I want to live

“I want to live.” 

Hearing the words from her broke my heart. I had sworn I would never cry in front of her, never show her my tears. I had promised her I would be her never ending smile. I had no intention of breaking my promise, but hearing those words from her made it almost impossible to keep the promise. 

“You will. Always.” 

I was 25. Lost everything in my life. With no reason to live. When I made the promise to myself. “I would live.” It was a strange promise to make to oneself, but I was in no normal position. For years I had been in a dark place, losing my life bit by little bit. I had lost all love from my life, my parents disappointed with me, the girl I love breaking up with me. I had no proper job for my qualification, which was the primary source of my parents’ disappointment. I wasn’t even making an effort at giving myself the life I deserved. I was just waiting for it to end by itself, because I was too scared to end it myself. 

And then, one day, my friend from college called me. He was getting engaged to his girlfriend, and he wanted us to meet. It had been two years since we met, and so he wasn’t ready to accept any excuse I might give. We met. We talked about our times in college, enjoyed our lunch, enjoyed each others’ company. And then returned home. That night, as I lay in my bed waiting for sleep to take over, I realised I didn’t really want my life to end. I wanted the sadness to end. I wanted the darkness in me to get dispelled. I wanted to live. That was when I promised promised myself, “I would live.” 

I got a job, in the sales department of a large company. I performed beyond all expectations. In a year, I was heading my own team. Another year later, I was promoted to lead the entire sales team of the new office in a new country. I was making an effort, and my life was getting better. The more time I spent with people, with friends, the more pronounced the darkness in me became. And the more I realised the darkness in me, the better the effort I could make at losing it. Everyone was pleased with what I was becoming, with what I was making of my life. And then, I met her. 

“She’s TinMin Yuan,” I said to my parents, introducing her. I did receive the expected punch to my side, but it hurt little because I was prepared for it. She wasn’t very fond of that name, and especially not of me teasing her for it. 

“I’m Christy,” she corrected. “He’s just being an a*s.” 

My parents laughed along with the two of us. They liked her. They had spoken to her over the phone many times already. They knew her since when we were friends, and then grew fonder of each other and started dating. They also knew that we loved each other and were ready to get engaged. They were happy for me, to see me smiling once again like I used to. 

“She’s good for you, I’m glad about that. It’s been years since we saw that smile on your face, the smile that would light up the world. When you were a kid you always had it on you, that was what made you so special. And then it was gone, for years. After so long we get to see it on your face again. And it’s because of her. So we love her for it,” mom had said, when I told her I loved Christy. 

They were right. She was special. I knew it since the moment I saw her. A week after I had taken up my new office, I met with the entire sales team, and there she was. Among the better performers of the team. Christy Yuan. With the smile never leaving her face, with her optimism lighting up her entire being, she looked the exact opposite of me. And I couldn’t get her out of my head. The more we worked together, the more I liked her. And she seemed to like me too. The first time the entire team went out for drinks was the first time we were meeting outside office. That was also when we became friends. After that, we spent more weekends together, going to movies, dinners, long drives. It wasn’t long before we spent all our weekends together. And it wasn’t long after that before I asked her out on our first date and she agreed. 

“I love you,” I told her. 

She smiled at me, tears staining her eyes, as she replied. “I love you too.”

“I know,” I replied. 

Smiling wider, as the tears started falling from her eyes, she said, “You’re supposed to say something else, anything other than I know.”

“I know,” I replied, and we burst out laughing. 

We were at the airport, returning from our vacation when we came home. My parents had given us their blessing, for whenever we might want to get engaged. We were happy. I was happy. Happy that I had her, that I had found peace, that I had managed to find life again. I was the happiest I had ever been, as we flew thousands of feet above earth. As we returned to the ground, little did I know what was waiting for me. 

“We need to do some more tests,” the doctor said, and I knew from his expression that I should be prepared for bad news. 
Christy hadn’t been feeling well, and we had come to the hospital. After a few initial tests, the doctor had asked for more tests. When the results for those tests were ready too, he called the two of us to his office. 

“I’m truly sorry for the bad news I have to give you,” he started. He continued to explain the condition of Christy. It was important to understand everything he was saying, but all I got was that Christy had very little time left. Months at best. 

