The Easy Way

It is about a man, going through the 5 phases of grief because he has to euthanize his sister.

There she was, sitting in that chair of hers. But she wasn’t trying to make it swing like she used to when she was younger. Just sitting, looking pretty serious, or sad. He couldn’t figure out her looks nowadays. It was a cold day and damp. Very damp actually, for Jon’s taste. He wasn’t fond of this kind of weather. He didn’t like the fact that he couldn’t see the sun or that weird feeling in his tummy. Weather was causing that feeling, it had to be. There were some things he liked about rainy days too though. He liked the smell, it smelled clean. It was like the earth was trying to cleanse itself. It was futile. No force in the whole universe could cleanse this place, set aside earth alone. It had been corrupted too fast and too much. And was about to get even more corrupted. He liked to think that it was clean anyway. He was a dreamer, some used to say. “A man living in a dream world, far far away” they used to mock him. He did never care about those people. For his whole life, he lived like the way he wanted. He believed in his own truths, not theirs. Never theirs. He stared out of his little hole of a window. The rain was falling pretty hard. Too hard, for Jon’s taste.

            He was having a hard time finding things to get his mind busy today. It had never been much of a struggle for him to distract his mind from what he is doing. Yet he was struggling about it now. He looked at her. He looked at her and didn’t see her. He saw a pretty little girl. A little girl who had nice auburn of hair, long enough to touch her waist. He saw her pretty smile; he saw the holes of her missing teeth. She was wearing a white long dress with a nice red girdle around her waist, her favorite dress. She would wear that one all the time if you would be naïve enough to let her, even to sleep. She had those beautiful, alive, colorful eyes. Her mother’s eyes they were; shaped like… He realized that he couldn’t remember it exactly. Were they round or were they more like almond shaped? He couldn’t make the shape, but he knew it was as graceful as the rest of her face. He didn’t want to look at her eyes now to figure out, because if he did, he would have to see her. Really look at her, not through her. And that was just too much painful for Jon’s taste as well.

            He tried to remember that little girl again. Tried to imagine what she would do if she were here. She would dart out of the door and play in the rain without her coat probably. She wouldn’t be afraid of some silly droplets hitting her body. She was always brave that one, more than she should have been maybe. He was the shy one himself. She would push his limits too often and too far. She loved the way he would blush with shyness. She would laugh at him when he blushed, every single time. Then he would blush even more. He was a dreamer and she was an adventurer. He would just imagine but she’d rather do it instead. The happiest person who ever lived and will ever live. She had always wanted to live in the moment. “Now is all we got and it is beautiful. That’s why it is called present” she had said once. Got that smart talk from some movie probably, but it was sweet all the same. Life was everything for her; living it well and living it all. So full of live she was. Too much life, for Jon’s taste.

            His eyes dropped to the floor. He tried to examine the floor tiles for a while. Just for a few minutes, he wanted to think only the tiles. He tried hard and failed. Memories were haunting him like some hungry wolves after a prey. He could feel them right behind him. One stung its cold, sharp teeth through Jon’s leg: he remembered a big bat. Another one went for his arm instead: image of a broken bicycle came to him instantly. As he fell, other wolves went for his thighs and arms and his back: old stamps, a broken vase, an elephant… His mind finally settled on a memory, one of the good ones. He remembered a white day, she used to love snow. That day, she had insisted to go out and play with snow. He had liked his hot chocolate and his comfortable chair more, but he could never resist his sweet sister. They went out that day, he remembered. Her lips had gotten purple from cold. They had made a snowman, a very beautiful one indeed. There were trouble… 2 other kids had come to destroy the snowman. But she had argued. She had stood up. She had beaten the other kids bloody that day. Those 2 girls had it coming though… That very moment, when she was helping Jon to his feet, she had said something, something didn’t matter then, something meant so much now… “I got your back little brother”. And she had, she had his back all the time. Not now. Now, he had to stand up for her. But it wasn’t helping her to her feet, it was so much different. He had failed to make the connection, he had failed hard.  His concise cried out. Too loud for Jon’s taste.

