I see End.
That's the name End. They are talking to someone, laughing the way others laugh. Effortlessly. The sound is like scattered stones on a hard surface, sharp and bright. My gut tightens. A purely physical reaction. The body again. Why does the body care? Someone turns, catches my eye. A brief, questioning look. Not pity. Not concern. Something else. Recognition, maybe? Or just curiosity at the blankness they might sense beneath the smile? My heart does that stupid fluttery thing. The wanting. Don't. Don't want.
It's just part of the performance, I tell myself. Part of blending in. You have to interact. You have to acknowledge. So I lift a hand, a small, measured wave. The acceptable level of social engagement. They smiles back. Not the bright laugh-smile, but something softer. And it hits me, right in the chest, that feeling. The wanting. To walk over there. To hear their voice up close. To see if that look of recognition was real. To break the great rule.
What is this rule anyway? Who wrote it? Just me. The waiting part of me. The part that knows the ending. Why add complications? Why invite in something warm and fragile that will only be ripped away? Better to stay cool. Detached. Performing the part of the alive person, but never forgetting the real part is already packed and waiting by the door.
But the body… the body feels a pull. The air around them feels warmer. Brighter. There's a gravitational force there that my waiting self has to constantly resist. It takes energy. Constant, low-level effort to stay on the predetermined trajectory. The trajectory towards zero.
I move away. Towards the edges. Where the interactions are less intense. Where I can just observe the others. Their dramas, their small joys, their frustrations. It's like watching a play from the wings. Interesting, sometimes. But not real to me. It's their reality. Their future-tense lives. Mine is firmly in the past-tense, just not quite finished yet.
The sun is setting. Painting the sky impossible colours. Orange, purple, streaks of blood red. Beautiful. The body registers it. A sigh escapes my lips, unbidden. Melancholy? Acknowledging beauty? Or just the body airing itself out? It doesn't matter. It's just a sky. It will be dark soon. Then light again. Repeat. Repeat until…
The cold is starting to seep in. Shiver. The body doesn't like the cold. It likes warmth. Comfort. Stupid body. Always wanting things. It wants food again. It wants rest. It wants… maybe it wants E? Stop it. Shut down that thought. It's the thing. The thing I want and don't want. The dangerous thing.
I walk faster. Trying to outrun the thoughts. Outrun the body's annoying persistence. Where am I going? Nowhere specific. Just… moving. Until the waiting is over. Pretending. Pretending to have purpose. Pretending to belong to the flow of people heading home, heading towards something.
Later, in my home. The quiet presses in. The performance is over for the day. The mask can drop. Just the waiting self now. And the body, tired, wanting sleep. Sleep is a little death, they say. A rehearsal. I like that idea. Rehearsing for the main event.
But even in the quiet, the thought of End lingers. A warmth behind the eyelids. A possibility that refuses to be extinguished. What if…? What if I hadn't moved away? What if I had walked over? What would have happened? Nothing, probably. Or everything. The terrifying dichotomy.
I think about the "do everything I want" resolution. Does it include the thing I want but don't want? That feels like a cheat. It's everything except the thing that would truly challenge the core state. The core state of waiting. No, the resolution was about experiencing the surface of life. Tasting, seeing, hearing, going through the motions. Not about delving into the messy, unpredictable depths of connection. That's where the danger lies. That's where the future lives. And I don't have a future. Not a long one, anyway.
How much time is left? It feels like not much. The air feels thinner. The colours outside seem sharper, more vibrant, as if the world is shouting its aliveness at me before I check out. Or maybe that's just my perception, heightened by the anticipation. The long, drawn-out anticipation.
Nineteen. I am nineteen. The age feels significant now. A number counting down to... twenty. Just before reaching twenty. That was the timeframe. The boundary. It feels close. Imminent. The waiting feels almost over. A strange sense of calm settles over the frantic thoughts. The body feels… settled too. Less insistent. As if it is finally beginning to understand the plan. Or maybe it's just tired.
The days become a blur, faster now. The acting requires less effort. It feels more natural, like the body has fully integrated the role. I move through the world, a ghost wearing human clothes, going through the motions, seeing the others Ends sometimes, feeling that familiar pull, that conflict, but it feels… distant now. Like a problem from another lifetime. The waiting is almost over. The stage is set. The final act is about to begin.
Another morning. The warmth of the mug, perfect. Just so. A gentle weight, a familiar ceramic curve. My fingers, accustomed to this, curl around it, a practiced grace. The steam rising, a wisp, a fleeting breath. My own breath, regular, shallow. Another opening act. The curtain, invisible, rises on this same, tiresome stage.
