Gray Days

Chapter 5: The Twentieth Day of December

5

Zoey.

Four years ago, a phone call woke us up early in the morning. It was Grandpa. Grandma was dead. I remember it clearly when we rushed to their house. The first thing he said was these three words, "She died peacefully." I didn't think it was possible, but if it was, dying in your sleep would be the most peaceful way to do it.

Wouldn't it?

There's no pain. No suffering. You won't go through any kind of stress in making sure the car won't go off the rail. No initial worry from your relatives because of some disease that's slowly eating you away. Not a single mark of a knife, a bullet, or any contusions from strangling if it's a murder. There won't be any hesitation of jumping off a bridge or a building if it's suicide. Nothing. There's only sleep and there's only you.

It would be just like you snapped out of a dream. You sleep alive, you wake up dead.

But as for me on the evening of the nineteenth of December, I sleep dead and wake up deadlier, already knowing since last night that today is the day my grandmother died peacefully, five years ago. Ironic as it may seem but her death was the start of everything. It's when I realized that death isn't the absence of life, it's the price of it. The day that I figured out that living to gain everything or to become someone or just plainly living is utter nonsense. Because what good is there in everything we have done while we're alive if we're going die anyway. Everything we have in this world is only fleeting and superficial.

At the end of day, when our hearts stop beating, we are buried back to the dirt from where we came.

We go back to nothing.

We are nothing.

I am nothing.

I'm just a sad seventeen-year-old girl whose sadness isn't in the right place. When I should be mourning over Grandma, I'm grieving over myself. I'm grieving over and jealous of everyone trying to live their best lives while a certain doom lingers in their eyes and in everything they do. They act like they don't know when I'm balled up in bed, worrying when this anticipation will end and waiting for this doom to consume me so I can finally stop worrying.

At the early hour of five, Mom sits at the edge of the bed, tucking loose hairs behind my ear as she gently caresses my cheek. I pretend to sleep even though I've woken up hours ago, feeling her soft touch over my skin.

This is what my parents are worried about, but they think it's because of Grandma's death. I let them believe what they want to believe. I don't tell them anything.

"She's fine now, honey," Mom says, referring to Grandma, "Your Dad and I want you to be fine too but—"

One wheeze and I can tell Mom's crying. This is why I don't tell them. They're already worrying too much about me, I don't want to add it up.

Mom stays beside me for more than an hour as I drift back and forth from sleeping and waking. Every time I blink my eyes open, Mom strokes my cheek and tells me to go back to sleep. Most of the time, I do. Sometimes, I pretend and just listen to her until I eventually fall asleep. By the time the alarm rings, the door creaks and seconds later, Dad kisses my hair. At this, I open my eyes and Mom smiles sadly.

"I made breakfast," Dad says to me, "Let's eat?" When he sees my denial, he adds, "Just a little bit."

Forcing myself out of bed, I go down and eat in my pajamas. I barely touch my plate when I tell them I'm full. Before I go back to my room, I tell them I don't feel like going to school and they understand. In turn, Mom says, "Dr. Kelly will come visit this afternoon. Dad and I will be home by then."