I finally understood what it meant, life shattering. I was in despair. There was nothing to be done the doctor had said. We weren’t convinced. We got a second opinion. And then a third, and a fourth. After the fifth, we realised it wasn’t going to change. Christy had the little time she had left. Few months. And in those few months we had to live our lifetime’s worth. 

“I am going to die. But I want us to live the remaining time like it was the greatest time of our lives. I want us to live an entire lifetime’s worth in the few remaining months. Let’s do everything we ever wanted to do. Let’s go scuba diving like you always wanted,” she said. 

“And sky diving, like you always wanted,” I replied. 

“Trekking across the alps.”

“Walk the length of the great wall of China.”

“Dive along the coral reefs of Australia.”

“Sit atop Mt Fuji.”

“Let’s do it all.”

We were in agreement. How many ever months she had left, we were going to do it all, live all our dreams. In the last few years when I had promised to live, I had made a lot of friends. Friends who were ready to do their best for me. I hadn’t realised it until then. When I called my bosses, they readily gave me a year’s sabbatical. My parents and my friends made all the arrangements for all the places we wanted to go to. We spent a week planning our calendar. An entire year’s planning. All the reservations for the places we were to go to were made. All that was left was us fulfilling it all. 

“My parents died when I was in college. Since then I always wanted to just leave everything and travel the world. If only I didn’t have my student loans to repay, I would have done it. But I’m glad I didn’t, because we met,” she explained as we flew to Pattaya for our scuba diving training. 

In the belly of the sea, floating amidst the world of blue and black, I realised how much she meant to me. It was just the two of us down there, like there was no rest of the world, like we were the only two people in the whole wide world. And I loved her for it. 

“I know you want to cry, and you should. Whenever you want to. I promise you, no tears from me. I will be your smile, always. Even when you are crying. So don’t hold anything inside,” I said to her. She agreed with a big hug. 

On the last day under the sea, we took photographs of us in outrageous positions in the water, like we planned. Those were the memoirs of our time under the sea. We then flew to dive by the coral reefs of Australia. We took photographs of us running along kangaroos, our memoirs of Australia. 

Every place we went to, every sea we dived in, every mountain we scaled, every wall we walked along, everything was in our memoirs. In six months, it was the thickest book I had ever seen. Over 3000 pages. And it neared its end. 

Christy had reached her final moments. She was admitted to the hospital. We told no one, because we didn’t want to make her last moments a tearful affair. So, it was just the two of us, in a hospital room in a foreign country no one knew we were in. We spent the days reliving the last few months, arranging the memoirs. We laughed at the moments when we had been outrageous, when we had fallen laughing at each other, when she had cried and I sat by her with the smile on my face, at all the people we met and all the stupid things we did across the world, at all the possibilities of lives we might have had which never would be realised. She spent a lot of hours crying, and I sat by her smiling just as I had promised. Never once did I let a tear fall, not even when she wasn’t looking. 

“You never did finish the story, of how you got the nickname TinMin,” I said to her. It was afternoon. We had just had lunch, and were resting, lying in bed beside each other. I had her hand in mine, and her head was resting on my other hand. 

“It’s an embarrassing story, why would I want to tell it?” she asked, amused nonetheless. 

“Because you started it. You had fever, and had been in bed all morning. In the afternoon your mother started playing wizard of oz on the TV. What after that?” I asked. 

With a deep sigh, she continued the story. “So, we saw the whole movie. After the end, I jumped up in bed, and screamed I’m TinMin, I can’t fall sick. Mom had the video camera by her, and taped the whole thing. A second after I jumped screaming, I fell back onto the bed, worse than before. It took three more days for me to completely get well. By when mom had printed out the photograph of me doing the TinMin act. Since then, the name stuck. All my friends who saw the photograph learnt of the story. The name grew popular, and stayed stuck.” 

“I’m TinMin, I can’t fall sick,” I screamed. She punched me again in my side, and it hurt because I was already laughing too hard. She was laughing too. The nurses had gotten used to our craziness, and our sudden laughter. Ignoring the noise, they let us be. We had many photographs of us in the hospital laughing like crazy in the memoirs too. It was almost 15 whole minutes before the laughter died down completely. 