The light filters through the window, dusty, golden. It catches the floating motes, tiny, silent dancers in the air. For a moment, I almost believe it. Almost. The sun on my cheek, the faint scent of stale toast from a neighbour's kitchen. This is life, isn't it? This slow, deliberate unfolding of hours, each one identical, each one a scene I've rehearsed countless times. Smile. Nod. Take another sip. The perfect picture of someone content, someone alive.
My patience. It's a thread, thin, stretched taut. It vibrates with an almost painful hum inside me. Every tick of the clock in the hall, every distant car horn, every chirp of a sparrow outside – it's a tiny pluck at that thread. Why isn't it here? Why not yet? The question screams in the cavern of my skull, a silent, raging echo against the calm facade. This is the final act, yes, I know it, I feel it in the marrow of my bones, in the faint thrum beneath my ribs that isn't quite a heartbeat anymore. But how long is "final"?
The script, it keeps changing, adding new lines, new moments of mundane interaction. A neighbour's unsolicited comment on the weather. Each one, a cue. Each one demanding a performance, a reaction. A carefully modulated voice, a flicker of appropriate emotion in the eyes. I deliver. I always deliver. My reviews are impeccable. "Such a pleasant person." "Always seems so calm." If only they knew the storm beneath the placid surface. The tempest of an ending that refuses to end.
I've tried to coax it, you know. Not physically, not with a clumsy, theatrical leap from a precipice. No, not that. That would be breaking character, spoiling the grand illusion. But mentally. A quiet, insistent yearning, a focused internal plea. I pour all my will, all my remaining energy, into the silent invitation. Come. Now. Please. I try to force the curtain down with the sheer weight of my desire for it. I push, mentally, against the invisible barrier that separates this prolonged performance from the final, sweet oblivion. But it's like pushing against air, against the very fabric of this persistent, insistent reality. It yields nothing.
And then, the desperation. The raw, screaming impatience that threatens to tear through the carefully constructed veneer. That's when I find the 'cure'. Not a cure for the inevitable, no. A cure for the waiting. A specific, potent antidote for the gnawing emptiness of expectation. It's the performance itself. The deeper I dive into the act, the more meticulously I play the part of the living, the less space there is for the waiting.
There's always work. Always a gesture to perfect, a smile to hold just a fraction longer, a thought to project. The newspaper. Turn the page. Read an article about a politics. Remarkable. Should I make another cup? Yes. The ritual. The measuring, the pouring, the patient watch as it boil. Each step, a task. Each task, a distraction. My mind, usually a restless sea, calms, becomes focused on the immediate, the tangible. There's no time to think of the end when you are so meticulously engaged in the middle. No time to question why it hasn't come now, when your current line is "Would you like milk with that?"
Sometimes, a strange thought surfaces, a curious eddy in the stream. This play. It's almost over. Why not, for a brief, fleeting moment, truly live it? Truly feel the sunlight, register the genuine warmth of the mug, truly taste the bitterness of the coffee? Strip away the pretense, for just a breath? Let the mask slip, just a millimeter?
But the thought dissipates as quickly as it forms. It's too late. The lines are too deeply etched into my face, the emotional responses too deeply wired. My very self, the one I remember, the one that supposedly existed before this never-ending dress rehearsal, has blended completely with the character. The separation is gone. I am the performance. This reality, this manufactured, acted-out existence, has swallowed the original. Trying to step out would be like asking a river to forget its banks, to flow uphill. It's impossible. My identity is now meticulously interwoven with the fabric of this grand, exhausting charade. The costume has become skin.
So, I perform. I'll keep performing. Until the stage lights flicker, until the final, definitive blackout. The thread is thin, yes, but it hasn't snapped yet. And until it does, I'll take another sip, I'll offer another polite nod, I'll continue this play of being alive, waiting for death to finally, gracefully, take its bow.
I am walking. Just walking down a street I've walked a hundred times in this performance of life. The sun is bright. There's the smell of baking bread from a shop nearby. Children are laughing somewhere. The body feels light. Surprisingly light. There's no pain. No fear. Just… a sense of arrival. The waiting is over.
The clock strikes. Not with a sound, but a feeling. A cessation. A pause that doesn't end. The air stops tasting like anything. The light fades, not into darkness, but into… nothingness. The body finally stops its performance. Almost reaching age of twenty that's where pretense ends.
And I die.