Till death do us part.

More and more days passed. Time was growing longer, memories started to feel distant. His once constant stream of sms’s to my cell phone seemed to have finally died. I called him to know where he was or at the very least to hear his voice again. All I got was a voice mail every time I tried. That hollow space in my chest seemed to grow bigger and bigger as if I was punched right through my heart. Emotions always elevate metaphorical feelings to physical heights.

I finally decided to face the truth. I wanted to stop lying to myself. I decided to confront him, see and hear the truth for myself. It was the only way to put myself out of my denied misery.

Standing in front of his apartment door, I reached for the door-bell. But something restrained me from ringing the bell. Instead, I reached for the door knob and turned it ever so slowly as if it would buy me all the time in the world to embrace what I was about to walk into. The door was unlocked. As I entered, I heard muffled sounds from the bedroom across the hall.

A lot of emotions ran through my body- confusion, fear, sadness. But I couldn’t find even an ounce of anger in me; the righteous anger that my body should deserve to feel. As I walked towards the bedroom, I could hear his shallow breathing. Deep gasps of air that a body takes in when it is either overly excited or equally exhausted.

I stopped myself from jumping to the worst conclusion even before I could see the truth for myself. The fact was, I was just too much in love with him to assume the worst-case scenario even though the present circumstances did point towards a darkened direction.

Even as the door slid open, I took one look at the room, at him and at that instant I knew. There he was alone as ever, sitting on his bed, taking in deep-shallow breaths as he tried vainly to inhale out of the empty inhaler. I quickly grabbed the medication script by his bed side table and rushed out of his apartment. That’s when I saw it. The medical script contained complicated medicine names for the treatment of lung cancer.

I didn’t need more to understand the reason behind his recent absence in my life anymore. The reason was pure deliberate. As I ran back to his room, apart from the tears in my eyes, something else was showing: Determination.

I know he will put up a fight to push me away from his life. But I’m determined to stay with him till the end.

Tagged to : Three Word Wednesday, ABC Wednesday