            He couldn’t settle his mind on any other thoughts for a long time. All of the memories he could remember were too recent. Even though he tried not to, he remembered one of their last talks. It was almost 9-11 months ago. She had more sense those days, haven’t lost her wits for good yet. Mostly she looked and talked like numb. But there were some moments were she had it all, her all sense would come back to her for a few moments. Every time that happened, Jon would hope that this one was going to last forever. He would think that she had beaten it and recovered. She never did. She was never going to recover. That was a hard truth he had faced a while ago. It was a time of false recovery and she wanted to speak to him desperately. She was pale and skinny, having hard time to control her own hands. She had managed to tell something though. One word had made it out of her trembling mouth. It was not a word Jon would like to hear. Too desperate, too painful, too harsh and too dark for his taste.

            Every single thing in this little can of a room made memories raid his mind. It was a dark and empty room. So tiny that only two chairs and a drawer could fit in together. It took only three furniture to remind him of the old times. His imagination had never been so vivid. He thought of several complex things at once. As the moment drew in closer, his head started to spin. He knew it was about time he was done with this. But he couldn’t put himself to it. He looked at the white little thing in his hands. Such a small thing, such an easy way… It was not though. It was not easy at all. He couldn’t even put himself to the imagination of it. He had to do it. It was his duty. He had made a promise. His eyes went wide when they found his sister’s. She was trying to move. Failing but it didn’t matter. She was there. She couldn’t speak, it was too late for that. She couldn’t even move her arms, too late for that either. But Jon could see that she was there. She had the control. Her eyes went wide when she looked at his easy way. Then her eyes met his once again; not confused, not surprised, not sad, but not happy either. It was acceptance. Maybe even a hint of forgiveness. Too little for Jon’s taste though.

             He realized that he had been looking at his sister for a pretty long time, without even thinking. Her eyes were empty now. He thought that he might have imagined what just happened. Because now she looked as if she had never been there, as if she had been like this for her whole life. It all felt like a dream that second. Growing fainter as he tried to remember… It wasn’t. This was his reality. Not the fairytales he seemed to remember. He pulled himself to his feet. Rain was even harder on the window now. With two small steps, he was there. Just in front of his sister, inches away. He kneeled. He felt tears on his cheeks. He opened his mouth to talk, only to find no words to say. What could he say? “I’m sorry”? “Please forgive me”? He thought that all his feelings were shared by a lovely little girl who was his beloved sister. He wanted to hug her, drown her in his kisses… All was futile. Nothing would help her more than what he was about to do. It had to be him sitting in that chair, not her, not his pretty little sister full of life. There had to be some other way. There had to be a cure for this. There had to be. It was too hopeless for Jon’s taste.

There was only one thing he could do now. What he never wanted to do, yet he had to. In what world would this have to happen? Why would god pledge him with something so horrible and unforgivable like this? What kind of god would do this to his people? He felt anger taking the empty shoes of his sorrow.  He found strength in that anger, power. He wanted to curse this bloody rain, doctors, the easy way… And the god, god most of all… He did, he did curse them all. He did it so loud that even thunder couldn’t choke down his voice. It didn’t do any good; not to him, not to his sister, not to this situation.

It was the time. He could feel it in his bones. He had to do it fast or he could never do it. So he did it. Gently, he stung the needle to his sister’s arm. When he took a step back, he couldn’t see straight. World was spinning and spinning and spinning… It was all he could do to sting the other one into his own arm. It felt real. It felt too bloody real for Jon’s taste. 

Author's Note

My main language is not English. So don't be too harsh on spellings and grammar please.

Reviews

[Marie]

You wrote this well. I found no mistakes in grammar or punctuation or spelling. You gave genunie feeling to these two people, made the love between them so strong...