They said it would all make sense at the end.
As I float in this vacuum of space, float with the remnant rubble of my crashed spacecraft, I think about that. The beeping of the sensor which indicates an empty oxygen tank is growing louder and louder by the second. The impending death is inevitable now, inching closer by the second.
They said it would all make sense now.
I see the darkness around me. Infinite darkness.
I see the floating stars millions of miles away. I cannot see the Earth, I cannot see the moon and I cannot see the Sun. I cannot see anything that's familiar. I see the endless cosmos, the endless universe and I see myself, powerless - as I wait for death.
It's cold. It's empty.
A cold empty infinite darkness with me somewhere inside it.
It doesn't make sense.
I can see the past which led me to this present. A wave of nostalgia washes over me, a wave strong enough to make me momentarily forget about the inevitable future.
I see my Dad. I see the way I liked to see him.
On his best days, in a plaid shirt with his curly hair tucked beneath a hat, smiling as he played with me in our backyard. Smiling, as he dropped me off at my baseball games. Smiling, as he taught me how to ride a bike. Smiling, as he and Mom played with me, together.
I also see the way he didn't like to be seen and I didn't like to see him.
I see his hair ruffled and uncombed, all over the place. I see his shirt covered in food stains and cigarette ash. I see him crying at mom's grave, not letting go of her, not yet, not so soon. He stayed there for three hours that day, until someone reminded him that I was still there. That he still had his son left.
But I don't think Dad ever accepted that I was still there. He lost me when he lost Mom and I lost both of them.
He was gone a year later.
I saw Mom. Mom, my perfect mom. Beautiful, kind, compassionate and endless. A world without her seemed like a foreign idea to me until I had been forced to live in that world. The world where her light didn't penetrate my blinds. The world where she wasn't there to comfort me when I cried. The world where she wasn't there to hold me, be with me, talk to me and to love me.
I missed her. I missed Dad. But they weren't there anymore.
No one was there anymore.
I sigh as I shake my head, jolting back to the present. Even that tragic past was a comfort now. It was familiar, it was home and it was mine. This death staring me right in the face was a stranger.
As the beeping ceased, my helmet cracked, mute silence of the space filled my ears. I tried not to think about it. I tried not to panic.
I tried to sink back into my memories, again.
