Life and death

“… Last week we lost one of our brilliant students, Catherine Mosby. The police after thoroughly investigating have found her backpack on the dragon hills. She fell into a loose chasm, and because it was raining heavily, the water slowly filled the chasm and she died of drowning in it. Coming from a teacher who never taught her in the class, I constantly heard about her being excellent in all the subjects, our school will mourn her absence… we tried to contact her mother for a small eulogy but because she’s in an emotionally weak state, instead her best friend Tom Brand will give it” said Mrs. D’Souza, in a hall filled with the all the students in a morning tone.Mourning is a really beautiful phenomenon, isn’t it? One could say there are different types of mourning, one where the body weeps for death of someone by showing tears, and the other, more delicate and fragile one, the one where the soul mourns, the type of mourning where a person feels a special connection to a person and losing them makes you feel empty, not just death but also being far from them, this way a person weeps for their loss and the feeling of living without them gives them an existential crises, where the loss of that person make one feel that their own existence is meaningless without theirs, this can only arise by the most gorgeous yet a destructive force called as LOVE!And that’s what Tom had for Catherine, no, not the conditional love that most people crave for but rather for Tom it was something more he had with Catherine, the unconditional love, something that a mother has for her children or in this case, what a person has it for their best friends.“sh…she was not just a friend for me, she was like a sister that I never had, to all those who don’t know her, she’s the one who always saved me from bullies, she’s the one who did my homework just because my mom was in the hospital battling cancer…do you think she is still dead?” said Tom with a low toned voice, he had tears in his eyes, his hands were shaking, he took a deep breath and said “NO..” while saying this he had those tears rolling down his face, his voice was trembling, he was biting his lips lightly so that he could control his tears.“No she is not, she is still alive, right here” said Tom pointing at his head, “She is right here, I had the best memories with her, that even voluntarily I cannot forget!” he started crying loudly, his speech was breaking while he was gasping out, he held the podium he was standing on tightly, he was angry and sad at a same time, his tears rolled down to the paper he read the eulogy from, smearing the ink.Mrs. D’Souza took a glass of water towards Tom, patting his back she gave it to him and said softly with a small smile having moist eyes “You can go now son”.Tom nodded and wiped his tears with his shirt cuffs.Mrs. D’Souza continued with announcing “Catherine Mosby will always be remembered, rest in peace dear…Students, the lectures will start after an hour, and you may have your lunch in the break time”All the students slowly left the hall, but Tom, he was the last one.During the lunch, Tom sat down to the same place he sat every day, but alone, he had an idea of eating lunch alone, as Catherine was suspended for a week, but sitting alone this time was different.He sat on his place with sorrowful eyes blurring out everything he could see, he rather was in emptiness, he did not think of anything or used any of his senses, he just sat down with a sorrowful heart, one of his classmates shook him a bit on his shoulder and with a soft voice said “I think you should eat something Tom” he gave a soft nod looking at her.He gave a sigh and opened his lunch, he had bought pasta, something he hated but always bought for someone really special, someone who was not a part of his life now, every Monday he used to bring pasta for her, and she would bring his favorite dumplings.He just stared at his lunch for a while, not having a single bite.The bell rang, he still didn’t take a single bite of his lunch, then he slowly got up and returned to his classroom, the journey from the cafeteria and the class was not a long one, probably it was, but with Catherine, Tom did not know when the time passed, that was the time when she appreciated his mothers cooking skills.But this walk was indeed, a long one.He sat on his desk, and stared at the desk on his right, giving a sigh he kept his head upon both of his palms facing towards him, as he gently massaged his face.“Tom Brand?” asked out the chemistry teacher for attendance.And Tom replied softly saying “Present”Her teacher continued by saying “Catherine Mos…”She stared at the attendance register for some amount of time, after all Catherine was her favorite student; she exhaled with grief and continued- “Krystal Summers?”Tom on the other hand, was feeling empty and desolated.Catherine’s loss did isolate him from the world around him.After the classes were done he headed out to his home.It was raining heavily, that is why he decided to take out his rain jacket, which was a gift to him by Catherine, he remembered the time when Catherine observed Toms tore umbrella, and took him to a general store made his choose a rain jacket, and bought it for him, the thing that he actually loved about that jacket was it was yellow, and Catherine hated the color yellow and Tom on purpose chose that one. Looking at that jacket, she would always say “I hate the color Tom, I really don’t know why, but, it suits you” she would say giving her charming smile…the heart melting smile.How alluring are memories, aren’t they?Does not matter how well or bad they are…we still remember them!What most people don’t realize is that memory is the real treasure which everyone has and yet no one seems to be thankful about it, what would happen if we took out all the memories from our lives and then we are asked to live? Will that be the time when we, humans will be called as ‘biologically functioning robots’?“Hey Tom?” someone said putting his arm on his shoulder. As he looked back, he identified the person, and said “Not today Johnny, I am really not in the Mood today” Tom said Johnny shoving his arm away.“Look buddy, I know you miss her, but even I do… in a week itself I realized how miserable I was bullying people around…and she is the person who made me realize that thing I am really sorry about whatever I did to you Tom, I wish I could just meet her once and thank her for the person she has turned me. I really wish whatever happened to her would have happened to me….” holding an umbrella, Johnny spoke in a low tone, with a sad and unsatisfied expression. Then he stepped forward to hug Tom, but Tom did not welcome it, he backed off a bit, taking small steps behind.“Yeah…even I wish that would have happened instead” said Tom looking at Johnny.“Ok Tom, I know you don’t trust me now, but if you ever need any help…just think about asking me Ok?” said Tom. Tom then gave a soft nod looking at Johnny and headed the way back his home.
MEANWHILE, AT CATHERINE’S HOME…“Yes, yes, I am just asking that did you recover her body…I know, you have said that couple of times, there was blood, but did you find her body? Umhmm, Ok, Ok… got it, thank you so much officer… yes, yes she was my daughter, oh, yes I am sad, really…really sad, oh no, I don’t need any medical attention, sure, sure, thank you!” said Mrs. Mosby as she talked to the police officers on her phone regarding Catherine, she was scared, but not in grief about her daughter’s death. She then kept her phone down and slowly started walking around, then she suddenly stopped and after taking a deep breath she looked above and in a sorrowful and stuttering voice she said-“Yes, you’ve won! The prophecy was right! And I have no idea how to undo this! Just…take care of her for me, Ok? Please?”  MEANWHILE, SOMEWHERE FAR AWAY“… ….”“… … ….”“How is the healing process going?”“Much faster my lord, faster than expected… After all she has the blood of the ‘One who rode lightning’… she is truly goddess Inanna reincarnated!”“Yes she is”“Oh look, she is opening her eyes!”“Who…who are you people?” asked Catherine lying on a bed massaging her aching head gently. She was staring at two people- one was quite healthy and tall and wore a golden crown, and the other was thin, old, and bald and had his hands shoved his hands in his long cuffs.“Oh hello Catherine, and welcome to the continent of Fafnir!” said the one wearing a golden crown and carrying a light smile, welcoming her as she kept staring at both of them with a curious expression. Yes, she was alive but somewhere else, probably the place where she was destined to be…she was in Fafnir.The concept of death is a really beautiful one, isn’t it? It is a human practice to mourn for somebody close, and that is what makes people realize that the person who will mourn for them after their death, are the people who really cared about them. After their death, can a person know who will mourn for them and who won’t? Actually the answer would be no.
Once an American inventor named Ray Kruzweil beautifully said-“Death gives meaning to our lives, it gives importance and value to time, and Time would become meaningless if there were too much of it”