floor and to my ceiling, not missing every spot and corner. Nabitawan ko ang bote dahil sa takot.

The impact of the bottle, hitting the floor is the last thing that I've heard until I saw the darkness crawling from my fingertips.

I begin to sweat, my heart begins to pound as I watch the darkness devour my whole hand.

It's now on my wrist. It feels so heavy and so painful against my skin.

It's like putting an alcohol straight to an open wound. The only difference was this sting doesn't disappear over time, in fact it's getting even more painful.

I'm so scared and I don't know what to do. The darkness is about to eat me up, whole and alive. I have no idea what the fuck is happening but my heart is pounding so hard and so fast that I couldn't breathe.

This. This was exactly what I've been feeling when I was at my darkest and no one helped me.

The face of my Dad suddenly registered at the back of my mind. Will he help me? Could he hear me? Or would he abandoned me, too just like how God abandoned me when I was screaming for help directly to him?

"Dad!" I scream, tears begin rolling down my cheeks. "Dad, help me!" I scream at the top of my lungs and as the darkness covered my neck, reaching to my chin and at the bottom part of my mouth, I let out a loud gasp and I came falling back down to my bed. The bed where I've been lying on all this time.

But the only difference is I'm not alone.

Because my Dad was here and his arms were wrapped around me while my head rested on his chest. I tilt my head up to look at him, he was already looking at me with both gentleness and pain in his eyes.

A gentle stares that are full of understanding.

Pain because it seems like he's hurting on my behalf.

Kanina pa ba siya nandito? Have I been screaming for help in my sleep?

"Dad?" I hear my own voice crack.

"It's me," he whispers, brushing a thumb over a tear that rolled down to my cheek.

"Dad, I had a dream. It was dark and I'm scared and..." My sobs and tears ate up all my words and my explanation and my story and he understands.

He just held me closer and tighter. "I know," he whispers softly as he puts a hand on top of my head. "Do not be scared. I am here with you." He says and his sentence was so strong and so intense that I almost heard a hammer, striking through the metal walls that I built around my heart.

I didn't say anything. I just cried my heart out into my Dad's embrace and his chest and he just held me through it all. Through my process of falling apart. Through my darkness and brokenness.

"Dad?" I look up to him once again.

He looks down at me and smiles his softest smile.

Peace.

That's what his smile instilled through my raging storms. When he smiles at me, I find peace.

"Was I screaming in my sleep? Did my screams woke you up?" I ask him when my tears subside.

Again, he smiles softly as he gently shakes his head. "You weren't screaming... you were whimpering."

I was genuinely surprised at his response. Then how come he's here? Siguro ay naisipan niyang kamustahin ako at napakasakto na binabangungot ako.

"But there's no small whimper coming out from you that won't wake me up. Even through your most silent cries, I would still stand up from where I am seated just so I could get to you and hold you. Because, Maeve, you are my daughter... There's not a second that I didn't think of you. You are so important to me, Maeve and you are more precious than all these things that you see around you... Did you know that I'd trade all of these things you see around you just so that I could have you back?"

I subtly roam my eyes around place. Almost everything in my room are made out of gold and everything that is expensive and yet he calls me more precious than them.

With tears streaming down my face at how my Dad's fierce love for me, I held held him tighter as I press my cheek against his chest. I felt his loving arms and warm embrace, surrounding me once again.

To have a father that will hear even your silent cries.

To have a father who's always ready to rescue me.

"Don't leave me, Dad..." I beg him in between my sobs. I'm afraid that if he leaves me here, the darkness will come back and it will devour me once again.

He pressed his mouth on the top of my head. "I never did, Maeve..." he whispers and then I fell asleep.