“I want to live,” she said. Softer than the breeze blowing in through the open window, I almost missed her voice. 

Hearing the words from her broke my heart. I had sworn I would never cry in front of her, never show her my tears. I had promised her I would be her never ending smile. I had no intention of breaking my promise, but hearing those words from her made it almost impossible to keep the promise. 

“You will. Always.” That was the best I could come up with, struggling the hardest to hold my tears in. 

We could both feel it. We both knew. Today was the last day. As we had gotten accustomed to, we would fall asleep soon, like every afternoon. She needed it after her medicine. We knew we had to fall asleep soon. We knew she would never wake up if she did. Neither of us could explain how we knew, but we knew. We didn’t even have to say it to each other. 

“No, I really want to live. I want to have endless more days with you. Cry in your arms. Laugh with you. Take countless more photographs of us, doing outrageous things, being crazy. I want to be with you for endless more days. I want to live, with you.” 

I expected her tears, but was surprised. She wasn’t crying. At the end, she had no tears to spend. 

“I know,” I said, holding back my tears which were at the edge of my eyes, ready to burst. 

“You are supposed to say something other than I know,” she replied, with a smile. 

“I know.” 

“Benny, I love you,” she said, closing her eyes. 

“I love you too, TinMin. Always will,” I replied. We both smiled, as we closed our eyes, and accepted the oncoming sleep. 

I didn’t know when the darkness took root in me. I didn’t know when I started to feel so depressed. When I had given up on life. But I knew when I started to want to live again. And I knew when I really felt alive. 

The day I first saw her, something began to change in me. The closer I got to her, the fonder I grew of her, the lighter I started feeling. When I fell in love with her, I had started to like my life. When we realised we loved each other so much that we would spend the rest of our life together, I knew why I should live. Even when we learnt of her condition, when we learnt of the little time she had left, the only thing on my mind was how we should live that time to the fullest. Ever since Christy had come into my life, the only thing on my mind was how to live. 

I was stirred awake by the nurses who had rushed into the room. The doctors were quickly there too. Pushing me off the bed, and trying to bring her back to life. But I knew it was over. She was gone. She had the smile on her face, the warmest smile in the world, the most beautiful smile, that wouldn’t leave. She looked happy. When the doctors finally pronounced her dead, they looked at me apologetically, but I smiled at them the weak smile I could manage. They said something to me, but it was all lost on me. There was nothing else at that moment but her. I just wanted to be with her. Just Christy and I. 

The doctors and the nurses left, leaving her and me alone in the room. Like every other evening. Only it wasn’t like every other evening. Christy was gone. And I was kneeling by her side, struggling to keep the smile on my face as I held her hand. 

As I had fallen asleep, a lone tear had managed to escape the prison in my eye. As I realised the escape of the lone tear, all strength was lost, the barrier was broken. Months worth of tears flowed uncontrolled, as I bellowed out all the pain and the sadness I had buried in myself all this time. Christy was gone, so I wasn’t breaking my promise. She hadn’t seen me cry, not once. I must have cried for hours, collapsed when I was drained of all strength. When I opened my eyes again, I was on a bed, in the room, next to the bed Christy was on. As I looked at her, I felt the tears welling up again, and I let them flow. I cried endlessly again, this time awake until the last tear was spent. 

Years ago, long before I met Christy, I had promised myself I would live. After I met her, I had found the reason to live. Now she was gone, but the promise remained. I would live. Not only for myself, but also for her. 

We had her buried by her parents’ side. A week after the funeral, I returned to office. My position was still waiting for me, my old team waiting for their dear boss. It was uncomfortable at first, for a few weeks. But then we got over it. We returned to how it used to be before. And we started performing much better than ever before, only getting better. 

The more time I spent with people, the pronounced the darkness in me used to get. But now, the more time I spend with people, the more I realise the absence of any darkness in me. Every last bit of it was thrown out by Christy. I had always wondered if I could ever be normal, without feeling the hopelessness I always felt. I never once was sure it would happen. But it had. Christy had made it happen. I miss her, everyday, every minute, every second. But I don’t feel the hopelessness. Because I had promised her, I would always smile. I knew something would come by, making my life good again, eventually. And that is why I will always stay true to my promise. And I will always love my TinMin. 

“I want to live.”