So, I died.
Nothing catastrophic or tragic like cancer or a car crash, no, it was self inflicted.
Years of depression, years of going back and forth debating if I should or I shouldn't. Finally, I took the plunge an took the toaster bath to the afterlife.
Death is…weird.
There's no more physical pain but it doesn't really solve any of your problems.
The guilt hit first. My family, the one coworker I liked who treated me like a son. What would they think? Would they be sad? Would I be missed? Does it matter any more?
Would I have a funeral? I didn't really have many friends. My mother and my grandparents had both passed on years ago. I had cousins, some aunts and uncles I never really talked to but no one close to me.
In the midst of my existential crisis, a voice comes from the darkness, "Hmm? A soul? But why is it so, broken? Damaged, like it's been tortured for decades?"
Well my guy, probably because it has been, I thought to myself.
"No no, you misunderstood. It's like your soul was forced into a body that it wasn't meant
to be in and it was trying to grow but it was continuously broken and battered
to make it fit to a container that wasn't meant to hold it."
Wait. What!? You can hear me?
"No little soul, I am Death. A god, primordial, a manifestation of existence itself in the
universe. You are in my domain, or at least you should be. You don't quite…fit."
So, what does that mean? I hang out here in the void for eternity? Man the movie Wristcutters was right, if you kill yourself you just go someplace shittier.
"That's a deep cut." Death let out a low laugh that sounded like the universe itself was crying.
Was that a pun? From Death?
"Just because I'm Death doesn't mean that I'm what you mortals attribute me to be. I'm formless, not Yama, not a Reaper, not pearly gates or fire and brimstone. I JUST AM. I'm quite current on your life, little soul, depressing as it was. I can see your history, your emotions, your visceral pain from just existing on Earth."
"I can see the depths of your suffering, all the times you considered ending everything, all the escapism you indulged in to drive away the negative thoughts, the constant changes to medication to try to get better. I can see the effort that you tried putting in, the desire to be happy, to be normal, to be able to feel anything other than a gripping exhaustion."
"I can see how much you wanted to want to live, little soul. Lives like yours may truly be the most tragic and yet the least respected. People saw the tired one, the one worn down, the one that could only mask their true emotions to show a fleeting smile. Contrary to how you think, little soul, that is just as tragic as cancer or a truck hitting you in the street."
I was stunned. I didn't know what to say, er, think. How did it take dying to finally feel seen?
Man, you really know to make a grown man want to cry, you know that big guy?
"Little soul, you are not the first to feel this way nor will you be the last. You are, however, one of the few that had no control over it. Rather, there was a cause for your mental illness."
You mean besides the chemicals and neurotransmitters in my brain being completely fucked?
"Yes little soul, besides all that. Like you were technically never supposed to have been born."
Well, shit you got me there.
"That's the thing, I get everyone eventually."
Ha! Oh man. Have you used that line a lot, or have you been saving up, big guy?
"Honestly, most souls that come to me are at peace and cross into the cycle of reincarnation. You however are interesting and this is the first conversation I've had with
mortals in millennia."
Well, my life kind of sucked. Not really looking forward to do it all over again. I just want to
relax, maybe sleep forever, just experience peace for a change.
"Unfortunately, you can't. If you do stay here, your soul will begin to fray apart and you will
erode in the void seeing countless horrors and be subjected to Nihility; you do
NOT want that."
Well. Fuck me I guess. So what's next for me then? Cross the river Lethe? Samsara? Returned to Earth in a shittier existence?
"Hmm, no. Not you. Your soul was never meant to be on Earth. It's too strong. The environment on earth was damaging it. You were sent there through Intervention and Grace."
Are you fucking kidding me? 30 years of soul torture because you or whomever was responsible for my previous incarnation sent me to the wrong gods damned world!?
"Well, looking at the past, your mother wanted a son and she wasn't going to get one any other way. So it looks like Fertility might have tipped the scales to make it happen."
Shit. Mom. Yeah, okay. Not forgiven, but, I get it. She just deserved a better soul than me.
"That's where you're wrong. You were her everything."